This Mom Turned a $750 Etsy Side Hustle Into a $50M Wellness Brand | Entrepreneurship | How We Profit | E6

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show notes or young and profiting.com/deals. It was a business-created by accident. This was definitely not an intentional business. I thought I was going to be a state-home-home. I was on maternity leave and we've been profitable every single year, but we didn't get from zero to 50 million in the first year. Luna Aziz is the founder and CEO of Legendary Milk. She built a women's wellness supplement brand from a $750 initial investment into a $50 million bootstrapped business. I bought

a coffee grinder and a pill and cap slater on eBay for like $100. I started testing for simulations on myself and I posted them on Etsy and received like 50 orders overnight one day. Now, your company controls like 70% of the lactate supplement markets, so you've like completely dominated what would be the most surprising thing people would find out about the price to develop a supplement, though we will not source any ingredients from China. So we have to be really mindful

“of what's the difference between selling something on Amazon versus selling something on retail?”

Like, is there any cost differences, shipping differences? The margins are virtually the same between D to C retail and Amazon. I have interest in it. And I think that's great for us because somebody wants to be a founder, a saved up $10,000 to launch your product. What would you tell them to do with that $10,000? I would say Luna, welcome to how we profit. Thank you for having me. I'm so pumped for this interview. I feel like you've got so much to share and it's so inspiring

to have learned about your story, the fact that your company is doing $50 million in revenue,

a company that you started 10 years ago with 750 bucks and a dream and trying to just create a solution for a problem that you had yourself. The company is called Legendary Milk. Tell us about your company, like, for people who don't know about it, what does your company do? Sure. Yeah,

“this, it does feel very surreal and after you just said 10 years, it doesn't feel like that.”

It feels like it's just flown by, but so Legendary Milk offers, it's a women's health supplement brand that offers science-backed solutions, primarily to women, obviously, primarily to mothers, focused on conception, the pregnancy period, lactation and the postpartum period. So your company really goes from women from every stage of their life, from pregnancy and before pregnancy to all the different stages, was that something that you decided from the start or did that

evolve over time? It's definitely evolved over time. Initially, it was very primarily focused on lactation and specifically low milk supply because of my own personal struggles with making enough milk for my son and then I realized that it's such an underserved community. It's still breastfeeding still so taboo. No one wants to talk about it, moms are shamed for it, but there are also just hallmark periods of a woman's life where she needs more support, she needs more education

and she needs, you know, science-backed solutions for whatever she's going through, whether it's hormonal fertility, what have you? So that's where we were able to expand, really beyond that to conception all the way through that postpartum period. So cool. I love the fact that you were your own customer, like you were actually trying to search for solutions. Yes. And the solutions that were out there were not working for you. Tell us about your experience, not making enough

milk for your child's, how you started researching about it and what actually brought you to the

point of wanting to create your own product. First of all, I was my own guinea pig tier point,

which I do not recommend. Please don't ever do this at home. But I had my first son 10 years ago

nesting and our baby registry and the labor and delivering what that's going to look like

“and everything else beyond having the baby is kind of like a tomorrow problem. And I think”

in media, you know, TV's and movies, we've simplified breastfeeding to make it look like it's just a really easy and beautiful and seamless process. And so that was what I was expecting. And then my son came a little bit premature. And I was being pushed very heavily to provide breast milk to him to help him to thrive. And I remember I was put on a triple feeding schedule right out of the gate right after I had him in the hospital. And triple feeding is probably one of the most

physically and emotionally demanding things to ask of a new mom. So what that entails is nursing your baby and then pumping directly after for them and then feeding that pumped milk to them. So it's this vicious cycle where that's kind of all you do all day long. Nursing, pumping, washing bottles, feeding baby, changing diaper and then the process starts all over again. So I did

that for the first nine weeks, not really understanding why it felt like that was all I was doing,

“24/7 feeling like I was trying to move heaven and earth just to make a little bit more milk.”

And he still was not, was not able to thrive on my breast milk. We were having weight gain concerns, he just seemed very collicky and upset all the time. And something didn't seem right. So I worked with the lactation consultant at nine weeks. Because I just felt I had my breaking point. I realized something's not right. I'm doing all the right things. And it's still not working for me. And there was a kind of a spiral of shame and guilt that comes with that. Like why is my body not doing what

it was supposed to be doing? Yeah. So I worked with the lactation consultant. And at the end of that she said, I'm not really sure why you can't make enough milk. I really can't help you with that. Some women just don't make enough milk. But there's a supplement called Fenigreek that you can try, and maybe that will help. And that felt very discouraging to think that there wasn't a solution.

And I wasn't happy with that. I always joke that I'm kind of like the Hermione Granger of lactation,

because for me it's always, I need to know the why. I'm just constantly curious about the inner workings of everything. And so that that option wasn't satisfactory to me. I needed to understand the underlying reason why I couldn't make enough milk. And I eventually did find out. Yeah. But I did end up trying the Fenigreek that she recommended. And it, I never tried to demonize anything

“that is out there because I think there are options that will work. Yeah. Some moms are not”

brothers. But for whatever reason, I had a really negative experience with Fenigreek where it dropped my blood sugar so low that the room was spinning. And I was terrified. I was about to call my husband because I thought I'm not going to be able to take care of the baby. We were by ourselves at home and I had to lay down. So just kind of a scary moment. And I realized that herbs are still medicine. And that we need to be mindful of how we recommend these things because we all have

very unique body chemistries. And I had a history of insulin resistance and gestational diabetes. And so that lactation insulin probably should have been thinking about a more targeted solution for me knowing my previous history. Yeah. And so then from there, it felt like there weren't any other options. This was a decade ago. So you know, you were either just shoveling bowls of, you know, oatmeal and tear mouth or you were eating. I think there was oval teen at some point that was kind

of a trending thing to drink oval teen. And then there were lactation cookies. And that was kind of it. Yeah. So I started doing research on what women have been using for generations centuries to help with milk supply. So I looked in the Middle East and India and South America

and Asia and found all of these herbs that I had never heard about that had been passed down from

generation to generation of women. And so I ordered them online. I bought a coffee grinder and a pill and cap slater on eBay for like $100. And I started, this is kind of where the guinea pig part came in, I started testing for Malaysians on myself. And I was able to come with that with five different formulations that ultimately worked for me. I found, you know, I would test, okay, I'm going to try this formulation for a week and see if it increased my milk supply.

