Tolwin and Savino pitched their business to the Sharks, demonstrating the strength of their product and the market potential they could seize if they had the funding to scale down their machine to fit on the countertops of coffee shops and homes.  One of the Sharks, Mark Cuban, decided to bite, and the duo was able to secure a $2 million investment for their growing company.

In addition to the investment Tolwin and Savino’s business received national exposure. Despite this resounding success, they had to solve a problem quickly; they didn’t actually have a working machine in hand. The model they showed the Sharks was only a high-quality 3D printed representation of the potential countertop product.

To execute a successful pivot, the Numilk engineering team needed to develop a significantly smaller version of their product, and they needed to do it quickly to capitalize on the momentum from their TV debut.

Plant-based milk is primarily made of two immiscible ingredients: oily ground-up plant nuts and water. Naturally, as the old saying goes, oil and water don’t mix well and will separate over time. Traditional plant-based milk that you find in cartons at your local grocery store is made at the factory with 80% water and plant-based oily ingredients, requiring additives such as emulsifiers, gums, binders, and preservatives to keep them from separating and spoiling during distribution.  

In addition, traditional plant-based milk distribution is energy inefficient and produces a lot of waste. Traditional plant-based milk cartons must be refrigerated at the factory, during transit, and at the store. Traditional plant-based milk is 80% water and requires constant refrigeration. After being purchased and used, these one-time-use cartons are thrown away and end up in landfills. 

Numilk customers reduce their carbon footprint by using raw ingredient pouches and reusable Numilk emulsifier bottles, removing the need to refrigerate excess water and throw away one-use cartons. Coffee shops that switch to Numilk keep an average of 3,000 cartons per year out of landfills, while families can save an estimated average of 160 cartons from landfills every year when they switch.

Numilk makes it easy to enjoy its product, by giving their customers the satisfaction of doing their part to build a greener economy while they enjoy fresh almond milk or oat milk latte. 

 “Our startup had a small engineering team, and each member had to perform numerous tasks fast, without making critical mistakes, to bring our first countertop product to the market quickly. Thankfully, we overcame the challenge by quickly iterating designs, to test and improve our product. Xometry’s various fabrication options enabled us to move more efficiently through the design iteration cycle.” said William Suh, Engineering Director at Numilk

"The Xometry Instant Quoting Engine® also has been really helpful. We have used a variety of Xometry capabilities, from 3D printing to injection molding and CNC machining, and sheet metal fabrication. Because we planned our product development process with Xometry, we knew what short-term, and long-term fabrication options were available to us. That helped our engineers design and iterate the parts and assemblies for the product, allowing us to send it to market while the next upgrades were being implemented. When we needed the next upgrade, Xometry turned around orders with reasonable pricing by using their manufacturing partners in the US and overseas.” 

By working with Xometry from the early stages of the product development cycle, Numilk was able to shorten its time to market dramatically.

“We designed, assembled, tested, and shipped our Pro3s to the market in just 6 months, and the Pro4s in 6 months as well.  Although these initial versions still had some room for improvement, we were able to get to market quickly, allowing us to take the position we now have, further developing the Pro5s and beyond, and taking full advantage of favorable market demand from existing and future customers." 

"If not for Xometry, we would have had to invest a lot of time in finding and screening several manufacturing partners. Xometry’s network of pre-screened suppliers helped us meet multiple demands for different parts. In our case, it was especially helpful to work with a supplier that could fabricate food-grade injection molded parts with intricate design features.  Best of all, any issue that came up was diligently handled by our account manager, Nicole Zaluski. I  could easily call her to help resolve issues that I would normally have had to resolve myself.  We are grateful to have good partnerships with multiple design firms and manufacturing services like Xometry.  We know that these kinds of partnerships can help startups like us bring innovation to the market.” said William Suh.

If you want to learn more about how Xometry can help you scale, consider watching our Webinar: Path to Production 一 Injection Molding Strategies. In it, engineers from Xometry discuss the injection molding process, the best practices for injection molding, and answer questions about it in a Q&A session. And if you are ready to start your first injection molding order, head over to the Xometry Instant Quoting Engine® now to get pricing, lead times, and DFM feedback.