Five Questions With: Angie Tran, Co-Founder, Kind Laundry

Angie Tran’s career has taken her from creative agencies in Paris and Hong Kong to the forefront of sustainable entrepreneurship in Toronto. Throughout her journey, a commitment to growth, learning, and adaptability has been her constant guide. In this candid conversation, Angie opens up about how her diverse experiences have shaped her leadership, the personal values that inspired the launch of Kind Laundry, and the lessons she has learned from balancing business with life.

She shares the moment when she realized that “healthy” choices often come with hidden environmental costs and how that inspired a mission to create truly sustainable products that don’t force a tradeoff between wellness and the planet. Angie also reveals how working closely with her husband as a business partner has deepened her understanding of intentional boundaries and the importance of protecting personal connections.

Beyond business, Angie addresses common misconceptions about eco-friendly products, emphasizing transparency and education as core values. She offers practical advice for entrepreneurs, urging them to embrace imperfection, trust their instincts, and move forward with progress rather than perfection.

Your career journey spans continents, industries, and roles, from life in a creative agency in Paris and Hong Kong to launching Kind Laundry. What throughline has guided your decisions across such a dynamic path?

The throughline that runs through my career is a deep commitment to growth and learning. Living and working across continents and industries has taught me the value of embracing change and staying curious. Whether I was leading creative projects in Hong Kong, Paris or launching Kind Laundry, I’ve always approached new challenges with an open mind and a willingness to adapt.

Every experience — no matter how different — has been an opportunity to gain new perspectives, build resilience, and refine my approach. That mindset has helped me navigate uncertainty, pivot when needed, and continually evolve both as a leader and an entrepreneur.

I believe this openness to learning and flexibility is essential, especially when building a purpose-driven business in today’s fast-changing world. It enables me to stay grounded while pushing boundaries, ultimately creating products and experiences that truly resonate with our community.

Kind Laundry was born out of your personal values around sustainability and health. What was the turning point that made you realize this idea needed to become a business?

The turning point for us was surprisingly simple — but powerful. We had invested in and were working closely with a “healthy fast food” chain, one that championed fresh, nutritious meals. On the surface, it felt good — we were part of something that was promoting healthier choices. But behind the scenes, something didn’t sit right.

Every day, we prepared salads in plastic containers, used plastic gloves, and tossed out endless packaging. By the end of a single shift, we were throwing away bags and bags of plastic waste. It made us pause. If this were happening at just one location, what would that look like across the entire franchise network? And how could something marketed as “healthy” be causing so much environmental harm?

That disconnect struck a chord with us. It made us realize that true wellness isn’t just about what we put into our bodies — it’s also about the impact our choices have on the world around us. That experience planted the seed for Kind Laundry. We wanted to create something different — a company that didn’t force a tradeoff between caring for yourself and caring for the planet. 

That vision eventually became our mission: to make everyday routines more sustainable, starting with something as universal as laundry (a category that was lacking innovation and still primarily made in plastic jugs and a list of harmful ingredients).

You’ve worked closely with your husband as a business partner across multiple ventures. What have you learned about building a company and a relationship at the same time?

Working with my husband as a business partner has been one of the most rewarding — and challenging experiences. Over the past 10 years, we’ve learned (and are still learning) how to build a company without losing sight of our relationship. In the early days, our lives revolved entirely around work. We discussed the business 24/7 — at the dinner table, during walks, and even while brushing our teeth. There were no boundaries, and eventually, we realized that wasn’t sustainable — or healthy.

What changed everything was becoming more intentional about carving out non-work time. No matter how stressful things got at the office, we committed to protecting moments that were just for us — whether that was going on a spontaneous weekend trip, taking long walks with no business talk allowed, or simply binge-watching a Netflix series together. These rituals help us decompress, reconnect, and remind ourselves that at the end of the day, we’re partners in life first, business second. That balance is something we’re still working on, but it’s made both our relationship and our business stronger.

Sustainability is at the heart of your brand. What’s one myth about “eco-friendly” living you wish more consumers understood — and how do you work to shift that perception?

One of the most persistent myths we encounter is the notion that eco-friendly products are less effective than conventional ones, particularly in laundry care. The truth is, legacy brands have spent millions convincing consumers that things like strong fragrances, optical brighteners, and vibrant dyes equal “clean.” But that’s just clever marketing. Those ingredients don’t necessarily make your clothes cleaner — they just create the illusion of cleanliness to save costs, as those ingredients are much cheaper to mass-produce.

At Kind Laundry, we’ve taken the opposite approach. We believe less is more. Our formulations are stripped down to the essentials — every ingredient serves a real purpose, with no unnecessary fillers, preservatives, dyes or very strong synthetic fragrances. We focus on high-performance, plant-based ingredients and enzymes that actually work, without compromising your health or the environment.

What’s encouraging is that more customers today are curious and conscious. They want to know what’s in their products and why. That’s why education is such a big part of what we do — whether it’s through our website, social media, or packaging, we go out of our way to explain our ingredients, our choices, and back it all up with certifications. Transparency isn’t a marketing tool for us — it’s a core value.

Looking back at the early days of entrepreneurship, what advice would you give yourself, and to other women launching purpose-driven businesses today?

If I could go back and give myself one piece of advice, it would be this: there’s no such thing as the perfect time. In the early days, we spent so much energy trying to perfect everything, our website, our packaging, our visuals, believing it all had to be flawless before we could launch. But over time, we realized that what we thought would resonate didn’t always connect with our audience — and the things we didn’t expect often did.

Now, our mindset is: launch when it’s good enough, then learn and evolve. Perfection can be paralyzing (and I am a perfectionist). What really matters is staying flexible, testing constantly, and listening to your community. The faster you test and iterate, the faster you can achieve incrementally better results. 

Trust your instincts, start before you feel ready, and let go of the need for everything to be polished — progress over perfection.