When New Zealand-based ecostore USA was looking for stateside retailers to sell its line of green cleaning products, company executives interviewed all the big names.

Everyone, it seems, is adding or creating green lines these days, but after hearing the ecostore story — how sales in its home market are growing 50 percent a year, why founder Malcolm Rands is called "ecoman" in New Zealand and Australia, and how the organic gardener and environmental pioneer has taken ecostore from a mail-order business to a dynamic international company — many wanted to sell the products.

"We'd talk to the management of the big chains and they'd always say the same thing to us: ‘Well, I think you're too late. You're too small. Other players have taken the space,'" Rands says. "Half an hour later they say, ‘O.K., well, when can you ship?'"

In the end, ecostore chose Grand Rapids, Mich.-based Meijer as its first U.S. retail outlet because, Rands says, the superstore had a sense of "local community" and its brand values fit ecostore's visions. Rands appreciates the fact that Meijer is a middle-range supermarket targeting the everyday shopper, rather than one of the higher-end stores that the average person cannot afford to shop on a regular basis.

"I really am interested in going into the normal ma-and-pa, down-the-corner-of-your-block supermarket where 95 percent of the population shops," Rands says. "That's where I'd like for our product to be."

The roots of ecostore can be traced back nearly 20 years to the 150-acre eco village where Rands, his wife Melanie and a host of other like-minded folks lived. They challenged themselves to drink nearby water, grow their own food and help one another. While he says the project was "not a bunch of hippies in a commune," it was here that inspiration struck.

"Once we started looking at the everyday chemicals used inside your home, we were quite appalled because the chemicals were actually far worse than the chemicals we'd been campaigning against going onto the food," Rands says. "In those days not many people had thought about that."

Rands had begun researching household products as early as 1986, and determined that natural elements could be just as effective as the chemicals found in most of them. "If everyone made small little changes in their life, we actually wouldn't have the environmental crisis we have now," Rands says. "It actually is quite empowering for people to do that."

That's what Meijer is learning. Although the privately held 185-store chain would not divulge sales figures, spokesman Frank Gugliemi says the ecostore line has sold extremely well. Meijer carries laundry liquid composed of 100 percent certified organic eucalyptus oil and plant-based ingredients; a citrus spray cleaner; dishwasher liquid free of synthetic chemicals; Pure Oxygen Whitener, which contains oil of citrus, coconut and other plant-based ingredients; and a cream cleanser with all plant-based ingredients.

Shocking statement
ecostore guarantees that its products are plant- or mineral-based and free of chemicals, use ingredients from renewable resources, have not been tested on animals, aren't genetically engineered and use recyclable packaging.

A lot of companies can make similar claims, but Rands insists that the key to ecostore's "amazing success is that our products actually work. I know that's a relatively shocking statement, but people are choosing our products because they actually work better, not because they're just looking after the planet and their health."

This fact impressed Meijer executives, Gugliemi says. "We were very pleased with the way that the ecostore products truly lived up to all their claims in terms of how they performed."

Meijer displays ecostore products on end caps in the cleaning aisle. Most products, Rands says, all but shout "look at me, look at me, and [are very] bright. If you look at our packaging, we've gone the opposite. We're actually using black and white photography, muted colors, and because of that we actually stand out by being quite different."

Meijer has been couponing and conducting in-store sampling to generate awareness and incorporated ecostore products as part of an already growing healthy living category.

"We have had a pretty aggressive focus the last couple of years on our healthy living initiatives inside the stores," Gugliemi says. "We look at the entire store and put ecostore products into the environmentally friendly category with organic foods or natural foods or our pre-natal and free antibiotics program. In many ways, it's a healthier living product."

Viral marketing
ecostore also undertook a viral marketing campaign. The company engages in video blogging and uses Twitter; it has targeted "mommy bloggers" in particular with its message of family health and wellness.

One popular blog, Pink Lemonade of Life, gave rave reviews of several of the company's products.

Of ecostore's Auto Dish Powder, the blogger wrote that when used in a new high-efficiency dishwasher, dishes came out "just as sparkling clean as they would have been with my old-standby brand ... and the best part is that I knew there would be no chemical residue left over for my family to consume."

According to Rands, ecostore has "cupboards full of testimonials from people who have used our products, stopped sneezing while cleaning or their rashes have gone away or their eczema has cleared up or even their asthma has dried up, just because we can reduce the chemical burden."

There are, he says, "very good biodegradable eco ingredients which are still bad for your health that ecostore won't use. We want to look after the planet, but most people are relatively urgent about looking after their health and their loved ones'."

There has been a strong consumer trend toward purchasing green household products over the past decade. Still, according to 2008 figures from consulting and research firm Kline & Company, truly green cleaners account for only 2 percent to 5 percent of the products sold in the $17.5 billion U.S. cleaning products market for household, janitorial, food-service and laundry chemicals.

ecostore is hoping to help move that needle. "The United States is a giant, there's no doubt about it," Rands says. "Things that happen in the United States can affect the whole rest of the world because people look to the United States for leadership."