Laviree has worked in the healthcare industry for the last 15 years. But her journey to WTHN began with a personal health transformation. Six years ago, she had a ski accident that left her with chronic neck pain. After countless rounds of physical therapy and other treatments, she tried acupuncture and herbal medicine. Not only did they give her pain relief, but also she found herself sleeping better, less stressed, and with a stronger immune system that resulted in fewer sick days.
“The entrepreneurship journey is all about highs and lows and navigating those extremes, which can be exhausting,” says Laviree. “There is no boss or mentor or built-in comforts like in any other job I have had in the past, so a lot of self-reliance is required. One of the most helpful things I have done is to build out my own very strong support network that includes mentors, colleagues, other founders, and friends.
Along with business partner Max Spielberg, CEO David Johnson founded Genexa because as new fathers, they discovered that there were no clean medicines for their children to take. “We were shocked to find out that many oral medicationsand almost half contain ingredients like lactose, hard-to-digest sugars and more. We believed medicine could and should be made cleaner, so we decided to do something about it.
Johnson grew up in a healthy household with parents who were naturopathic physicians and used only clean, organic ingredients in everything from food to cleaning products. When he had his son, he therefore found it “extremely frustrating” to not be able to find medicines without ingredients like red dye no. 40 and sucrose. “Everyone deserves clean, safe medicine that works. Being able to provide that to consumers worldwide is my life’s purpose,” he says.
To aspiring changemakers and entrepreneurs, Johnson offers this advice. “Do the thing you can’t stop thinking about, even if you don’t know where to start. My partner and I weren’t scientists, pharmacists or doctors. We were two dads who believed there was a better way. A lot of doors were slammed in our faces, but we didn’t stop trying. We couldn’t stop thinking about what the world would look like if we could make another industry cleaner.