In March 2023, we were three months into selling the Original Clear Ice Maker. Very early days.
I packed up my Subaru Forester and drove from Minneapolis to the Inspired Home Show in Chicago, where around 40 startups were presenting in the Innovators Corner - each one hoping a buyer or rep might stop and take notice.
One of those people was Kimi, a buyer at Williams Sonoma.
She stopped at our table, and we had a great conversation. She understood what we were building. I walked away feeling like it might be the beginning of something, even if I didn’t know exactly what yet.
The Inspired Home Show wasn’t where we landed a deal.
It was where we planted something that took three years to grow.
Two years passed.
We returned to the show in 2025, and I made a point to find Kimi and give her an update. By then, we were deep in development on our second product, the Klaris Mini, and the company looked very different than it had in 2023.
She was genuinely interested, and we kept the conversation going.
After the Mini launched in fall 2025, we sent her a sample. Shortly after, she came back with something unexpected: interest in a Williams Sonoma exclusive colorway in white.
That was the moment things started to feel real.
We kicked off development soon after, had our first samples by December, and spent the early part of this year aligning on color, packaging, and everything in between. We finalized the design in February and moved into production shortly after.
Now, in Q2 2026, Klaris is officially available at Williams Sonoma.
It’s a launch we’re genuinely proud of - and one that feels earned.
There’s a tendency in entrepreneurship to focus only on the big moments: the launches, the milestones, the announcements. But most meaningful opportunities happen much more slowly than that. They come from showing up consistently, staying in touch, and continuing to build even when no immediate outcome is guaranteed.
If there’s a lesson in this story, it’s a simple one:
Stay in touch. Show up. Let relationships develop at their own pace.
We couldn’t be more excited for what comes next.
- Chase & The Klaris Team