And if it did, I would continue with the next formulation. And at that point, I was four months postpartum. For me, I just felt like I had accumulated so much knowledge over this period of time that I just wanted to share with other moms because it felt like I was very isolated and alone and that I was the only one going through low milk supply. So I posted the products, the formulations, I ordered bottles and, you know, more pills and all of that, more ingredients,

and I posted them on Etsy. I had a little printer. I made my own little clipart labels. I mean, it was really scrappy. Just working in my little studio in my house. And I thought, you know, maybe if there's just, you know, another mom out there who's experiencing the same thing, at least she has other options. Yeah. And maybe I'll get one order a month, just as a fun hobby. And someone in a Facebook breastfeeding group of 20,000 moms, someone had purchased the product

and was raving about it in the group. And I remember I received like 50 orders overnight one day.

bottling everything, packaging, labeling, putting them into sealing them into boxes, putting the

“shipping label on there. I was also communicating with all the moms through Etsy. So what I would”

typically do was go through kind of a whole litany of things that they could be doing to help them to increase their mocks by before we would even talk about the products. So I was almost like troubleshooting customer service, educating, lactation education, and then also helping with the products. So I didn't sleep for the first year. I work probably until about two or three in the morning, every night helping moms connecting with moms. And then I would wake up at seven with the baby and do it all

over again. So I do not recommend that you will get stretched very thin very quickly. That's where burnout will happen absolutely. But I felt like I was just called to do this and it was something I was so passionate about. And in that process I connected with so many other moms who were going through it as well. And I realized, oh, this isn't isolated just me. This is something that is a much more chronic and serious than we probably talk about because a decade ago, social media,

“what is, was it, isn't what it is? Yeah. People weren't connecting on the same level that they can't”

know. So it was pretty amazing to create that community early on. Yeah, Ben, we knew what makes me feel

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indeed on this podcast. Indie.com/podcast, terms and conditions apply. Need a hiring hero. This is a job for indeed sponsor jobs. Something that I love about your story is that it doesn't feel like you were actually doing it for the money. Like that you didn't have this big goal. Like I'm launching a supplement company. I'm going to raise money. I want X kind of profile. You didn't do market research. You just started small built it brick by brick, used community. And something

else that I find fascinating is that you don't really put yourself out there too much. You're more of an introvert. And you were kind of, you know that faceless brand trend. I feel like you were doing it before maybe that was even a thing. And I'm just curious like how did you get the demand when you weren't necessarily putting your face out there or feeling comfortable. Like how did you get over that? If you did have to put your face out there from time to time. And walk us through

like how you're marketing strategy develops over time. I'd love to hear that. For sure. Yeah.

intentional business. I thought I was going to be a state home mom. I was on maternity leave

crazy. 50 million. Yeah, fam. 50 million. Yeah. To your point, I never really wanted it to be about

me even though the mission was my underlying issues with my own milk supply. Connecting with so many moms and realizing that we were all experiencing very similar experiences. Whether it was breastfeeding struggles or low milk supply, we all just needed to support. So what you'll find on our social media especially is we were with a lot of moms where we are filming with them while they're actively breastfeeding or we're talking kind of educational tips and tricks to help with nursing

or pumping. And what I wanted moms to see was themselves in those videos. So it really wasn't important for me to be there to be featured in it because I wanted all walks of life women who are experiencing various issues and complexities related to breastfeeding. I wanted mom to connect with that person and not with me. And I think that really resonated and created a community that is so diverse. But also I think we've we've gotten a lot of trust because it's very much education first

and the product seconds. So I was thinking about that Janet Jackson song. What have you done

“for me lately? Yeah. I think a lot of brands are doing this now which is great, but you have to”

put yourself in the place of your customer and what you can do for them. They don't care about your product necessarily. You have to understand what journey they're going through in the pain points and the selection points of where your product could be helpful and be supported in whatever they're going through. And I think that's we've done a fantastic job of that of making sure moms feel like this is a judgment free zone and community for them. Because that's

honestly it's something that I didn't have with my first baby. And I wanted to create that community

with legendary milk. Yeah. And now you've got over a million followers across all your different

platforms. Your company really hasn't spent a ton of money in paid advertising. Everything has been truly organic, word of mouth, driven, using Facebook and Instagram primarily. One thing that I love about your brand is that it has like such a fun personality. And you've got product names like SNKN, pump princess, girls got to go. And it's like really silly. And something that I teach my

“students. I teach a LinkedIn masterclass about personal branding is that you need to have a relationship”

with your audience and you need to really define what that relationship is. And you also need to have a personality like how do you show up? For sure. And you've really infused personality in the brand even though it's more of a like faceless brand. Talk to us about that. So I think humor in marketing is so underrated. And some brands are doing it really well. And I wanted to bring that cheekiness to you to your point. Because, you know, I think in the postpartum period, especially with a newborn,

if I was joke, if you're not laughing, you're crying. It's just the hormonal roller coaster that you're going on. And so, you know, initially with the lactation supplements, we have these kind of fifties, housewife kind of vibe with the women on there. And they all have this little speech bubble where there's kind of an inside joke where if you were a breastfeeding mom, you would kind of understand. It's like that right of passage where you're like, oh, I get it now. Kind of an inside joke.

And I wanted moms to just feel like they weren't alone that were all going through it. And they're doing a fantastic job. And you have this support of this community to, you know, to hold you up when you're having a tough day. So I hope that they open up, you know, they're covered and they look at that. And they're like, it's not so bad. Because I know their other moms going through this, too. And then we, we kind of, you know, channeled that into our women's health supplements as well with

Smith and Kitten and all of that. And you think about, again, taboo topics, taboo products. I mean, so much as swept under the rug when it comes to women's health and vaginal health. And yeah, just even research on women and, and how our bodies are so vastly different than men's when it comes, when it comes to any of the research, you know, around pain and just medicine and all that's just it's kind of crazy to think about. So we wanted to make sure that it was in your face or not

hiding it. It's something to be proud of to be a woman to experience these things to be validated in them.

“I think a lot of women have had to be their own personal advocate when they go to the doctors”

because things are swept under the rug. Yeah. And certain symptoms that you, you've experienced where you're like, I don't feel right. My body doesn't feel right in the doctors. Like, oh, that's just part of being a woman. That's part of the hormone is going, you know, during parry menopause or menopause or women. And I love that women are finally saying, no, it's not. It's not normal. And if you can't advocate for me, then I will do it for myself. And we're looking

for solutions outside of, you know, just the preliminary health that you're going to get from a doctor. And you're making it accessible. Right. You're making it really accessible. You're making it less taboo. I love your mascot. You're us. Yeah. Tell us about that. And like, did you think of that? We definitely wanted something to go in line with this kind of cheekiness, but also just opening

the door and the window to women's health and reproductive health. And it never imagined that we

events, or we've walked through Walmart because our products are sold in Walmart and target stores. And so we've walked into these stores and it's primarily men. They'll look at it and not know what it is for one. They have no idea that it's a part of the female anatomy. So it's kind of a great educational tool as well. But it's opened a lot of conversations about it too and that this is just

“a normal part of women's body. And it's not anything to be ashamed of. Yeah. When I think of”

the relationship that you have with your audience, I think of like, you're like a mom. Right. You're telling people maybe like what they wish their mom had told them or felt comfortable to talk to their mom about or even like their sister or best friend. That's when we get a lot is kind of that big sister. Big sister passing down. You've been through it. You've gone through the trenches. Like, what would you want to share with that next generation of women who are going through

this? Yeah. So for the listeners out there, something to think about is like, what is your relationship to your audience? Are you a mom? Are you a cheerleader? Are you a mentor? A big sister? Right. So I love that. So let's talk about your actual like business and the costs of creating a supplement. So you started with $750. Yes. It was just crazy. I actually just interviewed John Paul DeGoria, who's the founder of Paul Mitchell and Patron. And he started Paul Mitchell with

“$700. That's crazy. So he's got a billion dollar company. You've got a $50 million company”

but man, like you've had exceptional growth. Thank you. You started manufacturing all the bottles by yourself. Now you have like a huge facility in Austin where you're manufacturing everything in the U.S. Talk to us about some of the early like big learning lessons about being in the supplement industry like in terms of like manufacturing and what you had to figure out and what is the most expensive part of the process? What is the most lucrative part of selling a supplement? I talked about

the first year. I was making everything in house and then my husband, you know, part of my

French said you either have to chitter get off the pot. This is either a company or it's not. It's either a really valid business idea or it's not and you can't kind of have one foot, you know, they're in one foot with us and so you're stretched to thin. So we ended up finding a manufacturer in Dallas who made supplements very trusted manufacturer and our initial PO was the smallest that they'd ever received. They were taking how much? It was only 500 bottles

“over the span of I think five products. And how much do you think that costs back then? Oh gosh,”

I can't it was a tiny, tiny, a few thousand dollars, maybe it was a tiny deal. It was around 500 bottles. It was a thousand dollars. They were not expecting, I mean, we had, you know, been vetted by other manufacturers and tried to talk to them. They were like, they just closed it or on us. They're like, this is too small. We're not taking the hit on this because there are expenses involved. Yeah. Even running a small PO like that on their line, especially when they had bigger clients than us.

