You probably know Rent the Runway, the company Jenny Fleiss co-founded a decade ago. These days, Jenny, who still serves as an advisor and board member at Rent the Runway, has a new business baby: Jetblack. "It's a personal shopping service over text message, and you can order anything from paper towels, to a birthday gift, to a designer handbag," Jenny explains. "All with the ease of a simple message."
Starting a brand new company is not the only thing on Jenny’s plate. In addition to running Jetblack, and being a board member at Rent the Runway, she also advises a handful of female run businesses in the New York area, and is (did we mention?) a mom of three. With so many priorities and demands on her time, Jenny makes taking care of herself a priority too. "Health and wellness is really important to me," Jenny tells Hilma, "I do carve out time despite having three children and a busy work lifestyle."
So, what kind of healthcare products does a woman this busy and successful keep on hand? Jenny gave us a peek inside her medicine cabinet and shared with us what she swears by.
Jenny’s medicine cabinet.
I have a lot of products. I've always been intrigued by experimenting with products and I love a good trip to the drug store. Now there are so many health and wellness stores, and I love discovering new products in those stores too. My medicine cabinet is super loaded and stocked with a whole bunch of products. I fully take over my husband’s medicine cabinet too.
I travel a good amount too so I think one thing is buying travel sized items so you can keep those rituals and routines up while you travel. Sometimes when you travel it’s easy to just break down and get away from your healthy habits.
I'm also always trying to find ways to do things with my kids that are both things that I need to get done and things that are kind of educational for them, so something I’ve gotten in the habit of doing with my 7 and a half year old is going through all my vitamins. She found it fascinating that I take this handful of pills every day and wanted to know what are they. So I explained to her what vitamins are, and that they’re for me and not for her, and that she has a different one that sometimes she takes that’s for kids only. But she actually really enjoys the process of sorting them and putting the vitamins in the pill case with me. So once a week we sit down on the bed and we chat and we sort, and put a pill each in each bucket. It’s educational and she’s so methodical and loves hearing about each of the vitamins and what they do.
The supplements she takes every day.
I take red rice yeast, I take Magnesium, I take a multi all around, Vitamin B. I also take Vitamin D, I take Cranberry, L-glutamine, and a Vitamin C.
When natural remedies came into her life.
About the time I turned 30, which was also when I was looking to get pregnant (and it was taking a little long) I saw a nutritionist. My dad had seen the same nutritionist and had found some blood sugar sensitivities and that he was pre diabetic. This all encouraged me to go and get my blood sugar tested and understand more about how my body works. The nutritionist recommended a whole regimen including different vitamins, but also which foods to avoid and, when I do eat sugar, how to think about that. I then went on a pretty intensive reset and in just a few months I really felt the benefits. And shortly thereafter I got pregnant. In being able to observe the change I built a ritual that kept me on track with supporting my health.
Her perspective on natural products.
I prefer that the products I buy are natural, but I'm open minded. I think these days it’s so hard to tell if something is natural or not natural — what does natural even mean? You always have to dig in and research more. There’s a good amount of shades of grey.
There's a place called Cap Beauty where I go for facials now, and whenever I go there I have a deeper feeling and appreciation for being organic, and holistic, and natural. I have also done some Sakara detox cleanses and each time I feel and notice a difference in my skin. Being careful about using natural and organic products is a form of thoughtfulness, it’s about being mindful of what you’re putting into your body. That’s the most important.
Her personal philosophy on health and wellness.
One of my friends always asks me if something will matter in five seconds, five minutes, five hours, five days. It just puts things in perspective. I think a way of grounding yourself is remembering you are a small piece of this overall big picture. You are connected to it and that’s where health, wellness, using natural products can be powerful, but put it in perspective that the day-to-day small minutia is not that overwhelming. Let’s grab that mental clarity to push through.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
This information is for educational purposes only and should not be taken as medical advice. Please consult a physician before treating any disorder.