How a family health crisis inspired this mum to start an Ayurvedic spice business

Born to an Indo-Malawian family in Silicon Valley, Raina Kumra was fed herbs by her grandmother whenever she felt sick as a child. Kumra remembers chewing cloves when her toothache and drinking peppermint tea when she had an upset stomach. So in March 2020 when her daughter broke her collarbone in a biking accident and her husband underwent knee replacement surgery, Kumra turned to her grandmother's teachings in Ayurveda, an ancient practice medicine from India emphasizing food and herbal remedies, to cure them.

With extensive experience in digital marketing and venture capital, as well as building a start-up years earlier, the 45-year-old wanted to build something new. After conducting extensive market research to determine that there was a viable business opportunity in food medicine, she founded Spicewell, a Santa Barbara, California-based company that manufactures functional spices, or spices intended to have a positive effect on health beyond basic nutrition. The three-employee company, which Kumra is starting, incorporated in March 2021 and began operations in November. In its first month of product sales, Spicewell generated over $10,000 in revenue and expects sales of $250,000 by January 2023.

The moment of epiphany

Kumra learned Ayurveda as a child by watching her grandmother mix spices. For example, she says, turmeric and black pepper have antibacterial effects and support the immune system, while an herb called ashwagandha helps balance cortisol and lower blood pressure. Now supplementing the early knowledge she gained from taking a course in herbal medicine at Cornell University, she says people tend to overlook the power of plants: "It was just very amazing to me. that as a culture, in America, we've forgotten where the drugs really come from. There's a reason all these plants exist.

The idea of ​​turning the practice of Ayurveda into a business came to Kumra during her daughter's recovery. She had to hide vegetables in the 5-year-old's food by dehydrating and powdering them to mix into her smoothie. It took her daughter just 10 days to get back on her feet, while most people with broken collarbones take weeks. After this experience, Kumra realized she could put powerful functional ingredients into salt and pepper to provide vitamins to every meal. "Americans walk around with nutrient deficiencies, so my idea was a simple step to help people add more nutrients to their diets," she says. "It doesn't require a significant habit change."

From research to retail

However, Kumra found that it was not easy to determine which vegetables could be mixed with salt and pepper that people could not taste. She spent six months developing the idea, studying spice brands and testing recipes with neighbors. In the end, she spent her savings of $100,000 on research and development, partnering with medical advisors including Mark Hyman, the founder of the UltraWellness Center, a Lenox-based functional medicine provider. , Massachusetts, and Ann Veneman, a former secretary of the United States Department of Agriculture. After countless experiments, the team finally landed on organic kale, spinach, mushrooms and broccoli. Kumra chose pink Himalayan salt as a base and created a product with 30% less sodium than regular table salt.

Spicewell's Ayurvedic Salt and Pepper is "pretty unique from other seasonings because it's fortified with nutrients from organic superfoods," Hyman wrote in his newsletter in February. "His new salt is blended with ashwagandha, an adaptogen that helps your body cope with...