And you did all the bottle design marketing. You did it all yourself. Absolutely. We had a fantastic

designer who, you know, initially it was my clip art and then I found a designer who basically took

the idea straight out of my head and put them on paper. And she was so talented and she helped create her website and the women that are featured on there as well. And really just, I think, cemented the kind of that housewife theme that very cheeky, you know, yeah, look that we have. So we, we worked with this manufacturer. They really took a chance on us. And now we are their biggest client. We still are with them 10 years later. I'm very much, you know, if you take a

chance on me, then you have my loyalty kind of for life. And so I appreciated that they're one of the few that didn't slam the door on us. And so that was initial, like, first year, just creating growth because at that point, you know, it had to start to expand beyond the Facebook groups and moms were talking about it in their, their mom communities and kind of, I mean, word of mouth is so powerful. Especially when it comes to moms. They have so much purchasing power. So, you know,

it was still very organic, very bootstrap, but it was definitely growing and our social media exposure had also grown quite a bit because I was really focused on the education. So, moms were starting to follow us. They were starting to share with their new mom friends. And interesting thing is I started to notice that when I was out in about or even now 10 years later, I might be at a conference where a mom will come up and say, "You saved me during my breastfeeding

troubles. My anything that I was going through, I would go to your page and find some sort of

tip or trick that would help me." And I never used your products, but I had a girlfriend who was going

through clogged ducks or mastitis and I immediately recommended your products. And that is so hard to replicate just the trust that they had in us. I don't take that for granted and I truly appreciate every interaction I have with these moms because just so rewarding, it's, you know, I tell my team we're not selling a bag of chips here. Like there's a very much a tangible connection and

point in their postpartum period. They are ready to quit that moment. That day, and our customer

“service team has to rally around them and be there cheerleader sometimes because they may not”

have that support at home. And I take that very seriously. And now your company controls like 70% of the lactate supplement market. So you've like completely dominated this market and a lot of it has to do with the trust that you've built with your community. You provide trust with educational content. Also through your customer support, which every person has to have 90 hours of training. Yes. And they're breast milk like experts. Yeah, it talks to me. So there's a lactation

training that they take to your point, just understanding the foundations of breastfeeding,

not every customer service person that we hire is a mom. So they may not understand. And I always

think about breastfeeding is almost like a foreign language where there's so many complexities to it. And if you haven't lived it, you don't really understand, can't put yourself in the shoes of what a mom might be experiencing. So they go through this training so that they are able to affect

“ively troubleshoot with moms who reach out. And initially what happens is if mom reaches out for”

example and just says, hey, I'm having trouble with my milk supply. I'm concerned. I'm not giving enough to my baby. Right off that our customer service team has a list of questions that they're asking to help troubleshoot with this mom. Product isn't even mentioned. It's really just about kind of understanding what's going on behind the scenes with this mom. How can we help just give free advice, free support to them? And then, you know, weigh down the line after we've kind of gone

through this dialogue, that is when we might recommend a product. But we understand that it's just a compliment to what mom is already doing at home, whether it's nursing more pumping more, you know, working with the lactation consultant, we're going to find, you know, what that, it could be multi-pronged, but we're going to help to provide solutions beyond just our products to them. Yap, BAM, seven days. That's all it took me to go from my dear to a $500 million storefront. No

tech team, no coding, just my LinkedIn knowledge of business idea and Shopify. Here's what most

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idea has been sitting in the back, your head collecting dust, stop waiting, take action. Just do it. All you need is the idea because Shopify handles the rest. Start your free trial at shopify.com/proffeting. Again, that's shopify.com/proffeting. Go to Shopify.com/proffeting to start building your dream business today. I really want to dig deep on like the cost and like how to actually create a supplement brand and the cost involved with it. Something that people don't often think about.

When I'm thinking about how much does a bottle of pills cost? I'm thinking about the product itself, the marketing, the packaging, the shipping. But there's also this research portion beforehand

“that I think people don't think about. So how long is the typical research process for you guys?”

And what are the costs involved in the research process? That is the huge part for us because we

are not trying to launch a million different products a year. We are very pointed in what we launch

and our entire product development team consists of women. So we will have very candid round table discussions about just our own personal experiences with hormonal challenges and ovarian cysts and vaginal health and perimenopause. And I love those conversations because very rarely do you ever kind of hear that from people because it's so taboo. So your own team becomes your market research. And I do think that we obsessively follow what our customers are saying too. And I think

in the early days, that was a huge part of our success. I was in those Facebook groups listening to what moms really wanted and trying to address those needs. So just, I mean, I think that's a tip for anyone who is creating a brand or a small company right now is be obsessively following what your customers are saying because I assure there's little pearls and tidbits that you can take from that and maybe have your next product idea come from that. But yeah, we would have these

roundtable discussions. I was definitely very much at the heart of it as well because I think for any

going on in my life where I was having any sort of issues, for example, I have PCOS with this product

to help me in the the depths of my issues with hormonal imbalance. And if it wasn't something that would be helpful, we're not going to launch it because I want to be able to feel very pride, you know, very proud of what we've launched and be able to stand behind it. I don't remember, I'm aging myself, but they hear a club for a men founder. I don't know if you've ever

“seen those commercials. It was for, I think it was for two pays or the hair spray to cover”

bald spots. But he said, I'm not only the founder, but I'm also a customer or something like that. I mean, it's so true. Like, there isn't anything that we have launched that I wouldn't take for myself or wouldn't give to all of my friends and family and very much do so. So that was

super important to me to have a women-only product development team so that we could have these

really candid conversations. And then to your point, the research part. So it takes us about a year and a half to actually develop and launch a product. Wow. So we are typically in our especially of their women's health products. We're looking for ingredients that have clinical studies behind them. Typically, we're often using, using branded ingredients because they'll have a plethora of research behind them that we can then use for some of the claims that we might put on

the bottles. We're also sharing all those clinical studies on our product pages and our PDP images. The thing that's interesting about supplements is it's kind of like the wild wild west in the U.S. And I'm just literally just going to ask you about this. Yes, there's really not, I mean, I know that FDA says that they somewhat regulate supplements. They don't to the level that I would like them to, to be honest. And it's a little bit scary when I see some of the supplements

that have come out and just the lack of third-party testing and certification and I mean, a huge

chunk of of the money that we spend in the time is on that part. The third-party testing, the lab testing, all of the certification. So how law certified, kosher certified, non-GMO project verified. A lot of about that. Certified organic. I mean, sometimes I'll look at a bottle of something sold on Amazon and they'll just have the generic organic label on that. They didn't do any testing to make sure that every part of that was actually organic.

