From PTA Meeting to Successful School Supplies Business: A Story of Growth & Giving

These words have made quite an impact on the ever-growing entrepreneurial community to promote a philosophy of launching a product and iterate rather than perfect before launch.

Specifically, this mantra has been the inspiration of Trevor Seret, President and Co-founder of Sprout School Supplies, a company that simplifies back-to-school supply shopping for busy parents and gives back to local school communities.

From Analyst to the American Red Cross

An environmental science and economics major at the University of Virginia, Trevor graduated from college and started a laundry delivery service for college students with one of his friends, Cainon Coates.

He and his friend found a commercial laundromat that already provided wash and fold service, worked out the delivery routes and schedule requirements, then bought a large van and started small.

That early start was a recipe for success which led to a partnership with the university, and later established the blueprint for his future one, Sprout School Supplies.

Meanwhile, Trevor landed an operations analyst role at a private label baby food company with a mission to provide families with a less expensive baby formula option with the same quality as the expensive stuff.

There, he was lucky to have a wonderful mentor, Adam Burke, and learned a lot in terms of what it takes to run a larger business from how to manage the components and what financial metrics to evaluate, to doubling down on what worked and eliminating what did not.

A couple years in, though, and Trevor was looking for a more personal connection to his work. With a job offer in hand from the American Red Cross national headquarters, he moved to D.C. to help the non-profit help others.

Starting a business with a full-time job

Working at the American Red Cross provided him with more flexibility in his schedule, and Trevor was able to return to a personal passion of his from high school and college – volunteering as a tutor.

Non-profit and volunteer work aside, Trevor’s entrepreneurial spirit couldn’t be subdued.

At one of the PTA meetings he attended, a topic of conversation began around school supplies –– with the parents groaning in unison about what a nightmare it was to shop for over the summer.

Trevor’s light bulb turned on and he’d solve for this pain point.

After all, he had the logistical expertise from his laundry business to get goods from one place to the next. More importantly, he had been inspired since childhood by the Newman’s Own brand, and finally saw the opportunity to build a similar intersection between cause and commerce by giving back to educational communities through school supplies.

Sprout School Supplies business is planted

To begin, Trevor created a volunteer pilot program at the school and was able to successfully put together school supply kits and cross an important item off parents’ to-do list.

After his success, he began to think about seeing whether this side project had the potential to grow into something bigger. He soon teamed up Jeff Manthe, a teacher with a passion for helping schools beyond the classroom.

He did some market research and was surprised to find a couple of similar businesses already existed, including a subsidiary of Staples.

Nevertheless, he pressed forward with the attitude that “McDonald’s didn’t invent the hamburger.”

He knew his business wouldn’t start out with the scale of his competitors, but saw ways he could provide a better service to parents, and connect more with customers through a charitable component.

Trevor worked on bringing Sprout School Supplies to life, while still holding down his full-time job at the American Red Cross. After all, he had no outside capital to mention and needed to bootstrap all operations.

It was ten months until he put in his notice and began focusing full time on his fledgling business.

I caught up with him to talk through his experience with ecommerce platform, scaling his sales, his philanthropic component and so much more.

Trevor Seret, Co-founder, Sprout School Supplies

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