Sarah Wander is a Santa Monica, California-based entrepreneur who wanted to improve women’s daily lives while also giving back to women in need. Wander was interested in finding a way to build a bridge between empowering women to lead more enjoyable, pain-free lives with natural pain relievers and supporting women without access to reproductive health resources. The end result is, Allevita, a female reproductive health and CBD pain relief company that provides natural alternatives to pharmaceuticals and toxic topicals for menstrual and daily muscle pains. Today Wander is continuing to grow her business while also growing Allevita Women’s Alliance, which donates a portion of profits to three nonprofits supporting women’s access to reproductive health resources
Wander’s story, as told to The Story Exchange 1,000+ Stories Project
Allevita was originally created to provide females with a natural alternative to pharmaceuticals and toxic topicals for their menstrual and daily muscle pains. Not only are there very few natural alternatives for relief from cramps and hormonal changes but the mission of the company is to bring awareness, acceptance, and ultimately financial support to end period poverty that’s still very prevalent in 2020.
My goal is to empower women to lead more enjoyable, pain-free, and fulfilling lives, which is carried out by the Allevita Women’s Alliance program. As a part of the Alliance, we donate a portion of profits to three nonprofits in order to support women without access to reproductive health resources.
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My definition of success is not only to create healthy, natural products for women that they can feel good about using on a daily basis, but in doing so, educate and support other women on natural alternatives to pain relief.
My biggest success to date was giving birth to my very pre-mature twin girls last year girls, visiting the NICU on a daily basis for 30 days, while launching Allevita. It incentivized me to be able to create a better future for them and all girls by creating a female-founded company that puts women’s health at the forefront instead of the bottom line.
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As a company with CBD in our products, selling our products online was a seemingly continuous uphill battle. When covid-19 took over all of our lives, we could really only sell online and platforms like Google and Facebook/Instagram are still very conservative around CBD, even though there is no THC and thus no psychedelic effects to our products. Between marketing and selling online and finding a payment processor who supports companies that sell CBD products, it was a slow and difficult launch.
My greatest role models are Michelle Obama, RBG, and Kate Spade.
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