The former NFL liner turned into an entrepreneur helps Feed Island

Jeff Byers has spent most of his life surrounded by elite athletes. As all-American in the USC and later as a Linner of the NFL, he trained with some of the best in the world. And when it co -founded transcendental, a supplement brand backed by science used by professional teams and the US army, its mission was to give people the tools to perform at its peak.

But even Byers was impressed by what he saw in Hawaii.

In the last episode of One day with Jon BierByers recounts his visit to Maui Nui Venison, a company that humanly collects the deer of the invasive axis to restore native ecosystems and feed the local community. He joined the crew for one of his crops during the night and observed while carrying 140 -pound animals by the volcanic slopes steep in the dark, again and again.

“These types are absolute machines,” he says. “What they do is physical and mentally harder than anything I saw in professional sports.”

And they were using their product, FuelTo overcome it.

Related: an invasion of deer in Hawaii has become an environmental crisis, and a sustainable business opportunity

PERFORMANCE WITH PURPOSE

Fuel is the transcendental resistance supplement, developed for training that lasts more than an hour. Its 3: 1 carbohydrate ratio provides constant energy with less peaks or GI problems, something that directly appealed to the Maui Nui crew, which supports a lot of brutal physical effort.

Byers left that trip with a new sense of purpose.

“We start this company to support high performance,” he says. “But this was something else.”

He associated with Maui Nui to create a tropical -inspired fuel flavor, Guava Orange of Maracuyá. For each package sold, $ 10 go to the Holo ‘AI programwhich distributes veined meat harvested in the families of the island. The objective is to raise $ 200,000, enough to provide a meal for each resident in Maui.

“It’s not just a collaboration,” says Byers. “It’s a commitment.”

From NFL to nutrition

Byers’ trip to build transcendental was not started from a play book. After leaving the NFL, he entered finance before co -confunding the biotechnology startup behind Pr Lotion. That adventure finally merged with transcendental in 2021, and the newly combined company took off.

But growth came with pain, sometimes worse than what he experienced in the field. The fusion almost broke it.

“That was one of the darkest moments of my life,” he says in the podcast. “I was working 80 hours a week, I burned, trying to keep everything together and fail it.”

He had to rebuild not only the company, but himself.

“I realized that they never taught me how to lead people on this scale,” he says. “I had to change. I had to become the type of leader that the company needed, or let it fall apart.”

That meant making decisions that hurt in the short term. He took better selling products when the clinical data did not remain. He missed a complete production of a nootropic when purity tests lost the brand. This costs a transcendental time and money, but finally it was worth it.

“We are not chasing trends,” explains Byers. “We are chasing confidence. That is more difficult, but hard.”

Today, each NFL team use transcendental products, hundreds of university, Olympic and even NASA programs. The company has reached the Inc. 5000 two years in a row.

But Byers says that success is not about metrics, it is about the mission. And that mission focused during his visit to Maui Nui Venison.

“You don’t leave Maui Nui without changes,” he says. “They are feeding people, healing an ecosystem and doing everything with purpose and sand. He reminded me that performance is not about attention, it is about appearing in what matters, even when it is difficult.”

Related: The supplement business has a trusted problem. This technological startup wants to fix that.