How This Founder Hit Rock Bottom, Turned Her Life Around & Launched a Best-Selling Wellness Brand with Mari Llewellyn, Founder of Bloom Nutrition

Mari Llewellyn is the founder of Bloom Nutrition, a health supplement company designed to help everyone bloom into their best selves. Although she is now a renowned expert, serial entrepreneur, and influencer in the health and fitness industry, her journey wasn’t always this way.

During her college years, Mari weighed 250 pounds and was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder. This marked the lowest point in her life. Realizing that something had to change, she turned to fitness, which became her passion. This journey ultimately planted the seed for what would eventually become her company, Bloom Nutrition. In her early days of getting healthy, she walked into a GNC and noticed that most products were geared toward men. In response, she and her husband launched Bloom in 2019 to fill that gap. Fast forward to today, Bloom ships over 100,000 orders a month and is the top-selling greens powder on Amazon, amassing more than 100 million views on TikTok each month.

In this episode, Mari shares her story from growing up and hitting rock bottom in college to dropping out and completely transforming her life. We dive into how she lost 90 pounds and the critical role nutrition played in improving her mental and physical well-being. Mari also discusses how a single Instagram post, when she had just 900 followers, sparked the growth of her brand and community. Although she didn't plan on becoming an entrepreneur, her passion for sharing her story led her to start a business selling PDF fitness guides, which later expanded to resistance bands from her dad's attic.

Mari gives a behind-the-scenes look at launching Bloom, covering challenges like product pivots, rejections from retailers like Target and Walmart, and how they eventually succeeded. We discuss the power of influencer marketing, building a community, managing multiple businesses, launching a podcast, and so much more.

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

* Mari's struggles with mental health. [03:03]

* Her diagnosis of borderline personality disorder. [06:33]

* Mari’s fitness journey of losing 90 pounds. [12:31]

* Posting her before-and-after photos on Instagram. [20:07]

* Organic growth and community building in business. [22:47]

* The success of Bloom’s PDF guide. [24:59]

* Development of Bloom’s popular greens powder. [31:07]

* Securing product placements in Target and Walmart. [33:40]

* The influencer program & how it impacted their growth. [38:25]

* The biggest challenges in scaling the business. [42:13]

* Bringing in a business partner and future plans for Bloom. [49:07]

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 Mari:

* Website: https://bloomnu.com/

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

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

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