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The Irresistible Factor Podcast focuses on brands in the health and wellness space that want to become irresistible to consumers, investors and retailers. Kristi Bridges is the President and CEO of The Sawtooth Group where she has worked for over 20 years to create innovative, relevant strategies to bring brands and their consumers closer together. She is one of the creators of I-Factor®, the first and only research tool designed to understand today's digital consumer's relationship to brands.
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There are some categories where it feels like the world does not need one more brand. Fitness is one of them, especially Pilates. So when I sat down with Michael Ramsey, Co-founder and Co-CEO of Strong Pilates, I wanted to understand how they’re breaking through in spite of that. This was the line that stayed with me: The problem wasn’t Pilates. It was everything else people still needed. That’s the insight behind Strong. People love Pilates. They believe in it. But they al...
Most wearables track one thing at a time: steps, sleep, heart rate. Nanowear is building something entirely new: a single piece of fabric that acts like a full physical exam whenever you wear it. CEO and co-founder Venk Varadan started the company nearly ten years ago with his father, Dr. Vijay Varadan, after discovering a breakthrough textile that can read the body without adhesives or multiple devices. One fabric-based sensor captures heart, lungs, blood pressure, respiration, and metabolic...
When Arisa Katayama had her daughter in LA during COVID, she did what most first-time moms do: focused on the birth and the baby, not herself. Then the fourth trimester hit. Sleep-deprived, still breastfeeding late into the night, she kept opening a half-empty fridge filled with leftovers and frozen pizza, realizing there was nothing truly nourishing or postpartum-safe for her. That moment became the seed for For Her by Arisa, a Japanese-born brand now launching in the U.S. with postpartum re...
Reinventing Practitioner Commerce with Jon Armstrong When tech entrepreneur Jon Armstrong set out to simplify his own supplement routine, he uncovered a much bigger problem: practitioners were losing patients, and profits, to Amazon. His answer was GetHealthy.store, a turnkey e-commerce and marketing platform that gives health and wellness professionals custom storefronts, operational support, and access to thousands of vetted, clinical-grade products. Key takeaways from our conversation: ...
After two decades in biotech and a near-fatal heart attack at 43, Gary Seelhorst realized that success without self-awareness isn’t sustainable. He left corporate life to build Prime Peak Executive Coaching, a practice that helps leaders align peak performance with personal well-being. What started as volunteer work guiding veterans through career transitions has become a fast-growing, referral-only coaching business for executives and founders. Key takeaways from our conversation: Wellness d...
Economist turned founder Mette Dyhrberg didn’t plan to enter healthcare; she just wanted her life back. After collecting six autoimmune diagnoses in her twenties, she started tracking everything she was doing, eating, and feeling for months and months. She then used that data to uncover the cause of her symptoms and reverse them within 16 months, something that the medical community was not able to do. That personal discovery turned into MuneHealth, a platform created to help patients with au...
Radiologist turned founder, Dr. Cristin Dickerson, didn’t plan to run a company, she just wanted to do her job. But after seeing hospital acquisitions triple imaging prices and claims processes fail patients and doctors alike, Dr. Cristin looked to an unlikely category to find a solution. She built Green Imaging: a “Travelocity-style” marketplace that buys unused scanner time, bundles the entire episode of care, and passes transparent savings to employers and patients. Key takeaways from our ...
“It was very hard to accept, but I had to face the reality that our business was never going to give us the return we deserved. That was a mature set of decisions, to give up on dreams and accept defeat,” she says. As you can see, Kelly Spillane has lived both sides of the CPG journey. She started in Ireland as a founder, building a jam and marmalade company with her sister and even landing on supermarket shelves and high-end delicatessens in Paris, London, and New York. But after years of in...
What began with Matt’s own martial arts injury grew into a business model that now includes international instructor training, wellness retreats, and tailored protocols for everyone from elite athletes to entrepreneurs. His story is both exciting and inspiring. But building Cold Club hasn’t been easy. Matt has had to navigate the realities of entrepreneurship, scaling globally, wearing every hat, and planning for sustainable growth in a crowded wellness industry. 3 Key Takeaways 1. Buil...