All the way down to the capsule. The capsule also has to be certified organic to be able to have

“the green, the green label. And so I think a lot of supplement companies will cut corners”

because they don't think consumers understand or maybe care about those things. Yeah. And I very much care because we are working with a very vulnerable population when it comes to moms and babies. And I remember I was so discerning when I was breastfeeding because anything that I was ingesting, I was so worried about how would translate and transfer into my breast milk. Yeah. So we understand that we have to be at a higher level and elevate, you know,

our supplement standards. Maybe the rest of the U.S. can do whatever they want. But we we understand that we're working with a very vulnerable population. It's really important. Yeah. It's really interesting. It's like you really get what you pay for. You might find a really cheap supplement on Amazon for sure. But maybe that means they haven't invested in research or certifications or the quality is just generally low. So I feel like people really need to be aware of

“that. Absolutely. What kind of things should people be looking for with their supplements? I think”

if, you know, any of those certifications are important to you make sure that you are looking for the actual certification. We call it a bug that the actual label on there instead of the generic version. So there should be something that looks like the actual formal label like non-gimo has its own label. It's like a little like the organic type. Absolutely. Yeah. It's just kind of the circular little label on on the bottle. And you can tell it's generic because it doesn't look like the formal

label that you'd have. And you can go to all of those websites and actually see what the label should look like. Cosher and halal are two other ones. They're actually organizations that, you know, for like less for example, for rabbis. They have a kosher certification. So this is a group of rabbis that will go to your facility to your manufacturing facility and look at every process of how you manufacture and sterilize and sanitize the line and making sure that it's kosher acceptable.

So for someone to just put a generic kosher on there, they didn't do any of the documentation didn't pay for the multiple rounds of testing that what's the price for the rabbis. So just something to be aware of if that's important to you. What would be the most surprising thing people would find out about the price to develop a supplement? Like is the actual ingredients of the supplement like the cheapest part about everything? I wouldn't say it's necessarily the cheap. I mean,

I think that I maybe it's a unique situation for us because we're working with a lot of herbs that are a little bit unique and very specific to lactation. So there are certain ones that we source from different countries or certain countries actually that we refuse to work with. So we will not source any ingredients from China. They have a monopoly on a lot of these these crops and herbs.

whatnot and we just don't feel good about using those ingredients. It does make it a lot harder to

source when you're not using the huge behemoth that is China that's growing everything. So we have to be really mindful of seasonality ordering herbs ahead of time. So sometimes we have to order a yearned advance just to be able to have enough inventory to make the product. So we have a fantastic

“supply chain team who handles all of that. But I think that is kind of unique probably to”

to us a little bit because we do have very high standards when it comes to the ingredients that we use. Well, I'm assuming anybody tuning in that wants to launch any sort of supplement or something that we digest is going to have similar quality standards. So it's just such great insight to be giving us. What are some of the metrics that you guys are following as a business? Like what are some of the key metrics that you guys are looking at? So we are omnichannel which comes with a wonderful,

you know, there's pros and cons, obviously, to being omnichannel. So we're, we sell our products on Shopify. We're on Amazon of course, you know, and unfortunately you kind of have to be in this day and age. I'm going to ask you about that. We're also in target stores and Walmart stores. I like to be where moms are and that's typically where moms are shopping. It's, you know, target and Walmart. I remember with my, my baby that was kind of my escape. I would grab a

Starbucks and we would spend an hour just mowsing around the aisles, you know, just whirling away some time. It was like me, my me time. So we're in a little less than 2,000 target stores. I'm making my, thank you. 4,000 Walmart stores nationwide. We're also in some small, I shouldn't

even say small because HB's amazing. Yeah, but it's more of a local grocery chain. It's like our

Austin pride. Absolutely. Every day and awesome loves HB. It doesn't love HB. So we're an HB stores. We're in Meyer, which is kind of a northwest grocery chain as well. But we've been really mindful about where we go because it doesn't make sense for us to be everywhere, especially because we are a niche market. We're focused very much on postpartum and lactation. So some retailers don't make sense. And then beyond that, we're also on TikTok shop, which I have a lot of opinions about

TikTok shop, both good and bad. But, yeah, just, you know, by virtue of us being on the channel, sometimes it can be hard to kind of wrap your mind around all of the numbers and the sales and the profits and where you're kind of hemorrhaging money. TikTok shopping, one of them, if anyone is watching and knows how to be profitable in that channel, please let me know. Because I find that it's one where we spend a lot of money on influencers and samples and

ads spend and there really isn't any profit be found on that channel. So much hype, so much hype. And we do have sales on there by, you know, I shouldn't say that, but the commission rates are so high, the hidden fees associated with that channel. It's, it's very expensive to sell on there. And so what we found is it's, I wouldn't say it's necessarily even a sales channel as opposed to like a marketing channel for us. Like a more brand aware. It is. It truly is. And we've seen a halo effect where

it's impacting our retail sales and it's also impacting Amazon sales because someone might see a video on TikTok shop about a product and won't initially buy on there, but they might go into

“target. I think it's a lack of trust. It is because you haven't done much with paid ads. So that's”

almost like being viral, going viral is sort of like a paid ad for sure, because people aren't not necessarily going to follow. Oh, absolutely. They're going to see the content and it's almost as like they saw an ad, but then they see you and target. And suddenly you have more credibility. It's true. It's a TikTok. Absolutely. There's kind of this inherent thought that if you're in a retail store, that there's been some sort of vetting that's happened behind the scenes and that this is a good

brand. Oh, you know, it's like so popular, right? Absolutely. Yes, it's validates that. Okay, so let's talk distribution channels. I think this is one of the most interesting parts of your story. So you started on Etsy. Are you still on Etsy? Yes. Yeah, I mean, we're on Etsy,

but it's not it's also legal. Yes. Well, starting. I always tell people who are not entrepreneurs.

Yeah, I'm like, just start an Etsy store. I feel like it's such a great. Absolutely. First place to start and like being able to channel demand, you knew that moms are on Etsy because they're planning their baby showers, they're planning like they're already on that. Oh, every shelf heavily. So you ended up being where they're shopping. And then what was the next thing that you started was that you're shop if I shop if I was next. And you know, to your point, I mean, 10 years ago Etsy looked

“very different, too. And we still have our Etsy shop because we garnered so many reviews. And I think”

that is another trusted resource, right? I think sometimes now we even have to question reviews because you just don't know where they're coming from or it's more like kind of that gray market where like people are paying for reviews. And so these were legitimate customers, leaving their reviews. We had fantastic, you know, a rate, a fantastic, fantastic rating, fantastic feedback. So I just wanted moms to see that and say, especially in the early days where they didn't know about us

or learning about us initially to say, oh, this, okay, this is legitimate, this actually helped

we were actually approached by our the target buyer. So she had just had a baby and that's how she found us. So what to make it? Yeah, what typically happens is, most of the time, mom doesn't hear about us in the conception period and the pregnancy period, she's in a kind of a whole other realm of thinking about just preparing for baby. And it's shortly after she gives birth that she finds us. So that was the case with this, this target buyer. Yeah, and I don't want them to expect

they're going to have problems. And if they, if they do, of course, they have our community to

pull from. They don't always have to use the product. So target was the first retailer that

picked you up and it was actually a fan. It was a fan. It was a customer. That's amazing. And she loved the products. And I mean, talk about like building trust already and not really having to have any proof of concept or proof of business because she was a customer. Yeah. And so she was the

“first to take a chance on us and brought in a few of our skews. They did very well in store. I think”

because of one is the product patchy packaging. It's just cheeky and it looks a little bit different than everything else on shelf. Yeah. It's fun. And the other thing is we were kind of behind the scenes I was building this huge social media community in a way that other lactation brands weren't really focused on. They were very much focused about kind of shoving product down mom's throat. And I went from a different avenue of I want to just support mom and whatever she's going through.

