Meet The Disruptors: Jordan Schindler Of Nufabrx On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your Industry
An Interview With Fotis Georgiadis
Airplane pilot during turbulence. You might not have all the answers as the leader, but like an airplane pilot, people want reassurance. To know that somebody is aware of the problem, in control and working to resolve it.
As a Global Thought Leader in HealthWear™, Jordan Schindler is on a mission to simplify health and wellness.
Schindler, the Founder and CEO of NUFABRX®, an innovative technology company focused on the controlled delivery of active ingredients (vitamins, supplements and medication) infused in clothing, has developed and launched a new category of health and wellness products.
Founded in 2011 after Schindler discovered that his acne was caused from not washing his pillowcases often enough, and determined to find a better solution, the idea for NUFABRX was born. After years of research and development in partnership with a PHD formulation scientist, he developed the revolutionary patented platform technology.
NUFABRX is an innovative technology company focused on the controlled delivery of active ingredients (vitamin, supplement, medication) through clothing. Providing all day relief (the compression wear can be worn up to 150 hours) and lasting through 15+ wash cycles, the patented technology is activated by body temperature and moisture so you can feel it working.
Today, NUFABRX is an 8-figure revenue business with national retail distribution including the world’s largest retailer, Walmart and is identified as one of the fastest growing companies by Deloitte, Inc 5000 and in the brand’s headquarters home in Charlotte, North Carolina. The full line of NUFABRX HealthWear has something for everyone with two collections: Pain Relief and Maternity which infused with hydration and shea butter and designed to grow with moms-to-be.
It’s no wonder that Jordan Schindler believes in learning through testing and innovation led by science.
Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”? What led you to this particular career path?
I founded NUFABRX® in 2011 after a trip to the dermatologist where I learned that my acne was caused from not washing my pillowcases often enough. The doctor’s recommendation was to wash my pillowcases multiple times a week, which I did not foresee happening as a busy college student. I was determined to find a better solution, thus, the idea for NUFABRX was born — embed active ingredients and medications into a pillowcase which was our first product. From there we created a pain collection with Capsacin and a maternity collection with shea butter.
Can you tell our readers what it is about the work you’re doing that’s disruptive?
The patented drug delivery system employed by NUFABRX® works in a similar way to a transdermal patch. The textile enables the delivery of a time released medication every hour that an individual is wearing that particular garment. However, despite using analogous technology to that already on the market, there were still challenges to gaining regulatory approval for NUFABRX’s products. Since there isn’t a category for drug-infused garments, regulatory approval all depends on what claims you’re making as a company and what active ingredients you’re putting in your garments. For example, a drug is going to be regulated very differently for a cosmetic product, like shea butter, then for a medication like Capcasin. But because NUFABRX is able to deliver the same dosage as any other topical analgesic, that’s the regulatory monograph NUFABRX falls under.
Can you share a story about the funniest mistake you made when you were first starting? Can you tell us what lesson you learned from that?
Where to begin, there are so many. I could talk about almost flying to Switzerland for what turned out to be a fake $10M Term sheet, or a failed deal with Mike Tyson, I could tell you a story about a lifechanging deal on SharkTank gone awry, we could dive into the $40k of investor dollars we received in a box of Captain Crunch cereal, or that time we were almost kicked out of our lab lease because one of our employees refused to shower. But really the question was about what I’ve learned…
It’s all about Perseverance. Perseverance and hard work lead to most things. We have a list of 600+ investors that have all said no to investing in this business at one point or another. Sometimes they come back and invest later on, but often times they don’t. You have to keep going no matter what, that’s what makes the difference at the end of the day. Why did one of our early investors finally decide to get involved? Because I rode three public buses for two hours to meet with him, and he thought it showed dedication.
We all need a little help along the journey. Who have been some of your mentors? Can you share a story about how they made an impact?
Getting a business coach has been one of the best things I’ve ever done. Someone that can listen and offer an outside perspective about things that you can’t usually share with your team or colleagues. There are conversations an experienced business coach will understand that possibly no one else in your life can relate to. It’s a totally unbiased person with no preconceived notions that will help retrieve all that information and knowledge sitting in your head that you may have never known was there. Thank you, Ravila Gupta!
In today’s parlance, being disruptive is usually a positive adjective. But is disrupting always good? When do we say the converse, that a system or structure has ‘withstood the test of time’? Can you articulate to our readers when disrupting an industry is positive, and when disrupting an industry is ‘not so positive’? Can you share some examples of what you mean?
