We recently connected with Dara Chike-Obi and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Dara, thanks for joining us today. One of the things we most admire about small businesses is their ability to diverge from the corporate/industry standard. Is there something that you or your brand do that differs from the industry standard? We’d love to hear about it as well as any stories you might have that illustrate how or why this difference matters.

Griö baby bottles were inspired by our own experiences into motherhood while simultaneously having to manage other professional and household responsibilities. Our baby bottle systems center on infant nutrition AND parental well-being by enlisting human-centered design. This is why we completely overhauled the one-size-fits all baby bottle to tailor it to the needs of all caretakers and developing babies. Our cognitive building feeding systems establish meaningful emotional bonds, a love of learning and a passion for exploration – all at the earliest life stage.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

At two months postpartum with my first child, I was a full-time attorney while simultaneously working towards my MBA. We don’t have family in Austin, so I HAD to rely on a comprehensive network of support including my husband and nannies to make sure our baby was fed…and at baseline kept alive when I was at work or at school. It was in this space I looked for products that not only addressed my baby’s concerns, but also my needs as a busy multi-tasking mother who depended on others from day 1. It was also in this space I noticed the lack of community support features in baby products. Why was I expected to shoulder early parenting responsibilities alone? Why didn’t the market provide solutions for modern families that depended on others for assistance? As a Nigerian-American, the concept of maternal individualism felt isolating and somewhat inefficient. This is why I was determined to create a product that ALL caretakers could use…including grandparents, nannies and whoever else in a mother’s caretaking village.

At the same time, I met my cofounder Lydia, a chemical engineering professor who runs a research lab of 20+ PhD candidates. More importantly, she was a mom that had to navigate the frightening and unexpected world of the NICU with her twins. Upon dispatch she had to use everything in her professional background to engineer solutions that brought them up to speed while addressing their many feeding issues. Issues that led to a 15-17 hr/day feeding routine. Even though we began our motherhood journey on opposite ends of the spectrum, we found commonality in wanting to overhaul the feeding routine.

Griö supports parental health and wellness by making feedings less stressful and about more than milk. This product brings together the expertise of parents, medical professionals and developmental experts to nourish a baby’s neurological development, naturally address feeding issues, and support the healthy relationships between baby and ALL caretakers.

We created three sensory enhancing baby bottle systems that are designed for use along the entire feeding journey from newborn to 1+.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Career Pivot:

I was raised in Houston, TX where oil and gas was king. As such, an oil and gas attorney seemed like the natural choice. Over the years, I began to feel disillusioned by the limited upward mobility within the company and outside of my industry. I began to second-guess my job, my industry and my overall growth. Because of my specialized experience, I could not “network” myself into a new position. I felt that I had no choice but to start from scratch and re-educate myself on the world around me, so I decided to return to school to get my MBA as a brand new mom.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Griö has been supported by women and the University of Texas from the very start. My co-founder and I bootstrapped initial funds to support market and product research. The Texas Innovation Center at the University of Texas (led by two women) awarded Griö a 40K innovation grant at the exact time we were ready to develop our prototype. Further more, Pipeline Angels, a group of female investors that are changing the face of angel investing by investing in women, provided a very necessary infusion of cash at a time when we had no traction. Our individual investors are all women who saw Griö’s potential when we had nothing more than a sketch drawing.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.griobaby.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/griobaby/?hl=en
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/griobaby
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/72305308/admin/