For Emily Stein, the path from Stanford scientist to startup founder wasn’t straightforward. What began with a deeply personal motivation, preventing her grandmother from losing more teeth after a stroke, has turned into building Primal Health, an international company tackling one of healthcare’s most overlooked problems: oral health. Emily has led Primal Health through the challenges of launching products in both the human and pet markets, raising capital in a tough environment, and educati...
If you’re trying to sell ideas, products, and technology in the Healthcare industry, this podcast is for you. For Brendan McAdams, sales in healthcare isn’t about pushing products, it’s about creating real fit, listening deeply, and helping founders build businesses that last. As the founder of Kiinetics, Brendan has worked with health tech startups and entrepreneurs to navigate one of the toughest industries out there: selling into hospitals, payers, and health systems. With a career spannin...
After nearly burning out at her high-pressure job, Aisha Chottani knew something had to change. She swapped caffeine for meditation, cut sugar from her diet, and started paying attention to how she felt. The results were transformative, and they sparked the idea for Drink Moment. Launched in 2020, Moment is a functional beverage brand inspired by the feeling you get after meditating. With no caffeine, alcohol, or added sugar, each can is infused with adaptogens to help reduce stress, support ...
When Roger Ford heard the word “move” during a late-night meditation, he didn’t expect it to uproot his life. But within weeks, he and his wife had sold their healing center in the UK, bought a home in California online, and launched a brand-new chapter. That leap of faith became Healing in America, a nonprofit dedicated to making energy healing more accessible and more credible within the U.S. healthcare system. “We teach people to follow their intuition,” Roger says. “So we had to live that...
Lisa Boduch is taking it head-on, with a career that began in the salon and evolved into national leadership roles. She understands both sides of the beauty industry. Now serving as VP of Sales and Education at Alfaparf Milano, Lisa is applying decades of experience to drive growth for a professional Italian brand that’s stayed intentionally boutique. Her approach? Clear identity, disciplined storytelling, and meaningful innovation. In an industry often crowded by copycat products and big-box...
“PX stands for patient experience,” says Shareef Mahdavi, founder of the PX Movement. “My mission is to change the way that patients experience going to the doctor.” With PX90, he’s applying his decades of experience in healthcare and customer service to help practices rethink their environments, retrain their teams, and rebuild trust, starting with a 90-day, exercise-themed program that includes warm-ups, cool-downs, and strategic “workouts.” At its core, PX90 is about the mindset of the phy...
“You should always be heading toward something you’re proud of,” he says. “Something that feels like a meaningful contribution.” That’s why, after a career negotiating some of the biggest deals in the travel industry, Lou Zameryka decided to build something with a much deeper impact. That mindset led Lou and his co-founder, Andrew, to the much-discussed notion of healthspan. Instead of asking how long people can live, they started asking: How well can they live? The answer: Alively, an ...
After struggling to lose weight and finding existing fitness apps confusing or ineffective, Peter Conroy, former investment banker and now healthcare advocate, decided to build his own solution. That decision led to The Difference App, a predictive, AI-powered tool that helps users track weight with greater accuracy and personalization. Conroy’s approach centers around TrueBurn™, a proprietary algorithm that adjusts your estimated calorie burn based on your actual daily weight changes and oth...
Dr. Brian Levine wears two hats: founder of Nodal and founding partner at CCRM New York. His career began with a passion for genetics, but over time, it grew into something bigger, helping families. “I’d have to say, it’s been one of my greatest achievements, having the opportunity to work here and provide care to patients,” he shares. At Nodal, Levine set out to challenge an industry that was burdening hopeful parents with high fees and long waits. He saw an opportunity to build a transparen...
For Paul Buckley, U.S. Director of Sales and Marketing at Withings, joining the company was about more than a new role. “I wanted to do something that makes a difference in people’s lives—and Withings does that every day,” he says. Withings has been innovating since 2009, when it launched the world’s first smart scale. Today, the brand is known for pushing the boundaries of connected health, creating devices that help people track and understand their bodies well before problems arise. Key ta...
“There is no secret sauce of overnight success—it’s just a constant ‘what’s next.’” — Anthony Kjenstad, Founder & CEO of Firefly Recovery Anthony Kjenstad didn’t set out to build a consumer brand. But after a career in medical device distribution and a request to solve a real problem, helping patients prevent blood clots post-surgery, he developed a wearable recovery device now used by elite athletes across the country. Today, Firefly Recovery serves college and professional sports teams,...
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