Bedroom Bathroom Business

Sometimes entrepreneurs find fame and fortune by inventing a new
product or service that creates an entire new industry. Bill
Gates, for example, invented the personal computer. Steve Jobs
created Apple products. Elon Musk is building rockets and
electric cars. But sometimes, success in business comes from less
ambitious successes. Like addressing bad odors. Or figuring out
how to make it easier to make a bed.


Bathroom


Maria Bhacca is CEO of Aerowest International, a Baton Rouge
based company that specializes in scent marketing and odor
control for some of the country’s most prestigious hotels,
hospitals, and universities.


Aerowest manufacturers and services its own line of professional
air freshening dispensers and 50 fragrances. Aerowest is nearly
140 years old and was originally based in New York until 2012,
when Maria and her husband bought the business and relocated its
headquarters to Baton Rouge. Since then, they have slowly grown
Aerowest throughout the country.


Maria didn’t imagine herself the CEO of a company that treats
malodors. She came to the U.S. from her native Italy more than
four decades ago to get her PhD in foreign languages and
literature. She ended up staying and running a travel agency
before making the jump to the fragrance and odor control
industry. It’s a fascinating story!


Bedroom


Judy Schott and Nina Gassen are the founders of a business that
sounds so silly it doesn't sound like it's even real, much less
the big success that it is becoming. 


The two Mandeville moms of several now-grown children got tired
of making the bed, and more specifically, lifting the heavy
mattress to tuck the sheets in. So they invented a way to make
the bed more quickly. It's called Better Bedder and it looks like
a giant headband that goes around a mattress.


Judy and Nina found a seamstress on the west bank of New Orleans
to make the bands and started selling them online and at art
markets and home shows during the weekend. Then, in the fall of
2020, against all odds, Judy and Nina landed a spot on ABC’s
Shark Tank. The episode aired in early 2021 and local fans got to
watch while Judy and Nina wowed the sharks with their
mattress-sized headband and secured an investment from the hit
show’s Lori Greiner for $150,000. Since then, it’s been a
whirlwind of activity as demand for the product has soared.


This show was recorded live over lunch at Mansurs on the
Boulevard in Baton Rouge. You can find photos from this show by
Erik Otts at our website.


 


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