Yeah. And the products can be kind of a support after the fact. And it worked for us. It was definitely a model that has, you know, stood the test of time over the last 10 years. So you started off on Etsy, you go build a Shopify site and your DTC. Let's pause at that moment.

First of all, did you, did you create the Shopify website by yourself? We had our designer was kind

of a triple whammy. She was a graphic designer, slash illustrator, slash coder for websites. So she kind of built the, was that your main hire initially? She was, yes, she was one of the first she's fantastic. I'm just so talented. And so we had kind of a basic Shopify site that worked for a few years until, you know, it gets more complicated, more bugs happen. But it definitely worked

“for our purposes at that time. And I think 10 years ago, if you think about DTC, I mean, there was”

a lot more power and you to see at that point. You could have full control of your customer data and all of that on there. It was a very cheap to acquire customer on on Shopify. I would say that over time that is not one of our main sales channels. DTC has become less important, but it was a good way for you to start. Oh, absolutely. So for new founders who want to try Shopify, you can

go to Shopify.com/propheting. And they're one of our long-term wonderful. And they're amazing,

right? Like they're so good to get your feet wet in the DTC space. I agree. And so you are using Facebook and Instagram to drive people to your Shopify. Yes. And then you went retail. Has retail become your main distribution channel? I would say it's a mix between retail and Amazon. Okay. If I, if I had to make where you weary of putting your stuff on Amazon at first? Yes. Well, you know, I have mixed feelings about Amazon. I understand that a lot of a shop on their

eye shop on there as well. And I understand when mom is in panic mode and she needs something right now. It absolutely makes sense. She's not going to wait a week. If she has an active clogged duct or mastitis and I wouldn't expect her to. So I appreciated the expediency of being able to deliver our products to moms when they needed it, you know, right then. What we initially started with was just kind of dipping our toe with Amazon and not putting all of our skews on there.

We just wanted to understand what was happening. And to be honest, I was the one who listed our products. And I'm not an Amazon expert by Amy Means. I remember a few years after that, we had an Amazon agency doing audit. And they were like, you don't even have product photos on here. You have like one image. And I'm like, yeah, we, this is, that was me. Yeah, I was our Amazon expert for a while. You know, now we have an Amazon team and we have really cleaned up and optimized

our listings and all of that. And now, of course, we do have way more skews on there than we did before. But there are still some some products that we have not put on Amazon because they do well on

“D to C. I think it's still important for us to have a present there as well. We've tested certain”

things on TikTok shop just to see kind of what happens in terms of, you know, your point about morality. I think that it's a great channel to see kind of what happens in test and learn and then see that that halo effect happen with Amazon and retail. So oftentimes what we'll do is for a product launch, we might just start with TikTok shop and start to get, you know, some UGC, some content creation going on, getting a little bit of buzz and morality, and then we'll launch

on Amazon. Oh, so interesting. And then you still don't put all of your products on Amazon is it because you want some sort of like exclusivity for your DTC website? Yeah, absolutely. There's

collection cups. They're a pump part that you use with your breast pump. And there are a lot of them out there, but we found a lot of success with just keeping them exclusive to DTC and to

“TikTok shop. And it's one of our best sellers at this point. Really, I think maybe because you”

can't get it everywhere. What's the difference between selling something on Amazon versus selling something on retail? Like, is there any cost differences, shipping differences, minimums, even the relationship part of it? The interesting thing about that is 10 years ago, if you had asked me that, I would have said DTC is where the margins are the best. It's so cheap to acquire a customer, Facebook works exactly the way that you want to. And it comes to ads. It's actually

very different right now. I was talking to our CFO about this. The margins are virtually the same between DTC retail and Amazon. Yeah, interesting. So they're, and I think that's great for us because we're agnostic. We're going to go where mom is. And if it's Amazon for a period of time, so you can keep them prices also the same across the board. The same across the board. And that's actually really important. If you're looking to go into retail is those prices do have to stay the

same because you will get dinged on Amazon. You may learn lose the buy box. I mean, there's all of these kind of rules around, you know, the retailers are looking very closely to make sure that you're not offering a certain discounted price on Amazon or even on TikTok shop versus what it's going to look like in retail. And you might get dinged for that. So we have a fantastic sales team and that's kind of their job is to be responsible for making sure that there's price matching

no matter where you go. So that's a big thing that your sales team was actually focused on.

That's absolutely not true. Yes. So you're in Sony amazing retailers. Target, Walmart,

“HB, Sprouts. This is like every person's dream who's in, you know, the CPG business, right?”

How did you do it? Like, are you really good at relationships? Were you doing email campaigns? Did you know the titles you were reaching out to or did it just like happen? I think I wish I had a secret formula to share with anyone watching. I do think that it came back to like building in brand and building the such a strong community of moms. I think that the retailers couldn't help but notice did everybody just follow Target, like Target put it in and then Walmart was like

this is probably people looking at that. I do. I do. There's a lot of kind of drama that happens with the buyers going into each other. That's so cool. Yes. So they definitely, you know, and Walmart was something I had to think about because I didn't know if that's necessarily where moms are going to shop. But now it's actually proven to be a place where our products self really well and we're in 4,000 stores nationwide, which is pretty, pretty surreal to think about.

But I think it just came very organically and naturally and it came back to some of the buyers actually being customers of ours. The brand social media presence was just so strong. And to your point, we were able to kind of use to serve any other competitor because what we were doing couldn't be replicated. I remember our salesperson came from a competitor and she said, we used to go on to your social media and we would try to pinpoint what it was that people loved

about you. Like why were you getting so many followers and so much engagement and so many comments and we couldn't understand it. We're trying to kind of piece apart why it's working. And so I think, you know, once you have that good formula, like the sales and the following will come with it and you don't have to shove your products down someone's throat to get there. Yeah, you have such an

amazing founder story, like what a cool story. Thank you. No investors, food strapped at all,

reinvested all your revenue, just group break by break so much organic. Like do you ever feel like this is just like fate? Like it's just, I'm definitely where I need. I should be and I'm still so passionate about what I do. I mean, every day to we get constant messages from mom saying, you know, you helped me through such a tough time in my breastfeeding journey. I couldn't have done it without you. So passion. Oh, absolutely. And I think the people that we hire are very

mission driven to wear primarily women. I mean, which makes sense. Our team really cares about these moms and babies that we're helping. And so we're also passionate about it, which is fun just to kind of just hear people's thoughts. You're like, oh, wow, I didn't know you cared so much. But also it just resonates with me because I want to work with other people who care to this deep of a level. And I think it just elevates us. Yeah. And we started out with a very small

skeleton crew. I mean, I think with every founder, you feel like you can do it best and ultimately

find that you're actually one stagnating growth because you think that you're the Jill of all trades and that you are the expert and actually there are people who are much smarter than you and much

