Latest / The Mark Simone Show / Ken interviews Maria Intscher-Owrang, co-founder of Simplifyber.

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Ken interviews Maria Intscher-Owrang, co-founder of Simplifyber. · The Mark Simone Show

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Live from the War Life BAC Studios, Bill Mark Zimone
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: show guests hosting from Mark Today, Ken Rosato, and so
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: good to be with you on a beautiful Friday. It's
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: going to be this way all weekend long seven to ten.
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: Woar the Voice of New York. Hey. There is a
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  Speaker 1: really smart, super innovative company that uses plant based manufacturing
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  Speaker 1: methods to reduce waste before products are even made. It's
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  Speaker 1: called Simply Fiber, and a woman named Maria Insher Orang
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  Speaker 1: is the co founder. She's nice to have to be
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  Speaker 1: on with us this morning. Good morning to you, Maria,
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  Speaker 1: Good morning Ken, how are you great? Thank you? And
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  Speaker 1: for those who don't realize, Maria was on my show
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  Speaker 1: I do on the New Jersey TV channel on New
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  Speaker 1: Jersey this week and Maria saw my face every time
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  Speaker 1: she told me another thing about this company. My job
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  Speaker 1: was a gape and I said, this is brilliant. So
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  Speaker 1: I thank you for coming on the radio with us
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  Speaker 1: now in WOAR. First of all, tell everybody about Simply
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  Speaker 1: Fiber and what made you start the company?
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  Speaker 2: Thanks so much, Ken Well. I started the company because
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  Speaker 2: I've been working in the fashion industry as a designer
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  Speaker 2: for twenty four years, and I didn't really think that
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  Speaker 2: the production method was efficient. There's so much hand labor involved.
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  Speaker 2: I think most people don't realize how much hand labor
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  Speaker 2: is involved. And the whole industry was moving towards fossil
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  Speaker 2: based materials like polyester instead of natural materials. So what
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  Speaker 2: I realized is what we need is a better way
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  Speaker 2: of using natural materials. There's more efficient so they can
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  Speaker 2: compete and beat the prices of polyester.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, I bet you if you ask one hundred people,
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  Speaker 1: the vast majority don't realize that much of their clothing
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  Speaker 1: is made from oil, that it's made from fossil fuel. Right.
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  Speaker 1: The polyester is spun from the one of the byproducts
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  Speaker 1: of oil, and that's why that's why many shirts are
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  Speaker 1: very flammable. By the way, not that cotton is intflammable,
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  Speaker 1: but it goes polyester and it melts. But that stuff,
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  Speaker 1: as you were telling me this week, doesn't that break
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  Speaker 1: down to microplastics in landfill?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah? It does. Every time you wash your clothes, every
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  Speaker 2: time you move around in polyester, it releases microplastic. So
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  Speaker 2: that just gets everywhere. It's in our waters, it's in
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  Speaker 2: our bodies and textiles especially, are a good way to
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  Speaker 2: kind of lose microplastics as you wear them. Now.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, Now you were saying that manufacturing clothing using polyester
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  Speaker 1: is done in a certain way that's rather efficient, and
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  Speaker 1: the problem was when you use traditional cotton or whatever,
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  Speaker 1: you have to first spin it into a fabric, then
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  Speaker 1: take the fabric and manually turn it into the clothing, etc.
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  Speaker 1: That it was kind of painstakingly laborious, whereas it was
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  Speaker 1: a little more efficient with polyester. But you're now able
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  Speaker 1: to take simply fiber, which is manufactured from anything that
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  Speaker 1: grows right, any kind of plant, and you could turn
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  Speaker 1: it into a fabric as efficiently as one could do
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  Speaker 1: that with polyester.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, in fact, actually more efficiently, because even with polyester
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  Speaker 2: you're still stuck with the same supply chain where you're
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  Speaker 2: you know, spinning yarn, weaving your knitting, fabric, cutting and
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  Speaker 2: then sewing. What we do is we actually use the
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  Speaker 2: materials more like molded plastic, So it's kind of a
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  Speaker 2: combination of paper making and injection molding where you can
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  Speaker 2: actually create the shape at the same time as the materials,
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  Speaker 2: so it's never a roll of fabric. You just go
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  Speaker 2: straight from fibers into shape in one step. It's more
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  Speaker 2: like three D printing than it is traditional fabric and
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  Speaker 2: textile making.
