Katlin Smith is the founder and CEO of Simple Mills, a healthy food company that only uses simple whole food ingredients.

Katlin founded Simple Mills after cleaning up her own diet and seeing incredible results. In 2012, Katlin was working as a management consultant, traveling often, and relying on convenient packaged foods to suit her on-the-go lifestyle. She wasn’t feeling her best and decided to switch to a primarily whole foods-based diet to see if her food choices were to blame. After witnessing her own transformation and then feeling restless in her job, she began experimenting in her kitchen with grain-free, paleo-friendly muffin recipes to create healthy alternatives to sugar-packed treats. A buyer at a nearby Whole Foods agreed to sell Katlin's muffin mixes and placed an order for twelve bags. Initially, Katlin hand-mixed ingredients in food-grade barrels due to a lack of funds for a mixer. She demoed her mixes in three Whole Foods stores and, seeing the demand, quit her day job to focus on Simple Mills. Over a decade later, Simple Mills leads in the cracker, cookie, and baking mix categories, selling in over 30,000 stores.

In this week’s episode, Katlin emphasizes the importance of self-belief and shares advice on building the courage needed to take significant leaps. She discusses the challenges of creating her first product without a baking background, perfecting the taste, and getting Simple Mills into retailers while working full-time. Katlin shares her corporate experience and the realities of running her business on the side, including dropping out of business school, early funding strategies, and dealing with difficult conversations with misaligned investors. She also provides insights on avoiding burnout, common misconceptions about starting a business, her evolving leadership style, and more.

In this episode, we’ll talk to Katlin about:

* The importance of self-belief in Katlin’s journey. [03:10]

* What helped Katlin during times of uncertainty. [06:06]

* Katlin’s childhood and upbringing. [08:26]

* Katlin’s early entrepreneurial spirit. [11:47]

* Creating the first product in her kitchen despite having no background in baking. [18:16]

* Hurdles in perfecting the food taste. [21:06]

* Getting the product into retailers while having a full-time job. [22:37]

* The origin of the name Simple Mills. [29:40]

* The impact an influencer had early on in her business. [31:39]

* Funding the business and the fall-out of their first potential investor. [34:23]

* Getting $200,000 from her parents and going all in. [40:24]

* How Katlin avoids burnout and stays grounded. [44:22]

* Misconceptions about starting a business. [47:50]

* Lessons learned in the Simple Mills journey. [49:36]

This episode is brought to you by Beeya:

* If you or anyone you know have been struggling with hormonal imbalances and bad periods, go to https://beeyawellness.com/free to download the free guide to tackling hormonal imbalances and to learn more about Beeya’s seed cycling bundle.

* Plus, get $10 off your order by using promo code BEHINDHEREMPIRE10

Follow Yasmin:

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yasminknouri/

* Website: https://www.behindherempire.com/

Follow Katlin:

* Website: https://www.simplemills.com/

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/simplemills/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's true, women need more sleep than men, and hormonal changes throughout our lives can make it challenging to get the deep sleep we need. In today's episode, we dive into sleep and other ways we can optimize our brain health, emotional resilience and overall longevity through our daily habits.

In this episode you’ll learn:

* Why women need to pay attention to brain health

* The best sleep aids that benefit the whole body

* How many hours of sleep we actually need

* The truth about alcohol, sleep and brain health

* What to consider before taking melatonin

* How to exercise for better cognition

* And more…

Neurophysiologist and human performance coach, Louisa Nicola is the founder and head performance advisor of Neuro Athletics - a consulting firm that boasts the best athletes in the world. By using science driven data from EEG scans, labs tests and cognitive assessments, Louisa has a first class ticket inside the brain of elite NBA and MLB stars. Louisa graduated from the University of Sydney medical school with a master of medicine in neurophysiology and is currently completing her doctorate under the guidance of Dr. Tommy Wood at UW, studying the effects of resistance exercise on the brain.

This episode is brought to you by Beeya:

* If you or anyone you know have been struggling with hormonal imbalances and bad periods, go to https://beeyawellness.com/free to download the free guide to tackling hormonal imbalances and to learn more about Beeya’s seed cycling bundle.

* Plus, get $10 off your order by using promo code BEHINDHEREMPIRE10

Follow Yasmin:

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yasminknouri/

* Website: https://www.behindherempire.com/

Follow Louisa Nicola:

* Website: https://www.neuroathletics.com.au/hybridcoachingprogram

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/louisanicola_/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Michelle Wahler is the co-founder and former CEO of Beyond Yoga, a company that’s on a mission to give every body the luxury-level comfort they deserve from activewear.

Coming from the fashion world, Michelle realized the need for a body positive brand with pieces that flatter a wide range of women’s bodies. After creating her own line which started as a side hustle, she met and then partnered with Jodi to build Beyond Yoga in 2005. Michelle has built the product and brand from the ground up and served as its CEO for nearly 20 years. What started as a mere concept led to a global wholesale business, ecommerce site and opening of six retail stores, selling tens of millions of units around the world. She also led the negotiations and her team through the brand’s acquisition to Levi Strauss & Co in 2021 for a reported $400 million dollars.

In this week’s episode, we talk to Michelle about how the idea for Beyond Yoga started, the initial challenges and investments involved in getting it off the ground, and the importance of staying profitable and reinvesting in the company for long-term success. Michelle shares insights into the early strategies that led to incredible success, including the introduction of their popular space dye fabric, and the lessons learned from partnerships they pursued. She walks us through how Beyond Yoga lost over six million dollars in revenue in one week and how she navigated the business through such challenging times. Michelle also offers valuable advice on avoiding burnout, how they ended up selling to Levi’s despite never wanting to sell the business, and so much more.

In this episode, we’ll talk to Michelle about:

* The importance of giving yourself grace. [03:42]

* Sustainable and profitable growth of Beyond Yoga. [05:15]

* Michelle's upbringing and her relationship with her parents. [07:40]

* Initial work experiences and starting her first venture, Unsweetened. [09:50]

* Meeting her business partner, Jodi. [11:05]

* Biggest learnings from Unsweetened. [16:54]

* Funding the business and finding the right contractors locally. [20:14]

* A major inflection point: Introducing space dye fabric. [29:16]

* Hiring her husband as the COO/CFO. [31:31]

* Michelle’s learnings as a leader. [36:19]

* Michelle’s experience of motherhood. [39:15]

* Saving Beyond Yoga during COVID and millions in lost revenue.[46:03]

* Selling Beyond Yoga to Levi Strauss & Co for $400 million. [54:03]

* Re-investing and her first experience with investors. [59:39]

* Advice she would give her younger self. [01:02:26]

This episode is brought to you by Beeya:

* If you or anyone you know have been struggling with hormonal imbalances and bad periods, go to https://beeyawellness.com/free to download the free guide to tackling hormonal imbalances and to learn more about Beeya’s seed cycling bundle.

* Plus, get $10 off your order by using promo code BEHINDHEREMPIRE10

Follow Yasmin:

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yasminknouri/

* Website: https://www.behindherempire.com/

Follow Michelle:

* Website: https://beyondyoga.com/

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/beyondyoga/

* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michelle.wahler/

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.