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You don’t need permission or perfect credentials to build a trusted brand in women’s health.
Lindsay Pinchuk sits down with Kat Schneider, founder and CEO of Ritual, for a conversation about building a category-defining company without a science background or a perfectly mapped plan. Kat shares how Ritual began during her first pregnancy as a response to unanswered questions about trust and transparency, and how choosing a DTC model early allowed the brand to educate customers, show real proof, and earn credibility instead of asking for it. What changes when you build trust before scale? How do you move forward when you do not feel fully ready?
Kat also reflects on how that DTC foundation shaped Ritual’s growth and made expansion into retail, including Target, feel intentional rather than reactive. She talks about leadership lessons learned along the way, from hiring mistakes to the pressure many women feel to be experts at everything, and why surrounding yourself with people who are stronger where you are not can change everything. Tune in to understand how intuition and decision-making become the real competitive advantage when you are building something meant to last.
Episode Breakdown:
00:00 Why This Conversation Matters for Women Founders
02:20 How Ritual Started With One Pregnant Founder Asking Better Questions
05:52 Quitting a Job While Pregnant and Challenging a “Niche” Industry
07:39 Building Ritual Without a Science Background
12:58 Launching One Product and Earning Trust Through DTC
20:56 How DTC Education Enabled Expansion Into Target and Retail
32:30 Leadership Lessons and Early Hiring Mistakes
38:14 Three Core Lessons on Intuition, Rejection, and Decision-Making
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Podcast production and show notes provided by HiveCast.fm
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