Shawn Seipler

| Visionary |
Shawn Seipler
Executive Director,
Clean the World

Orlando, Florida
Age: 35

Four out of five nights on the road can get a person thinking about all kinds of things. Shawn Seipler couldn’t help but wonder what happens to the used soap left behind in hotel rooms. As an e-commerce vice president of sales and marketing, he was good at recognizing opportunities. Learning that impoverished children worldwide die from diseases preventable by simple hand washing, he and a business partner set out to reclaim and sanitize partially used hotel soaps and amenities and get them to those in need. He started Clean the World in his own kitchen; in two years, he’s partnered with 1,000 individual hotels, diverting 550 tons of waste from landfills and sending eight million bars of soap to people in U.S. homeless shelters and to 42 countries worldwide. Under his leadership, the nonprofit earned the World Vision Haiti Relief Award, Sustainable Florida Best Practices Leadership Award, a Chase Community Giving Grant and a Harrah’s Foundation Grant. Seipler launched Clean the World Global in May to help meet swiftly rising demand. What’s next? Replicating the soap experience for hotel textiles.

—Katherine Manfredi

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
“I truly hope that our green and socially responsible programs are a standard in the global hospitality industry. And more importantly, in 10 years I hope that Clean the World’s work on the international humanitarian front is being recognized as one of the reasons diarrheal disease and deaths caused by a lack of proper hygiene are quickly moved off the top 10 killer list.”