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  Speaker 1: That's amazing. And it does it still breathe? And is
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  Speaker 1: it still washable?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's still washable. It breathes kind of the same
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  Speaker 2: way as other types of natural materials.
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  Speaker 1: You know.
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  Speaker 2: I think you can compare it to something between a
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  Speaker 2: cotton and a leather in terms of air permutability. But
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  Speaker 2: we can also perforate and do all kinds of things
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  Speaker 2: as materials to make it breathe more too.
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  Speaker 1: Well, a lot of sense. That's brilliant. And is it
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  Speaker 1: How about cost effectiveness? Is it expensive? More expensive? Less expensive?
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  Speaker 2: It's less expensive because you're actually starting with the basic
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  Speaker 2: building blocks that's fibers, and that's always the cheapest part
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  Speaker 2: of the supply chain, and then with all the other
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  Speaker 2: usual steps, everything just gets more expensive. But we're only
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  Speaker 2: making things in one step, so it stays relatively cost effective.
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  Speaker 1: That's just it's like, this is a total when when
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  Speaker 1: I am desperately trying to find a negative, you're and
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  Speaker 1: I can't. How about color? Like you could inject color
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  Speaker 1: into this and make it any color you want?
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  Speaker 2: Oh? Yeah, absolutely, and we even have different kind of
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  Speaker 2: flavors of color, so it can be really bright, saturated color,
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  Speaker 2: but it can also be heathered effects where you have
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  Speaker 2: a little bit like salt and pepper colors, and you
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  Speaker 2: can mix fibers together. You can even kind of change
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  Speaker 2: colors within the same piece, so you can do some
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  Speaker 2: new tricks that weren't possible before with.
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  Speaker 1: Other text of Text seven t w R The Voice
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  Speaker 1: of New York. It's ken risottow In on the Mark
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  Speaker 1: Simone Show on a Friday, speaking with Maria Insha Orang,
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  Speaker 1: who is a co founder of Simply Fiber. What has
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  Speaker 1: the reception been like in the industry. Are fashion houses
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  Speaker 1: looking into this at this point or are they still
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  Speaker 1: a little reticent, a little scared to jump a whole
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  Speaker 1: whole hog into it.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's been great. Actually, we weren't even expecting the
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  Speaker 2: attention to come from where it came from, but we're
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  Speaker 2: getting a lot of We're getting a lot of requests
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  Speaker 2: from the footwear industry for shoe uppers, and we're getting
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  Speaker 2: a lot of requests from the car industry for interiors.
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  Speaker 2: So we've recently did dash and door panels for Kia.
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  Speaker 2: We also just showed on the Paris Catwalk some shoes
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  Speaker 2: for Gani. So everywhere, especially where you need like high performance,
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  Speaker 2: durable materials, we're getting a lot of requests because those
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  Speaker 2: kinds of materials aren't off. It's not always very easy
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  Speaker 2: to find natural materials that do those things.
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  Speaker 1: And you think about how many companies, even big fashion
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  Speaker 1: houses sadly use practical slave labor in third world countries
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  Speaker 1: to do all the laborious stuff, and you're eliminating all that.
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  Speaker 1: No longer do you need to have that. By having
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  Speaker 1: this basically go from woodpulp potentially or plant matter right
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  Speaker 1: through a computer and boom, cut out the exact panels
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  Speaker 1: that you need.
