The Founder Series is a column by and about Utah founders and how they got to where they are today. Click here to read past articles in the series.

In 2015, I was living in Spain, an entire ocean away from my community of family and friends back in Provo, Utah. I had just given birth to twin girls, and my postpartum experience was anything but smooth. 

Though I had given birth to my first child while living in Italy a few years earlier, I wasn’t prepared for the hormonal roller coaster that shook me as I recovered from this pregnancy and delivery. I had looked forward to getting my girls here safely, and I was so grateful to have two beautiful, healthy daughters. 

But the truth is, I just didn’t feel like myself. 

For months, I struggled with symptoms that interfered with my ability to function. Debilitating menstrual cycles kept me bedridden, outbreaks of hormonal acne limited my desire to interact socially, and erratic mood swings left me wondering what had happened to the old Jess. 

My gut instinct told me that there had to be a better way. I wanted to heal and not just “grin and bear it” like so many women before me. I reached out to a circle of female friends, pleading for suggestions, advice, wisdom and compassion. Fortunately, I found all four in Cody Sanders. As an extended family member, Cody felt like a trusted place to turn. 

I shared with her my frustration about looking for doctors who could solve my issues. Their answers had always felt like trite, disinterested band-aid solutions. “Have you tried Midol?” “Give it time. It might just work itself out.” “Let’s try a different birth control.” In contrast, Cody really listened to me, and she introduced me to a holistic health approach that ended up changing both our lives.

More than a magic pill

Cody had been on her own journey, studying for years to better understand natural approaches to nutrition, exercise and wellness. Using her skills as a functional nutritionist and holistic health practitioner, she formulated a treatment for women suffering from symptoms like mine. She offered the remedy to her clients as gel capsules, and those women had reported impressive results. I was totally new to the holistic approach and didn’t understand much about hormone imbalance, so I admit I was a little skeptical — but I was also desperate. I wanted to feel like myself again and be the mother my three kids deserved. 

When Cody gave me my first set of capsules, she included a sobering caveat. “Look, everyone wants an instant solution,” she cautioned. “They want to take one pill that will fix everything overnight. That’s not what this is.” She told me I needed to commit to being consistent for 90 days. She also wanted me to keep a record of how I was feeling and the severity of my symptoms over the next few months. She knew that addressing the nutritional deficiencies that lead to symptoms of hormone imbalance takes time. 

True to Cody’s instructions, my symptoms didn’t disappear when I took the first pill — but they did start to improve in the first month. I wondered if it was just a placebo effect, but I kept my promise to be consistent and dutifully took one capsule a day. By the end of the third month, I called Cody and said, “You must be a genius or a witch. I feel like myself again! What is this magic?” 

My second question was less tongue-in-cheek and much more heartfelt: “How can we get this in the hands of women everywhere?” I believed women deserved to know there was a solution. They deserved to feel as good as I felt.

A sippable success

The only problem? We had no idea where to start. We knew we had a product (now officially named Hertime) that worked, but Cody was motivated to improve the formula’s absorbability by offering it as a powder that could be mixed with water. Changing the delivery from a capsule you swallow to a drink you sip meant it had to taste good enough that women would choose to make it a part of their daily routines. That decision led us to the name of our company: Mixhers. 

In 2019, without much more than an Instagram profile and a website, we launched our company with Hertime as our first and only product. We felt like nervous trailblazers, as we were some of the first women to tackle the somewhat taboo topic of women’s periods in such a public way. 

While we knew there were so many women who experienced disruptive PMS symptoms, we couldn’t have anticipated the enthusiastic response coupled with deep waves of gratitude that came pouring back into our business. Like me, these women had suffered in isolation. They thought that feeling sidelined from life every month was just the price they had to pay for being female. They didn’t realize that relief through hormone balance was possible. 

One of the most satisfying parts of founding and running this company is the connection I feel with our customers. I love when women approach me and share their Mixhers stories with me. They tell me about their own lives and how our products have helped them thrive. They tell me about their mothers, daughters, sisters and friends who have experienced the same restorative transformation I did. Hearing these stories is deeply rewarding and motivating to me, Cody, and our entire Mixhers team — now 35 women (and three men!) strong.

What started as a company that helped women resolve PMS symptoms has rapidly grown into a company that offers 15 nutritional, sippable supplements formulated for women. Our Hergreens launch quickly gained a loyal and passionate fan base that loves getting the health benefits of greens like broccoli, kale and spirulina in craveable flavor profiles like mint limeade, pink grapefruit and mango. 

When we approached the manufacturer we were working with at the time with our formula for a woman’s libido support supplement called Herpleasure, a room full of men emphatically pushed back against our idea. They thought women’s libido was too taboo to market and even told us that women don’t want to hear about or discuss their sex drive. We disagreed, and we put it in writing by putting up a Herpleasure billboard on the side of I-15 to normalize conversations about women’s sexual health and satisfaction. Customer demand created such overwhelming web traffic that our website crashed nine times on launch day.

Trust falls and triumphs

Not every product launch has been flawless. In fact, one of my most humbling experiences as a CEO was the launch of Hernightly. Instead of writing “Hernightly” on our packaging, we realized the night before launch day that thousands and thousands of sticks of the product said “Hernigthly” instead. My stomach dropped when I realized the mistake, thinking that this could be the end of Mixhers. As a young startup company, we couldn’t afford to delay the launch and rerun the product. 

Instead of throwing in the towel, we decided to trust our customers instead. We promoted the product while acknowledging the mistake in an open and humorous way. Customers laughed with us as we laughed at ourselves, and the “Hernigthly” saga is now part of Mixhers lore.

One of the most challenging times as the founder of Mixhers was when I realized I needed more help. Cody and I hired our first employee, Kara Atkisson, early on. The three of us kept Mixhers humming for the first two-and-a-half years. But company growth also meant growing pains. As much as I loved Cody and Kara and as passionate as I was about our mission and product, I still felt like I was drowning. I had to learn to release the reins I was gripping so tightly and ask for help. 

As we continued to scale our business, I realized that to be the best CEO I can be, I can’t also handle all the decisions about marketing, operations, HR, accounting, etc. Today, I am incredibly proud of our Mixhers team. They are so bright and driven. It’s been a beautiful thing to see each new employee step into their role and just crush it. Many employees actually had their first touchpoint with the company as consumers — they fell in love with our products first and then sought out a position. I truly love our Mixhers family! 

Fueled by women 

Looking ahead, the future of Mixhers is bright. We have customers in every state, we’ve expanded into wholesale and retail markets, and our subscribers continue to be the foundation of our success. We’ll continue to launch new products that can help women live healthy, fulfilling lives, and we’ll continue to strengthen our brand presence on a national level. We have so many exciting things to roll out in 2024. We know that women evolve, and Mixhers will, too! Our team has been hard at work on a new look for Mixhers that emphasizes our clinical credibility while still embracing our joyful, aspirational branding. 

As we’ve grown, I’ve been fortunate to expand my circle of mentors and advisors. I feel like I can turn to them when Mixhers has crossroad decisions to make. I’ll always be grateful for the village of women who have “raised” us, supported us and contributed to our success. I’ve also realized the value of trusting my own gut. I trusted my intuition as a struggling postpartum mom back in 2015 when I turned to Cody for help, and I plan to continue trusting that same gut instinct as I help Mixhers thrive as advocates for women’s hormone health.