Biolyte Started as a Secret Project. Now It’s on Track for $25 Million in Revenue This Year

Jesslyn Rollins got a phone call from her dad on June 15, 2016, that would change her life.

“We have four pallets of this drink I’ve been secretly working on with your sister, Sarah, coming to the house tomorrow. And I know your career in standup comedy isn’t going anywhere,” she recalls her father saying. He proposed to her that she become the new product’s chief salesperson.

She also recalls being a “completely conceited” 25-year-old and thinking: “of course Dad wants me to head up his sales department!” It wasn’t until years later she realized she’d just been an easy mark–and unpaid labor, as she told Inc.’s What I Know podcast.

Turns out, the role of pitching the product her physician father had created, an electrolyte-heavy drink to aid dehydration, called Biolyte, was a great fit for her. Rollins hadn’t only been doing stand-up comedy, but also had experience in theater and improvisation. The family assumed Biolyte had three potential target markets, as a medical aid, a hangover cure, and a sports drink. Rollins didn’t hesitate to load her car up with coolers of the drink to find which market might fit best. She drove it in her Toyota to local high-school sports practices, and endured nights out “overindulging,” to test the product.

After two years of pitching, selling, soliciting feedback, building customer relationships, finding store placements for Biolyte, and helping build the brand, Rollins learned all three markets fit well for Biolyte-and she, personally, wanted more.

“I knew I wanted full operational control of this company,” she says. “I was very confident, even at a young age, that I was the person for the job. I didn’t want anybody else doing this.”

Rollins put together presentations for her parents laying out the responsibilities a chief executive role–which Biolyte the company hadn’t had–would include, and why she should hold that title and be responsible for making Biolyte a success.

Her parents weren’t convinced. “They were like: ‘Absolutely not,’” she laughs. “But I always heard ‘absolutely not’ as ‘not right now.’”

Rollins continued to help grow the company. Every so often, however, she’d re-up her CEO pitch to her parents. 

In January 2019, they finally gave her a yes. Biolyte the company, originally self-funded by the family with about $1 million, is profitable, has doubled in revenue every year, and in 2022 is on track to make $25 million.