We are so honored to add Happy 2nd Birthday to our incredible community of creators and founders. Below, the story of how Juliana & Jae's father inspired their company and mission and what is means to them to create this unique brand with their family at its center. 

 Our father’s experience with cancer is the inspiration behind our brand. He was diagnosed with Stage IV non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma in 2012, and underwent numerous treatments of chemotherapy and radiation before having a bone marrow transplant in 2018. During all the treatments, he experienced numerous side effects to his skin, including chemo rashes, radiation dermatitis, and extremely dry and sensitive skin, all of which are quite common for cancer patients.

After witnessing the side effects of treatment to his skin, we tried to find him skincare products that safely helped improve his skin health while also offering a positive self-care experience. While we had no trouble finding products that were considered safe for him to use, they all lacked the quality and packaging that beautiful skincare products have, which offer a pleasant experience during use. After struggling to find products that our father enjoyed using, we thought, why not make our own? And that’s what led to our decision to create Happy 2nd Birthday.

Happy 2nd Birthday recognizes that something as simple as a skincare routine can have a huge impact on making a person feel better about themself. Emotional wellbeing is incredibly important, and taking a little time for oneself can have long lasting results. We also know firsthand the emotional toll it takes to be a caregiver for someone suffering from a long-term illness. We aim to help people improve their skin health, and subsequently, their emotional health with our products, and give back to charities and organizations whose goals align with ours.

Happy 2nd Birthday is an inclusive brand — while most of our products are safe for cancer patients, all of them are safe for pregnant and breastfeeding moms. We formulate with specifically dry, sensitive skin in mind without leaving out other skin types that may enjoy the sensory experience of a light scent. This means that while the majority of our products are unscented, a couple do have a natural citrus scent.

It’s pretty awesome that from the brand inspiration to actually launching the business, it’s always been about our family. We’ve never worked together before, but we discovered that we balance each other between our strengths and weaknesses. If we were both strong in one area, we might be stepping on each other’s toes. Instead, we realized that our natural interests and talents complement each other well, and it’s led to a pretty clear division of labor.

There’s also something really cool about starting a business with your sibling. We couldn’t choose to be brother and sister, but we chose to be business partners! I mean, that says a lot. But really, we recognize how fortunate we are that we work well together, and most of all, we have fun together!

Le Wren’s origin story is similar to ours, in that we both struggled to find products for our parents who had cancer. We understand the difficulty of finding gifts that help to both heal physical conditions while making our loved ones feel better emotionally as well.

Le Wren curates such beautiful gift boxes, and we’re honored to have our Ultra-Hydrating Body Butter included in the Cancer Care gift box! There’s something special about giving and receiving a gift with so much thought behind it, to show support and understanding of a loved one’s needs based on a certain situation. We hope the Le Wren community continues to grow and help many people feel appreciated and supported through these thoughtful gifts.

To check out more of the Juliana and Jae's story, go directly to their website.