Happy Pot last December collaborated with Ben Estates to come up with a custom set of trophies for the real estate agency’s annual award ceremony.
This represents the plant pot business venture’s “biggest project to date”, with it making 80 units in the space of four days, all specifically shaped like a house to fit the client’s theme.
Chris Mercieca and Ġorġ Vella, who were University of Malta students at the time, joined forces last October to launch Happy Pot, which seeks to combine creativity and personality with sustainability and environmental awareness through its 3D-printed plant pots. Aside from making use of recycled bioplastics for its products, a percentage of the profits made from each pot goes towards afforestation projects.
Happy Pot Co-Founders Ġorġ Vella (left) and Chris Mercieca (right) / LinkedIn
Speaking to WhosWho.mt, Mr Mercieca opened up about working on the latest B2B project, which he described as “easily the most fun” the team has had since the venture’s launch.
He revealed that Ben Estates reached out to Happy Pot for custom trophies “with a twist” in December.
“As is often the case, while the achievement for the award would be significant, the trophy itself is likely to end up on a shelf or tucked away in a drawer. So, we set out to create Malta’s first ever functional trophy, a custom, sustainable solution which grows a plant, rather than collects dust,” he explained.
“We wanted to go a step beyond just placing their logo on our standard pots, so we decided to design a completely new product from the ground up, which truly reflects the Ben Estates brand and what it stands for,” he said. Following some “collective brainstorming and tinkering with the 3D design”, they came up with the Happy House concept.
“The custom pot was 3D-printed in five separate components, all of which were designed to seamlessly adjoin each other without any adhesive,” he said, before adding that the houses’ front doors displayed Ben Estates’ logo, along with a congratulatory message to the agents, “all 74 of which were custom-printed with their names”.
He revealed that the team’s favourite part of the design is the roof, which can be detached and transformed into a saucer for the pot, catching any runoff water and soil when the plant is watered. “While we were racking our brains trying to find a zero-waste solution, our good friend Joe nonchalantly suggested this option, and we decided to go with it,” Mr Mercieca explained.
“These sustainable, functional trophies will not only commemorate big achievements for the agents, but also mark the first of many steps towards a more sustainable organisation,” he continued.
Through the collaboration, Happy Pot planted 74 trees around the world on behalf of the real estate agency, and plans to continue working with Ben Estates on their Corporate Social Responsibilities by teaming up on green initiatives, both locally and overseas.
“We crammed more than 300 hours of printing into a single weekend to pull off a completely custom job from scratch,” he added.
He proceeded to thank Ben Estates for its trust, and “looks forward” to the projects and opportunities that are lined up for 2023.