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  Speaker 2: Right exactly, it's a really good opportunity for restoring some
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  Speaker 2: of the manufacturing and getting that more happening closer to
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  Speaker 2: where the customers are, so you don't have to have
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  Speaker 2: your products crossing the world a few times before they're
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  Speaker 2: even reaching the customer. So it's really designed to be
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  Speaker 2: less labor intensive and gives manufacturers more options to be
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  Speaker 2: able to make the things that they want to make.
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  Speaker 1: This is just absolutely brilliant and you could reproduce it
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  Speaker 1: over and over and over again just by putting in
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  Speaker 1: the dimensions and the design into a computer and letting it,
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  Speaker 1: like you said, like three D printing, just kind of
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  Speaker 1: spit out the panel or the shirt or the whatever
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  Speaker 1: based on what you input, right, so it just keeps
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  Speaker 1: it could work round the clock and just spit out
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  Speaker 1: as many items of an order as you'd like.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that's that's great.
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  Speaker 1: How long have you been doing this? Now?
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  Speaker 2: About five years, so we did. We kind of did
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  Speaker 2: the pre work for about a year before that really
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  Speaker 2: literally started in my kitchen and then we started moving
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  Speaker 2: into chemistry labs and material scientists teams. Now we're operating
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  Speaker 2: from Raleigh, North Carolina, and we've got a full production
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  Speaker 2: system which we've just built up this year.
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  Speaker 1: But you are what make America great. Seriously, your brilliance,
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  Speaker 1: the intelligence, the concept, and then you risked a lot,
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  Speaker 1: i'm sure in getting the company started, because I mean
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  Speaker 1: you're great idea to somebody else might might have been
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  Speaker 1: initially thought of as that's crazy, that'll never work. You
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  Speaker 1: risked it. You You risk the money, the time, the reputation.
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  Speaker 1: You left your other job and you did this. So
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  Speaker 1: we applaud you and I hope you are a trillionaire
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  Speaker 1: many times over for coming up with this great concept.
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  Speaker 1: You are fantastic, Maria insure O Rang remember that name,
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  Speaker 1: co founder of simply Fiber, and that's s I m
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  Speaker 1: P l y F y b e R.
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  Speaker 2: Correct is actually simplify and then be er. So just
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  Speaker 2: switch the iron.
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  Speaker 1: Oh so, I guess my dyslexia kicked in.
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  Speaker 2: I apologize.
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  Speaker 1: There you go, so and look it out, look at
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  Speaker 1: it online. I saw it online the other day. I
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  Speaker 1: was just fascinated. The whole concept is brilliant and we're
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  Speaker 1: gonna we got to have you back on again and again.
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  Speaker 1: You are fantastic, Maria. Have a wonderful Yeah. Please you
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  Speaker 1: have a wonderful weekend and just much success to you.
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  Speaker 2: Thank you so much, Ken, thanks for enthusiasm. I'm happy
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  Speaker 2: to speak to you anytime.
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  Speaker 1: You've take care.
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  Speaker 2: Wow, it just fascin.
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  Speaker 1: I mean that there is the example right there. I
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  Speaker 1: was talking about this earlier. That's the example of how
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  Speaker 1: capitalism works. She worked, she worked for other people, came
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  Speaker 1: up with her own concept. Build a better birdhouse, if
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  Speaker 1: you will, in this case, build a better widget, create
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  Speaker 1: fabric something you think it's okay. This has been done
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  Speaker 1: for hundreds, if not thousands, of years. How can you
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  Speaker 1: create a new way of making fabric? She came up
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  Speaker 1: with it, boom, and now she's doing great. The company
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  Speaker 1: is simply fiber. Maria inscher O rang unbelievable. Ken Rizotto
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  Speaker 1: went for mark on your Friday. When we come back,
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  Speaker 1: we'll take more calls. Now's the time to call in.
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  Speaker 1: Eight hundred three two one zero seven ten eight hundred
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