“more people in certain areas. And you should probably focus on your strengths. Yeah. And I learned”

that the hard way at the time. And now we have a fantastic, very capable, very smart team that I

paying attention too much to the finances necessarily. And I'm really the same way. I've been getting more into it with my business. But I get more excited about creating new products, building community, being the visionary of the brand. And I've hired around the places where I'm weak. And every good founder should do that. So at some point, you were super burned out. And you were like, I need a leadership team, even your husband, I think, works for you. Yes, of what he does for you,

guys. But like, how have you designed your team? Oh, absolutely. Yes. So my husband is our COO. And we also have a very strong CFO. She is a dynamo. She's terrifying in the best ways. She's just so smart, so capable. I mean, when people say we all have the same hours in the day, she doesn't. I don't know how she gets the stuff done. She mazes me every single day. And she, she's very much looking into the financials and really digging in and trying to understand, because we

are on new channel, just not letting anything get out of control. Because that can happen very quickly. We're, you know, we were looking at TikTok shop. For example, the other day and we're like, what are all of these hidden fees? All of a sudden, we're paying 10% more than we were the previous

“month. And that can happen very quickly when you're on new channel. Because you just, you have to”

be able to kind of like get full control over what all of the distribution looks like in your sales channels. So I, I really credit her with helping us to get organized and implementing processes and all of that, which we're very much needed. We operated under a skeleton crew for quite a while and then we started hiring in marketing, accounting, and finance regulatory. So we have an in-house regulatory person who's essentially just looking to make sure that any claims that we

make are substantiated that we have research behind them and all that. I think it's really important. And I think a lot of brands get in trouble because, again, back to the Wild Wild West, where there's certain things you just can't say. Yeah, again, they're not proven. There's no research behind them. And that's where you kind of get the slap on the wrist from the FDA. So it's super important that you, you know, if you're thinking about working in supplements that you have a regulatory

team behind you, even if you're going to hire someone to do that for you. And you outsourced that. It's super important how that. But you primarily, our management team, our women, our head of product development as a woman, CFO, head of marketing, head of sales. And I just and you have

“a board now too, right? You have a board. And I think it was really important for me to see women”

in manager and director roles because I don't know about you, but I never had a female manager

before I saw you in the company. I just never saw that happen. And so I wanted especially young women who were starting with us, maybe this is their first job out of college to be able to see role models in their bosses. And I think that I want to be like this person in 10 years. And so I think it's fostered a lot of mutual respect amongst the team. We have clear expectations. I'll get on my soapbox for a second about the one thing that I is a pet peeve of mine is when

small businesses or companies will say we're all a family. I don't think that my team members are my family. I think it is actually an appropriate kind of even to relate to that because I have a family. I have two kids and there are certain things that they can say or do that I accept, because they're part of, you know, they're my kids. Yeah. So the other day my son said, I really didn't like the ham sandwich she made. It was really dry and terrible. I went dad

to make it next time. I have to accept that abuse for my son because he's my kid. Yeah.

“But I think that when we were permissive and we say that this is part of your family,”

well you don't pay your family to interact with you and hang out with you for eight hours a day. And you don't fire Terminator let go of your family. Yeah. I think that it sets unrealistic

expectations. I think what I'm always expecting from my team is mutual respect, mutual support,

clear expectations. And I think that we've really fostered that environment where we are kind to each other. We're able to have constructive discussions and discourse even if we don't agree on things, because again we're all very passionate about what we're doing. But ultimately we are here to help moms and babies. And I think we've done a fantastic job of that. So how many people are on your team and total would you say? There's about 40 of us all together. In all Austin

based. So we do have some remote people because I do think when you start to specialize. So for example, for Amazon, we found a team in California where that was kind of their bread and butter. It wasn't something that we can necessarily find in Austin. So wherever we need to,

basically where it makes the most sense where we're going to outsource. But we do try to keep

everyone in the Austin office if we can. Very cool. Okay. I want to do a little segment called founder failure. So I'm going to just read off some questions to you because we all learn best from failure. And why not help other people tuning in, not repeat the same mistakes that you necessarily did. So I go with that sounds good. All right. Let's do it. What was your worst

if I went back to Wyatt failed first, it would be because we weren't listening to our customers

in the way that we should have again obsessively listening to the customer and what they wanted. There were these breast milk bags. So if you are a pumping mom, you collect your milk into these milk bags that you then store in the fridge or freezer and then you could feed it to your baby at a different time. And we had gotten some feedback from mom saying that they're milk smelled off or tasted off after they thought the milk. And in me doing more research because I had

to put the Y hat back on and understand and do the, you know, do the deep dive. We realize that it can be due to light exposure. And so we created a bag that actually was completely opaque and had an oxidation layer inserted inside of it so that it couldn't, it could were basically prevented

“oxidation of the milk. Really cool product. Yeah. Very neat. And I think kind of ahead of its time.”

But then we realized, oh, because it was completely opaque when mom poured her, her bottle of milk in, she couldn't see any measurement lines of where she had actually how much she had pumped. And that was really important to mom because she's breaking these bags, putting them in the freezer. She needs to know the exact amount for, you know, a month from now when she goes in, in thoughts that that milk can feeds it to baby. So again, great idea, but we weren't like,

thinking of it through absolutely whole process. So that was a flub on our part and the product didn't really sell. And the people who who did like it, that was their main complaint is I can't see the milk anymore. And but unfortunately, the whole solution was it was going to help make your milk taste better and prevent that oxidation. But obviously, but you look for that right? Because then you put out another sort of physical product, right? That wasn't a supplement. And you do it

differently this time. Definitely primarily focused on supplements. We've kind of expanded into gear a little bit. We have one product. I'd say it was kind of like a spinoff of that one, which is a honey bear straw cup that has done phenomenally. I don't think any of us expected that it would do as well, but it was another kind of remake of a product that already exists and just trying to make it better. So we again looked at the customer feedback, what were moms really wanting and were it

able to create a version of that that was better. And I think the sales have proven that what was your biggest marketing flop? I probably took so many, you know, influencers and creators that we worked with that were, you know, early on, certain like reality TV stars that I cost you. I remember one was asking for like $20,000 to do one post and we did it. And I think we got like two sales from it. And you know, and you know, it's early days and everyone was kind of into this very,

“like the big, you know, influencers. That's what you were supposed to gravitate towards and you”

spend your money towards that. So, you know, we lived and learned. It was, it was a good learning lesson. But I do think TikTok shop, I can't even say that it's a bad investment because it has helped from a marketing perspective into your point about brand awareness. But from a purely sales channel,

I would never put all my eggs into that basket. On the flip side, I know that Facebook Instagram

has worked really well for you. Is there any other marketing channel that you want to highlight that we didn't talk about that? You're like, man, we get a ton of sales this way. And people might not think about that. I'm trying to think, I mean, Google for sure, Google odds are is another, okay. So you are doing a bit of ads. A bit of ads as well. Yes, we've, we've definitely started incorporating more on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Google as well. We also have email marketing.

