Gelato featured in Sifted: The unicorn fighting shipping emissions
“We need to change the whole structure of the production industry; if we don’t do that, we will not solve the climate challenge,” Gelato Founder and CEO, Henrik Müller-Hansen tells Sifted in an article by Mimi Billing, entitled "Everything produced everywhere all at once — the Norwegian unicorn fighting shipping emissions."
The article opens by noting the Norwegian production-on-demand scaleup has attracted investments from notable backers, including Insight Partners, SoftBank, and Harald Mix, and goes on to explain that Gelato aims to revolutionize global production and address sustainability concerns, political climate issues, expensive shipping, and disrupted supply chains.
“With the shipping industry contributing significantly to greenhouse gas emissions, Gelato proposes a solution by emphasizing local production through its on-demand production platform.”
The article further explores how Gelato, through its integration with ecommerce infrastructure like Shopify or Etsy, levels the playing field for global ecommerce entrepreneurs, providing instant access to local, on-demand production through its software and network of 130 production partners in 32 countries. It gives merchants the capacity to produce everything from apparel, drinkware, wall art, phone cases, and more. Gelato also has agreements with 50 distributors worldwide that enable local transportation - closer to the end customer - helping cut waste, carbon emissions, and delivery times.
In 2022 87% of Gelato's orders were produced locally, in the same country as the end consumer. Gelato's vision for the future is one where localized, personalized, on-demand production becomes the norm, eliminating the need for centralized, mass production hubs.
Read the full interview on Sifted.
About Gelato
Gelato is a software company on a mission to redefine global manufacturing for people and the planet. Through its network of 150+ local production partners in 32 countries, Gelato provides the operating system for local manufacturing,
GelatoConnect. It consolidates every element of digital print production into a single platform, driving profitable growth, efficiency and control.
GelatoCreate, empowers creators and ecommerce entrepreneurs to reach customers anywhere in the world without the burden of inventory, upfront costs, or long-haul shipping. Orders are automatically routed to local production hubs, ensuring products are made closer to the end customer, reducing costs, transportation distances, and waste caused by overproduction. The result is a more streamlined supply chain and new way of manufacturing and distributing products—better for people and the planet.
Gelato was founded by CEO Henrik Müller-Hansen in 2007 and consists of GelatoConnect, GelatoCreate, and GelatoConsumer, operating under the Optimalprint brand. Backed by Insight Partners, Dawn Capital, SoftBank, and Goldman Sachs Asset Management, Gelato is headquartered in Oslo, Norway, with 16 offices worldwide, including in the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Pakistan, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, the UK, the US, and Vietnam.
To learn more about Gelato, visit Gelato.com. For career opportunities, visit Gelato’s careers page.
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Danielle Eldredge
Head of PR and Communications