More Than Matcha Hit $125K in Year One With Zero Ad Spend

Rosie Goldwasser's matcha brand generated $125,000 in revenue in its first year without a single dollar spent on advertising. The next year, it more than doubled that figure. Now, after leaving her corporate job at PwC in March 2026, the 28-year-old Santa Monica founder is on track to bring in between $400,000 and $500,000 with More Than Matcha in 2026 — all fully bootstrapped.

Goldwasser built the premium matcha and lifestyle brand while working full-time as a customer experience strategist at PricewaterhouseCoopers. She started building in 2023 and officially launched in March 2024, backed by $25,000 of her own savings and no outside funding.

Where did the idea come from?

The business grew out of a personal frustration. "For years, I was either too tired to function or too wired, jittery and anxious from coffee to sleep," Goldwasser said. "There was no in-between until I discovered matcha. It was love at first sip."

Matcha delivered what coffee couldn't: calm, focused energy that lasted. But finding quality matcha was its own problem. Cafés charged $10 for drinks that disappointed her. At-home options lacked quality, consistency and a brand she could connect with.

Goldwasser saw a gap she couldn't ignore. She brought four years of marketing experience and six years of customer experience consulting to the venture. "I've always been fascinated by what makes consumers fall in love with brands and how to create experiences that exceed their expectations," she said.

What did it take to launch?

Goldwasser refused to launch until she found a powder she believed in. "I was never going to launch a matcha brand unless I found a matcha powder so good that I felt I'd be doing the world a disservice by not bringing it to market," she said.

She spent months researching growing regions, cultivars, harvesting methods and sustainable farming practices before settling on a four-cultivar blend. She has since visited the supplier in Japan and met the farmers behind the product.

Her $25,000 went into branding, packaging, website development and product photography. She handled fulfillment herself for the entire first year, packing and shipping every order on nights and weekends. During busy stretches, friends and family helped turn her 700-square-foot apartment into a makeshift fulfillment center.

Outsourcing fulfillment changed the trajectory. "I realized I was spending so much time keeping the business running that I had almost no time left to actually grow it," Goldwasser said. The added expense bought back her time for product development, marketing and partnerships.

What went wrong on launch day?

The brand's biggest product launch — a matcha travel collection — collapsed hours before going live. Goldwasser had approved the final sample of single-serve matcha sticks and moved forward with producing 25,000 units. The manufacturer kept delaying. The first four boxes arrived the night before launch.

Goldwasser drove to the fulfillment center to inspect them herself. Her instinct was right. Matcha powder leaked from both ends of the sticks, coating other products in the boxes. The units were unsellable — after weeks of teasing, a full marketing campaign and a website redesign.

Rather than hide the failure, she filmed a one-take video explaining exactly what had happened. Customers rallied instead of complaining. "The comments and DMs poured in, thanking me for being transparent and refusing to compromise on quality," she said. A new manufacturer is now producing the sticks, and the collection is scheduled for early 2027.

What would she do differently?

Goldwasser would have skipped the merchandise. More Than Matcha launched its matcha powder alongside four different hats, imagining a lifestyle brand customers would wear everywhere. The problem: nobody knew who the brand was yet.

"We spent so much time and money sampling, designing and producing merchandise before we had built a community of people who actually wanted to represent our brand," she said. She'd put that money into the core product and customer loyalty instead.

Running a solo CPG operation taught her to make decisions before she needs them. She interviews candidates months before hiring, opens manufacturer conversations long before switching, and asks other founders about challenges she hasn't faced yet. "In a business where one decision can impact your product, customers and cash flow for months to come, that preparation can make all the difference," she said.

How fast did the money come?

Consistent monthly revenue took about four months. Year one closed at $125,000 with zero ad spend. Year two more than doubled it, growing organically with earnings reinvested. It took four months from launch to see consistent monthly revenue.

2026 became a reinvestment year. Goldwasser rebranded completely, upgraded packaging and the website, and poured resources into the travel collection — the company's biggest launch yet, now slated for early 2027.

Her advice to founders: skip the perfect plan. "Done is better than perfect," Goldwasser said. She launched with no three-, five- or 10-year plan. "Let real customers help you figure out what comes next."

With the travel collection landing in early 2027 and a customer base built without a dollar of advertising, More Than Matcha's first fully founder-funded year will test whether organic growth can carry a rebranded CPG label past the half-million mark.