We have a pretty robust email marketing channel as well. Quite a few subscribers that we've accumulated over the last decade. And I'd say the same premise that we use for social media is what we do for email marketing. So it's very much education first and then product second. And that has worked well for us. What was your most painful inventory mistake? So this is kind of the inverse of probably what a lot of founders have done is we're pretty conservative when it comes

to our purchase orders. Even now, I'm still very conservative because you just never know

if something is going to perform well or not. And we do have a warehouse in East Austin, but, you know, we have to conserve spaces. We do have quite a few other skews and we have to be mindful and smart about, you know, what we order because it needs to be funneling in and out. So a lot of it is

“like projections of what absolutely orders you have to be forecasting. And you know, sometimes it's”

like, this is how you forecast. That sounds good. I'll throw a number at the wall. But I remember we had a lunch. We were about to lunch. A drink mix was the first time we'd ever done this. It was called Sheast thirsty. And it's a really fun packaging. I love our, our Sheast thirsty packaging. And it's for pregnant and postpartum moms, breastfeeding moms to make sure they stay hydrated, especially during the summer months when your pregnant got you're just like chronically thirsty.

dehydrated coconut and then we had these really fun flavors. It tastes amazing. And I guess I didn't

really expect the demand for it and the excitement for it. And so we had a pretty conservative purchase order and we immediately sold out like within days, which sometimes is not a good thing. It isn't. It can be a good and bad thing. I mean, there was definitely a creative sense of urgency and we had people signing up for the wait list, but also you don't want to be out of stock too long because people forget about it. Right. They move on to the next thing. Or they try to find something

that's comparable to whatever that is. And so then we made a bigger purchase order and that's sold out. So it just kept happening until we were like, okay, we have to kind of go big with this. You know, probably bigger than we've ever done before and take the chance and take a risk. What's a decision that you made too slowly? A couple of things would be hiring out a very

“capable and competent team. I think we were too late on it and I put way too much stress and pressure”

on myself and experience very debilitating like physical and emotional burnout from it. And I was also managing, you know, two children and, you know, my husband and family life and home, you know, just household chores and just there was just so much on my plate and I wish I didn't think I had had to be the end all be all for the entire business because that's

a lot of pressure to put on one person. And there are some amazing people that we've hired that I

wish I hired earlier. And then the other thing is I think we probably could have tried, especially with Facebook, it was much cheaper to acquire customer like 10 years ago than it is now and the algorithm has changed so much, it's much more difficult to even have ads spend on there anymore. And I wish that we had maybe pulled the trigger a little bit earlier when it came to actually doing paid ads because there were several years where we weren't doing that and it was

“very much where to melt. And it worked well for us, but I think we probably could have”

expedited the business a little bit more by doing that. I feel like sometimes when you start a business, you're like, your brand is carrying you in the beginning. It is. And sometimes when you're going to have to invest in a different way or try something new and kind of get to that next level. And retail was like really big for you. Oh absolutely. In terms of like gross spur, they took us to the next step. They took you to the nightly and I think we talked about like

it garners a certain level of trust and authenticity to the brand when you see something you retail because you do think, oh, this has been a vetted brand. There's been some sort of testing to bring this into store or it's just very well loved, right? And you're kind of start to think, oh, I wonder if I want to try that now because it's there. It seemed a bit effortless for you to get into these retail stores, but what was your biggest retail challenge?

There are hidden costs and things that happen when it comes to inventory stock outs, not shipping inventory on time. But it's stock outs. So let's say they put in a purchase order for 100 units and at this moment in time, you'll only have 50 units available to send. You will get dinged for that and they will have leave. They will charge you. They will charge you for that. If you don't ship the products at a certain date, if it doesn't get there in time, they will find you.

So it means just as they're all the hidden costs, so you don't realize until you're in it. And some retailers are better than others and easier to work with, but they all have certain roles and requirements. It sounds like your husband has to worry about that. But that's, yeah, both like supply to, I would say he does a not fun stuff, but yeah, mostly supply chain and RCFOs is fantastic about making sure we're keeping up on all the inventory as well.

Okay, another game I want to play with you is a slot. And now it's not going to be fun. It's

“a great way to, I think, to kind of recap some of the things that we talked about. And this”

conversation has been incredible. I feel like people actually really learned a lot and I feel like

we've got a lot of great stories out of you. Definitely. Okay, so what would you say? Legendary Milks biggest strength is as a business. I would say the brand loyalty and trust. I think that has carried us for the last decade and I hope it continues to carry us. And what would you say your biggest weakness is as a business right now? There's so much stigma around breastfeeding and what that looks like in the US. There's just, I mean, go and read our Facebook and TikTok comments.

They're outrageous. Like people are still so disgusted by breastfeeding. And so I think there's just a hurdle of providing that education about why breastfeeding is so important and why breastfeeding rates are so low in the US. And so kind of getting past that hurdle is something we've been working on for the last 10 years and advocating, you know, for, for moms to not feel like this is just such an underserved community. It's still something that's very, I think there's still a lot of work

to be done. So that has been a huge hurdle because we'll, you know, we'll be randomly posting about a mom breastfeeding and, you know, and typically it's an older woman for some reason and she'll just be like, "Oh, that's gross. Cover up." And it takes away from the mom being able

to see things like that. So I don't know that that's, you know, bad for the business, but I just

think at the heart, I've always been about for me the support to mom and I just, I hate to see

comments like that because I think it, it takes away from the progress that we've made. So it's like battling like the culture around it. Absolutely. And like making it okay to look for this talk about that. I think it's gotten better, but there's just so much work to be done and I think that

“other countries have got it right and it's just a part of life. You know, well, maybe you need to go”

on more podcasts. Maybe that is. How about you being a bootstrap business and not having an investor. And like, I know a lot of, uh, I just talked to a lady who has this company called Rebel Cheese. She's making about 20 million. She's also in retail doing great. And for the first time ever, she's like raising like $5 million or something to help with marketing and paid ads and get her to that next level. Do you feel like it's a weakness or a strength that you would strap?

I don't see it as necessarily a weakness. Um, you know, we've, we don't have any debt. We've never

had any capital investment, no loans. I think that also we've not had any overnight success. You know, I think you probably have had brands where maybe there are a few years old and and maybe they had a, uh, someone, within the celebrity world who posted about them and that was just like overnight success, which is amazing. But we've kind of just been slowly chipping away at it over the last 10 years. It's been consistent and we've been profitable every single year. But we didn't get from

zero to 50 million in the first year. And I appreciate that stability and consistency because I don't think a lot of brands think of it that way or operate that way. They want to have that like overnight crazy success. And I don't think that that helps with longevity. If that's what you're really thinking