For me it’s all about outcomes, disruption can be extremely good when it leads to a positive outcome for a consumer or the world. At NUFABRX, by disrupting the age-old textile industry and merging it with new age drug delivery, we pioneered a better way for people to become healthy. Patient compliance is one of the biggest challenges in the medical industry, and one of the biggest costs to the insurance industry. What if, instead of having to remember to take a pill, or rub a messy cream on your body, you could just get dressed? We have taken an industry that’s been around for hundreds of years with not a lot of innovation and turned it on its head; at the end of the day, it’s all about making products that provide a solution to consumers. Instead of having to go buy a sleeve and a tube of pain medication, now it’s one product, one packaging, one solution. That’s disruption where the consumer wins every time.
On the flip side, there are lots of disruption where the consumer doesn’t win. Industry consolidation, polarizing monopolies that provide less choices for the consumer and push for overseas manufacturing. Those are examples of primarily bad disruption. A positive impact in a consumers’ life must be at the forefront of which disruptions ultimately are positive.
Can you share five of the best words of advice you’ve gotten along your journey? Please give a story or example for each.
Live in the moment and be happy. I believe that happiness is the key goal of life, and how to maximize happiness is important to me. Business and the journey to success should bring happiness. You often hear stories (I really like How I Built this on NPR) about entrepreneurs that sell their businesses for $100M dollars and suddenly are unhappy. They don’t know what to do anymore, they get depressed, and they realize that the building of the business, the working with great employees, the adversity, was what actually made them happy. Hopefully, we’ll all have the luxury of experiencing that level of success, but let’s enjoy the journey, do things that make you happy today, be generous, live in the moment; because that is where the true, life satisfaction comes from. And ultimately that is what helps make someone a better leader.
Always give people a “respectful” way out. Saving face and dignity matter to people. Firing people is never fun, but I’m convinced that this approach has helped us avoid an upset customer or potential dispute. Empathy matters. Think about what the other person wants and imagine yourself as them. Is there a way that both sides can win and nobody loses?
Airplane pilot during turbulence. You might not have all the answers as the leader, but like an airplane pilot, people want reassurance. To know that somebody is aware of the problem, in control and working to resolve it.
We are sure you aren’t done. How are you going to shake things up next?
Not by a long shot! One of the fun things about this business is that it’s a true platform technology; there are so many different types of products that we can make. Imagine a Rogaine hat, a Caffeine arm band, or Melatonin pillowcases. There is so much more to do here that everyday feels like a new business and new opportunity. But yes…there are some more ideas in the Entrepreneurial Notebook by my desk.
Do you have a book, podcast, or talk that’s had a deep impact on your thinking? Can you share a story with us? Can you explain why it was so resonant with you?
Play Bigger: How Pirates, Dreamers, and Innovators Create and Dominate Markets by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, and Kevin Maney. The book tells the story about Category Creation; how Uber established and thus dominated the ride share category, how Salesforce pioneered their own industry. There are clear steps and design stage gates that need to be implemented when building a new market category. As we continue to grow NUFABRX, we’re building an entirely new category of products, HealthWear, at the intersection of drug delivery and textiles. This game changing book has laid the foundation for how we do that. We’re all about the big “lightning strike” events and ridiculous outside the box marketing ideas (cue inserting $20 into every Walmart retail box and PR blitz).
Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?
Work is 50% of our lives; the enjoyment of that time matters so much. Culture and team are everything and that’s why I like coming to work every morning. We call it our “Core Fibers” instead of core values, with “F” standing for Fun. If we don’t enjoy work, if we don’t get to work with people we like and we don’t get to build something that adds value to the world; then I believe something is wrong. Life is too short to accept anything less.
To that end, I’ve also started to try to put slightly better controls on technology. For example, I use the Freedom app that blocks notifications after a certain time at night. Being always on, working on vacation, and not spending enough time with my fiancée are all things I’m trying to get better at. I’ve learned that ultimately working all the time doesn’t make me a better leader, it just makes me a more tired one. That’s not the life or example I want to set for my team. It has taken me a long time to appreciate that.
Honestly though, call me crazy, but Monday morning is still my favorite time of week to get to check emails, get back to the grind and continue building.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
Corny as this is, I feel fortunate that I get to live this everyday with NUFABRX. Our mission is literally about simplifying health and wellness and making people feel better. My movement is the HealthWear Revolution!
How can our readers follow you online?
Jordan Schindler on LinkedIn
Nufabrx on LinkedIn
@Nufabrx on Instagram
@Nufabrx on Facebook
This was very inspiring. Thank you so much for joining us!
Meet The Disruptors: Jordan Schindler Of Nufabrx On The Five Things You Need To Shake Up Your… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
