Alex Taylor left her president role at Clique after a Hashimoto's diagnosis, bootstrapped Perelel through COVID, and now runs a pregnancy supplement brand that covers IVF and perimenopause.
Alpha Score of 56 reflects moderate overall profile with weak momentum, moderate value, moderate quality, moderate sentiment.
Alex Taylor was president of Clique, the media company behind Who What Wear and Byrdie, by age 29. She worked 12-hour days, answered emails at midnight, and ignored the warning signs her body was sending.
In 2016, her hair started falling out. She had brain fog so thick she could barely concentrate. Her fingers swelled. She gained weight rapidly. Then shingles broke out across her skin. Doctors diagnosed Hashimoto's disease, an autoimmune condition they linked partly to extreme stress.
Taylor wanted to start a family. She had been struggling to get pregnant. "That's when I realized what I had done," she said. "I had always envisioned starting a family, so I blamed myself."
She changed her diet to an anti-inflammatory regimen and started prescription medication. Her doctors told her to reduce stress. "I wondered how I was supposed to do that while leading a company," she said. "Then it clicked – no job was worth my health."
She left Clique and was recruited by URBN to lead Free People Movement. She was seven months pregnant when she started. The job lasted about a year. She felt a pull to build something of her own.
After giving birth to her son, Taylor found herself sorting vitamins from multiple bottles – her obstetrician, acupuncturist, and naturopath each gave different advice. She met Victoria Thain Gioia, whose daughter was born with a nutrition-related cleft lip. The two learned how critical certain nutrients are during pregnancy and decided to start a supplement company.
They tried fundraising. Then COVID hit, and "everyone's checkbooks slammed shut," Taylor said. They bootstrapped instead.
Perelel launched in September 2020 with five products for different pregnancy stages. A seed round followed, led by Unilever Ventures and Willow Growth. Selva Ventures and Prelude Growth Partners joined later rounds.
Taylor had a second child, a daughter. Her partner worked in the film industry and was away for months at a time. She lived near family in Los Angeles. Her mother and mother-in-law helped with the children because she could not afford a full-time nanny.
Five years later, Perelel has an LA office, a full team, and an expanded product line that covers perimenopause and IVF journeys.
Managing stress as a mother and founder is still hard. Taylor meditates almost daily. She goes to bed at 8 p.m., right after tucking in her five- and seven-year-old. She stopped reading self-improvement books and switched to fiction. "I realized I have to stop over-optimizing myself," she said.
She bought a Brick phone lock to stop multitasking during bath time. "Most of my stressful moments came from trying to respond to team Slack messages while with my kids," she said.
Taylor said her career taught her how to stay ambitious without putting her health into crisis. She now runs a business built on the problem that broke her own.
Unilever PLC holds an Alpha Score of 55 out of 100, a Moderate label in the Consumer Staples sector. The score reflects the company's steady dividend yield and global brand portfolio, offset by slower revenue growth in emerging markets.
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