“about where if you want to be here in 10 or 20 years, I think probably the better way is to think”

about it in small increments and just slowly continuously to grow. Yeah. So is this more of a lifestyle

brand for you that you want to do forever or do you guys plan on selling the business? I would like to continue. I mean, I still have a lot of energy and passion for what we're doing. And I think you can also expand beyond, um, just postpartum too. I mean, I think that there are so many chapters of a woman's life that are underserved. I'm now going into Perry Menopause. And I mean, talk about like people sweeping symptoms and and chronic issues under the rug. Like that's a

huge aspect of it where there's not enough research done for women. And we're told that all of these hormonal imbalances and issues are just normal. It's part of being a woman, um, and I don't accept that. So I think that there, there's a way for a legendary monk to expand beyond kind of the postpartum. Kind of grow with you as you grow. Absolutely. Yes. As your passions change. Definitely. Just like really awesome that your customer gets to really grow with you. So let's talk about

opportunities. What do you think are the biggest opportunities of your brand legendary milk? I think there's still opportunities for retail expansion. I mean, there's still various retailers that we're talking to international expansion. We've, I talked a little bit about, you know, the U.S. being the Wild Wild West. And I actually really appreciate that in other countries. There's a whole plethora of documentation that has to be happened from like the government levels

even get your products. It, you know, to be sold there because they, they just have a lot more scrutiny on them. Um, so, you know, I think that's a goal for us is to start selling in Canada and Australia and part of the Middle East. And they're our breastfeeding moms all over the world. And we would like to be able to cater to them as well. So definitely opportunities for international expansion. And then just expanding the product line as well. I think there's still opportunities for us

in conception, fertility, the pregnancy period and postpartum as well. Last threats. What do you think are the biggest threats of your business? I don't see it necessarily as a threat. But I do see competitors pop up all the time, which I appreciate because, you know, kind of speaking about back to, you know, when I started this 10 years ago, there weren't a lot of options. It was Fenigreek and kind of cookies and lactation cookies and brownies, and that was it. And I think that mom

“should have options. I think it's really important to, for her to feel like we have unique body”

chemistries and networks for one mom might not work for another. And I don't want her to ever feel like she's run out of options and solutions for her. So I see other brands popping up all the time and I love that. I think it's great to have healthy competition and it makes us better, too. Yeah, I love that. Well, thank you for that swat's brand. So I feel like that went really well. I'm going to do that with every vendor. That's from now on. So let's talk about if somebody can

actually copy this. Now, of course, you own 70% of the lactation supplement market. So you've got a mo, I don't think anyone's going to try to compete against you. But if they want to launch a different supplement for hair loss or whatever, you know, problem that they're suffering from, that they found a solution for, what is an industry secret that you feel like you really got to let them know? Oh, absolutely. I mean, I think again, religiously following your customers,

feedback and comments take it to heart, understand what they're telling you. That is a gold mine.

We're in my reviews too. Oh, my gosh. We have the reviews read. I mean, we will get DMs from

moms, just unprovoked, just unsolicited feedback of like, hey, I liked this product. But I wish it had been X, Y and Z. And we take that's a heart. We have a whole spreadsheet where we're

“following that feedback. I think it's really important to enter. I mean, this is the jackpot you're”

hitting when your customers are actually willing to give you feedback. I think about all of the different products that you use on a daily basis. Do you typically go to these brands and tell them what you did or did not like about it? Probably not. Yeah. So if they're giving that to you unprompted, that's a gold mine. Yeah. So definitely be reading that, reading the feedback, go to the places that your customers are at. So I joined the Reddit forums. I look at the Facebook

groups. Again, I want to be, I'm not actively breastfeeding, but I want to understand what moms

pain points are and what they're experiencing in this period of time in 2026. Yeah, because it looks very different than 2016 when I had my baby. Yeah. So I think that's really important for any brand is I promise you they are not interested in your product. Find a way to relate to them in a way that you understand their pain point and then relate it to your product. Go back to that Janet Jackson song. What have you done for me lately? And think about that in any time that you

make a social media post. You make an email, you do a paid ad. Think about the pain point for that respect of customer and what you put yourself in there. She's in what you would want from them. So smart. If somebody wanted to start a supplement brand, I know you started with $750, but that was 10 years ago. Very different times now. What do you think is like the appropriate budget that they should save up for? If they want to bootstrap it, I think it's so different now.

I wish I could even quantify what that would look like now because I know it's a much more saturated market. So competitive. And you have these like $1,000 brands who have so much investment behind them already. You know, I think Groen's is one of them. Yeah. Like they had so much backing behind them. Celebrity backing. I know the investors already and were able to kind of

“catapult sales from that. It's a lot harder if you don't have that. But I think you have to understand”

what your premise is as well. I think Groen's, I think they said something about the science wasn't important to them. The clinical research, it was about it just tasting good from a compliance standpoint. And so that's what their laurels are. That's, you know, kind of their mission is to make good tasting supplements that maybe aren't necessarily as effective. And that's fine because I think that there's a lot of consumers who wouldn't, they enjoy the, the, got me's,

they want to keep taking them. And they'll continue to take them and probably get some benefit from it. Yeah. And so I think just understanding what you bring to the market, that's what makes you different. Absolutely. What are your key differentiators? Because it's a very saturated market. And I have seen small brands just burn to the ground because they didn't understand how they were different. And how could they get different shape in the market? Okay. So let's say your,

somebody wants to be a founder and new founder. You saved up $10,000 to launch your product. What would you tell them to do with that $10,000? I would say find out what your strengths are and outsource everything else early on because they, I promise they're experts in the field. You are more educated on this, more competent, who can absolutely help you right out the gate. Definitely bringing, bringing some sort of awareness or creating some sort of awareness on social media.

That's free advertisement for you, create a present there. So it's like figure out what your brand is. Absolutely. Absolutely. What's your mission for sure? Yes. Definitely. I think there's something to gorilla marketing. I think Kendra Scott does this a lot or she did early on where any time that she was opening up a new store, she very much entrenched herself in community events and really creating a presence in whatever city or town that she was in. So start local.

So start local. I think that there's definitely some, some validity to that. And also is a great way to get a kind of a mini focus group of people who can give you feedback on what they like or don't. Absolutely. Or try to get an investor. It's probably like holes because you're your own like tunnel vision, right? You have a certain goal in mind. You think this is going to be the next great product. But there are probably holes that someone could pick through it because they're

not so closely attached to it the way that you are. Would you recommend that? So you were saying

start local. But how about Amazon? Do you feel like that's like the second step is like getting your

stuff on Amazon? Or should it be DTC or on website? I mean, I think that there's benefits to both. I will say Amazon has changed so much over the last 10 years and probably what I did where we listed, I helped, I launched everything on our Amazon by myself. Probably wouldn't cut it these days.

“I just think it's very competitive on there now and you have to have your optimized listings in”

your, your A+ content in your PDP images and there's a lot of compliance that comes with that with supplements. So that's another thing is that we didn't touch on. It's just getting insurance.

God forbid anything happen. It's really important that you have insurance for the business because

“supplements are again something that you ingest and there comes a level of risk when it”

associated with that. For somebody who's out there tuning in and they really want to start a business

and they're similar to you in terms of like, they're a little bit more introverted. But they

“have a great idea. What is your final piece of advice to them? I think I would go back to start”

small reinvest in the business and obsessively follow what your consumers or future consumers are

saying and what they want. Because there's there's probably some validity to what you want to launch but they'll pick at those holes and make it better for you. Luna, thank you so much for joining us on how we do it on the budget profiting. Thank you so much. Thank you. I appreciate it.

“And that's how Luna and legendary milk profit. Every business has a hidden engine and today we”

learned that for a consumer wellness brand, the real leverage is trust. Luna built trust with her community before she ever asked for the sale and that trust became her biggest growth channel. Thanks for listening to how we profit Wednesdays. The young and profiting series where real entrepreneurs share real numbers, real margins and the real story of how their business is actually work. I'm Halita and I'll see you next time.