Rif Care

Beverly Hills, CA 

Lowering Our Carbon Footprint, One Cycle at a Time

Val Emanuel, earth activist and co-founder of Rif Care, decided to take control of her reproductive health and find an alternative solution to the current period care options on the market. Rif Care, launched in June 2022, makes safe, non-hormone-disrupting period care products out of naturally antimicrobial/antifungal and super-absorbent hemp fiber. Hemp also aids in the fight against climate change by absorbing more carbon dioxide from the atmosphere than any other commercial crop. 

Emmanuel and her cofounder, Rebecca Caputo, are BIPOC women entrepreneurs with backgrounds in media, science and sustainability. These skills informed their passion for Rif Care, but they needed help with launching the brand and building the business.They met with several Pasadena SBDC advisors, including startup expert Craig Wilson, who guided them through options to raise money. He suggested they begin with Friends & Family, and they raised $130,000. He then helped them prepare to raise a Seed Round of funding; reviewing their pitch deck, and suggesting different options. Val also met with CPG expert, Larry Johnson, who helped them with their retail strategy and things like logistics and inventory management.

Since the middle of 2022, they have acquired shelf space at 22 retailers, including Erewhon, Whole Foods, Sprouts and Target, and are now in close to 100 retailers. In 2022, they were accepted at Techstars in Atlanta where they received a$120,000 equity investment. 

 

Nictavi

Los Angeles, CA 

Patient heals himself and countless others!

Nictavi Founder and CEO, Nathan Horner, had a cornea transplant over a decade ago that required sewing his eye shut for weeks at a time, and like many other entrepreneurs, he knew there had to be something better. When he found there wasn鈥檛, he designed, patented and developed the Tarsus Eye Patch, and then set about changing the world for other patients.

Nathan began tinkering with the Tarsus Eye Patch in 2016, and met CTIP and SBDC in 2018, and launched online in 2021. He was approached by the second largest OTC medical products provider in 2021, who ultimately decided the product was too much of a niche for them, but provided valuable marketing data and coaching to Nathan. Sales climbed steadily online due to his hard work with eyecare clinicians, who love the product, and attending trade shows, and in 2023, he signed his first deal with a strategic partner to provide Nictavi Tarsus patches in their post-surgical kits. This had a huge impact on his demand and revenue, which created a host of new challenges, all good, that he continues to work through with the assistance of the Pasadena SBDC advisors.

Nathan Horner is the quintessential American entrepreneur. Through personal experience, he identified a significant problem in a market, and focused on solving it, thus helping himself and thousands of other patients along the way.

 

The Little Bra Company

Arcadia, CA

Attractive and Well-Fitting Bras for Every Frame

In 2007, Emily Lau founded The Little Bra Company because she couldn鈥檛 find any attractive bras that fit her smaller frame and chest. The bras that fit better looked like training bras, and the ones that were sexier were ill-fitting. 鈥淢any of my petite friends shared my lament, and so I created a collection of bras that fit and flattered our specific body types better,鈥� she said.

In May of 2020, Emily came to the Pasadena SBDC and worked with advisor Andrew Cohen who helped her with both the EIDL and PPP loans. Later that year, Emily decided she was ready to buy the building needed for The Little Bra Company, and Andrew referred her to advisor Rithya Tang who she worked with to prepare financial documentation to provide to various lenders. Following that, Rithya made several introductions to potential lenders for Emily which resulted in the company obtaining two letters of intent for $728,000, allowing her to finance the purchase of the building.

The Little Bra Company provides the petite woman with a complete bra wardrobe that never existed before. Emily continues to look to her customers for inspiration and listens so she can continue fulfilling different needs. Today, Emily's business is thriving; featuring over 20 styles of  bras in over 20 sizes, Emily is achieving her objective of providing both practical and flattering options for petite framed women everywhere.

 

Los Taquero Mucho

Montebello, CA

Classic Tacos with a Twist

In February 2019, Sylvia Garcia, her brother, Alex, and husband, Miguel, created Los Taquero Mucho, a catering business servicing small backyard parties and company lunches with delicious, classic tacos featuring a Mexican-Guatemalan twist. Shortly after launching Los Taquero Mucho, Garcia met with Pasadena SBDC advisor Barney Santos who invited her to join an incubator program for restaurants. Working with Santos, they eventually opened their own location at the BLVD Mrkt food hall in Montebello, CA, and then expanded again to a ghost kitchen in Orange County. The journey to the restaurant鈥檚 present-day success wasn鈥檛 necessarily an easy one, but Sylvia and her team are realizing their dream, and they credit the expertise and guidance offered by the Pasadena Small Business Development Center (SBDC) as providing crucial help.

In August of 2021, Los Taqu