From Chef To E-Commerce: How Trauma Brought Sam Sheffler to the Reusable Gear Business
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As the aughts drew to a close, chef Sam Sheffler was just beginning his thriving culinary career. Eight years after his first gig with a Miami hotel, though, a series of traumas altered the course of Sheffler’s career forever.
In summer 2017, Sheffler was injured on the job in the kitchen, and a car accident that followed shortly after added insult to literal injury. As he realized his physical condition might require him to limit the kind of work he did, he began realizing that a concern with health tied all his culinary work together. And then, early the following year, the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shooting – the same one that birthed the March for Our Lives movement – occurred just minutes from his home. Needless to say, Sheffler was rattled.
Realizing that he needed to minimize his physical labor, Sheffler sought out in pursuit of another career. It took a chance gift — a high-quality reusable water bottle — for the next step in his career to click. He launched Water Bottle Shop Online shortly thereafter.
The company is no ordinary reusable water bottle seller – it carries all sorts of reusable products such as straws and cutlery, camping and survival gear, and even bulletproof backpacks and vests. It may seem intense to find a diverse collection of reusable eating and drinking gear on the same website as materials intended to thwart active shooters, but that’s exactly the point.
“I know it sounds morbid, but unfortunately, that’s the world we currently live in,” says Sheffler.
Of special note among Water Bottle Shop Online’s water bottle collection is the 27 oz Santeco Super Light Stainless Steel Pop-top Vacuum Bottle. Sheffler points to this water bottle as boasting everything he hopes that Water Bottle Shop Online’s offerings will achieve. The bottle’s vacuum layers keep the water inside as hot or cold as when it was first added to the bottle, making the bottle as good for hot coffee as it is for ice-cold water on a broiling summer day. With environmentally-friendly construction and temperature control lasting up to 12 hours, Sheffler sees the Santeco as a must-have.
Sheffler ensures high quality similar to the Santeco across all of Water Bottle Shop Online’s offerings. “I enjoy the quality control while working with a product that promotes health and solves the problem of one-use plastic beverage bottles,” he says. “I pick all the bottles by hand. I’m very choosy.”
Soon, Water Bottle Shop Online’s customers will get to enjoy what’s likely the sharpest fruit of Sheffler’s vision to date. Water Bottle Shop Online will soon launch its own signature line that Sheffler personally designed and developed. Titled “The Aqua Grail,” the collection is set to make good on Sheffler’s commitment to providing environmentally-friendly, functional, eye-catching water bottle choices for all consumers.
While many of The Aqua Grail’s specs are under lock and key before the launch, customers can be certain the new bottle will be among Water Bottle Shop Online’s most innovative offerings. After all, Sheffler has poured his whole heart into the store: “I needed to find something exactly like what I’m doing now,” he recalls thinking before launching his business. Sheffler accomplished his mission, and water bottle consumers across the internet couldn’t be happier that he did.