From a Basement to a Billion Dollar Brand: The Greatest Founder Story You Never Heard
episodePreviously titled “She Took a Leap of Faith and Built a Billion-Dollar Brand” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 3, 2026
Transcript
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What motivated Monique Rodriguez to start Mielle Organics?
So today I get to sit down with the incredible founder, Monique Rodriguez, who founded a company called Miel. Now this is quite literally the American dream come true. When you start a brand at your kitchen table, raise millions of dollars and then sell it to one of the biggest conglomerates in the space. But it wasn't all smooth sailing. And what I love about the interview is that she's really honest about what it actually took to build and sell this business when she didn't know anything about the space or the category and had no idea about what it would actually take to make it successful. What is so amazing is that Monique is actually on the other side. She's still the CEO of her brand, which was acquired by Procter & Gamble.
It's pretty much a masterclass in what it takes. And I know you guys will love this episode. Don't forget to like and subscribe. The Start With Yourself Tour kicks off on April 15th in New York City. Tickets are on sale now at emagreed.com. Monique, welcome to Aspire. Thank you. I'm so excited to be here. So happy to be here. And I am so excited to have you. We've got so much to talk about. Yes. So I'm trying to like figure out if we've covered it all before, but we're going to cover it for the people all over again. We're definitely going to cover it today. I promise you. Oh, yes, we are. And I love you for that. When I think about you, Monique, your journey has been like quite literally any founder's dream.
And what I wanted to ask you was like, when you pull the curtain back, what do you think the hardest part has been in building Myale?
Wow. Well, I would say the hardest part in building Myale was not having anyone to show me the blueprint. And really just figuring this out as I go, like we were flying the plane and building it at the same time. And so that can come with a lot of mistakes, a lot of trial and error. Also not having the capital to sustain. When we first started out, we were bootstrapping and using our paychecks and what we had in our savings. to fund the business. And that was a huge risk because, you know, I was working as a nurse, my husband was an engineer, and we were really just betting on ourselves. And we had to make this work because, you know, we didn't have a plan B to fall back on, right? We took all of our life savings, we took all of everything that we were making to just solely put it into Myel.
And that's the hard part that people don't see, like they see the glory on the outside. but not really understanding like the turmoil that comes with the stress of not knowing where your next payment is going to come from to fund your inventory. And then you have your kids depending on you and you don't want to disappoint them.
How did personal adversity shape Monique's entrepreneurial journey?
And then you have the outside world that's looking at you crazy, like, well, you guys had great jobs. Why are you leaving these great careers that are very stable and you have your 401k and your pension to fall back on? Like you're just throwing all of that away. So you're also dealing with the pressures of the families and friends that don't really understand and see the full picture. You know, you don't want to disappoint. You don't want to disappoint them, but more importantly, not disappoint yourself. Oh, a hundred percent.
What would you actually say to other founders? Like, what do you wish you'd have known
earlier in your journey? So what I wish I would have known earlier in my founder journey is that everyone's not going to like and agree with the decisions that you make as a founder, even if your intentions are very pure.
Mm-hmm.
And I had to learn that, obviously, when I did my acquisition with P&G, and I felt that this was something that I prayed about. I felt that, you know, this was something that was God-led. And I knew that my intentions behind why I wanted to be a choir was very pure. But on the back end, I received a lot of criticism for that. Okay. you did really? I didn't know this. Yeah. Yeah. Right. I felt it.
We are going to dig all the way in because people really have to understand what you've been through, what you built, the scale of what you built.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What motivated Monique Rodriguez to start Mielle Organics?
0:09–2:48
2
How did personal adversity shape Monique's entrepreneurial journey?
2:48–5:56
3
What were the biggest challenges faced while building Mielle Organics?
5:56–10:07
4
When is the right time to scale a business?
10:07–13:40
5
What lessons did Monique learn about navigating criticism?
13:40–18:38
6
How did Monique handle the transition post-acquisition by P&G?
18:38–21:48
7
What strategies did Monique use to maintain her brand's vision?
21:48–25:02
8
What future plans does Monique have for Mielle Organics?
25:02–1:21:06
Speakers
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