It’s time to give (or get) a handj*b to check sperm

No thiiiiiis JVN episode is your best ever. Okay Barbra Walter’s go off!! Such a good epi and SO many details it’s incredible. Good job girl!!! - Executive at Shopify

ICYMI ⋆˚✿˖°

This week was BUSY.

I hosted our first-ever brand event at our home for our latest HSR Ventures portfolio company, Bird&Be (use HSR15 for 15% off), to celebrate their launch into 300 Ulta doors and Ulta.com — and we did it for the first time as husband and wife!!!

Courtney and I personally invested alongside a much larger HSR Ventures syndicate investment into Bird&Be earlier this year. You might not have heard of them yet... but you're about to.

They’re leading the charge in prenatal supplements and fertility testing. And when I say leading, I don’t mean market share (yet!) — I mean formulation.

This part is important to read if you are or want to be pregnant one day.

Bird&Be is the only supplement on the market formulated by both OBGYN and Naturopathic doctors, that actually puts the health of the mother and baby first!

In the words of JVN, “not to bring it up but” this recent article from The Cut says everything you need to know about what’s going wrong in the supplement space with current players out there. As misinformation spreads (like the claim that you don’t need folic acid for a healthy pregnancy because there are “other forms”), it’s more important than ever to know who you can trust.

With Bird&Be, you don’t have to worry. That’s why 300 of the top fertility clinics across North America are recommending and selling their supplements directly to patients — because they know they’re the best.

I came on board as an investor to do what I do best: brand and marketing. The product is already #1 from a formulation perspective, with actual clinical studies testing they’re effectiveness, and now, it’s about making sure everyone knows it. Which is why I convinced co-founder and CEO, Samantha Diamond, to let me throw an intimate event with 15 influencers and their partners — because it’s time to bring men into the fertility conversation.

Why is it that sperm quality is the contributing factor for up to 50% of infertility diagnosis’ but the onus is on the woman to be treated?

To see the BTS of our dinner you can watch tonight’s vlog so LET’S GET INTO IT.

♡ Pilates by Bryony x Jess Hunt: This collab felt so intentional: two best friends teaming up to offer a 14-day movement, nutrition, and mindfulness program — inspired by Jess herself, founder of Refy. Grounded in community, the launch included an opening Zoom call, a kickoff podcast episode, an editorial-style magazine in the PR kit, and lots of thoughtful surprises along the way. Bryony and Jess prove that authentic partnerships always hit different.

♡ A lot of our favorite NYC fashion influencers skipped PFW and headed to Jourdan Sloane’s wedding at Cal-a-Vie Spa near San Diego. If you’re trying to plan a wedding in LA proper… don’t even try. I can confirm: there are no great wedding venues in the city. So I’m especially excited to see how Jourdan transformed a health spa into her dream wedding venue. Proving that there’s a spectrum to influencer weddings (and the content that comes out of them), I loved how Jourdan clearly set the tone — saving her reveal for her own page to post after the moment while still encouraging her content creator friends to share the experience.

♡ Brightland, the girl’s favorite olive oil, just introduced The Brightland Bear — your new cottagecore companion and a charming addition to the brand identity. It’s a smart move to further differentiate as the olive oil for the girls, especially in the middle of the olive oil wars with Graza and Flamingo Estate. Next? I’m sensing a collab with Ralph Lauren or Dairy Boy.

♡ I can’t wait to get my silver Oura Ring 4 set up. Maybe it’s because of my color theory analysis (yes, I’ve officially switched all my jewelry to silver), or maybe it’s because Oura has been everywhere in the news this week — but I ordered mine ahead of Prime Day to make sure my size 7, silver Gen 4 didn’t sell out. ICYMI, Oura’s latest fundraise (rumored to have closed last week) values the company at $11 billion, with over 5.5 million rings sold to date. Between my color palette shift and the growing focus on women’s health, I upgraded my ring faster than I’ve upgraded my iPhone. Will keep you posted on the difference between versions.

♡ Ashley Graham isn’t the main character in the movie Omitted — but she is the main character of the body inclusivity movement. She just launched her collaboration with JCPenney in the most out-of-the-box way: teasing a fake movie trailer on her Instagram (21.1M followers) three days before the drop. The movie doesn’t exist — but the curvy collection does, and it’s available exclusively at JCPenney.

♡ THE POWER OF LEVERAGE (and video podcasts). I told you — video podcasts are the future. Case in point: The Toast just signed a massive three-year deal to stay with Dear Media, and they had the leverage to mandate video on Spotify — not just YouTube — as the podcast wars heat up. Rumor has it, SiriusXM and iHeart were both gunning for the daily show that consistently outperforms Good Morning America, the most-watched network morning show in the country but it landed back home with DM who has a financial interest in other endeavors like the Spritz Society.

Ok angels, this is the LORE on the JVN episode!! I fell in love with JVN products in 2023 after they were recommended to me at Sephora and became a religious user of the Embody shampoo and conditioner to wash out my slick backs. So fast forward to the end of 2023 when the parent company of JVN went bankrupt and in early 2024 it was announced the brand was sold for a mere $1.25M to Windsong Global. Naturally, I was like ?????? this just can’t make any sense. SO I made a video that “went far and wide” to the point where JVN and his team saw it. Fast forward to earlier this year when we got an email from JVN’s team asking for him to come on the pod to share what really happened.

I knew this episode was special when we filmed it but have been blown away by all the comments and messages about it and how it’s totally changed people’s opinions on JVN for the better. The whole goal of the podcast is to tell real stories about real people in the midst of growing their businesses and this episode is exactly that.

♡ the brands, people, places, things that have captured my attention ♡

♡ Women’s Health & Beauty ♡

♡ Media, Entertainment & Creator ♡

♡ E-Commerce, Retail & Social ♡

♡ Tech, Business, & Investing ♡