Startup Spotlight #219: lume

lume is a 1:1 coaching membership for founders & leaders to hit their goals faster—professionally and physically.

Katie Kirsch is a product, design, and startup leader based in NY, with an engineering degree from Stanford and an MBA from Harvard Business School. She’s the Founder and CEO of lume, a 1:1 coaching membership for achieving your professional goals without sacrificing your health. Katie's work has been featured in Forbes 30 Under 30 (2024), Fast Company, and more. She has also taught at Stanford's d.school and Harvard's Graduate School of Education. Outside work, Katie’s interests include yoga, silent meditation, personal finance, skiing, biohacking, and brewing great coffee.

lume is a 1:1 coaching membership for achieving your professional goals without sacrificing your health. Our coaches are former founders, CEOs, & executive leaders with 10+ years of experience. Certified, heavily trained, and now coaching full-time.

lume combines career and health coaching because you can't bring your best self to work if you're not taking care of yourself. You'll work with two dedicated coaches—one for your career and one for your health (sleep, nutrition, exercise, biohacking). You'll also get to join curated group workshops, access our library of digital resources and wellbeing perks, and more.

Enter Your Email Below To Receive Startup Spotlights:

Startup Spotlight: lume

Problem: America is sick with stress. 77% of employees are burnt out (up from 43% in 2020), leading to churn and rising corporate costs. Stress is cited as the root cause of 75% of doctor visits, straining our healthcare system overall. People under stress are also 2.5x more likely to suffer sleep disturbances and 1.4x more likely to make poor nutritional choices.

Market: lume is initially launching B2C and then scaling B2B, targeting the growing $5T global health and wellness market plus the $20B global coaching market.

Solution: lume is the first all-in-one membership with integrated professional and health coaching to deliver transformational outcomes.

Team: lume's co-founders are startup veterans with the ideal combination of skills, experience, passion, and grit. Katie Kirsch is a 4x startup founder, ex-IDEO product leader, Stanford University (engineering) and Harvard Business School (MBA) grad, Forbes 30 under 30 consumer tech founder, and a trained executive leadership coach. Ari Gootnick is a 2x startup founder, has spent 100% of their career in startups (like Bird and On Deck), and is a certified yoga, breathwork, and forum leader. Plus, his dad is an exec coach, and his mom is a therapist.

Founder Advice:

Kirsch: Don't wait for the "perfect idea" to start building. Get started now.

Previous Startup Spotlights:

• Startup Spotlight #218: Sumtive - Sumtive is an AI driven discounts platform. We find the best discount recommendations - made just for you.

• Startup Spotlight #217: Paradigm Robotics - Paradigm Robotics builds next-generation robotic platform solutions for the most hazardous environments to serve those who serve.

• Startup Spotlight #216: Tandem - Tandem empowers startup employees to do and feel their best at work, through mentorship and coaching.

• Startup Spotlight #215: FindRx - FindRx is a pioneering platform that helps patients find medications, including essential treatments like ADHD and diabetic injections.

• Startup Spotlight #214: The Abbey—The Abbey is a social news platform exclusively for reading and sharing high-quality articles.

If you enjoyed this article, feel free to check out my other work on LinkedIn. Follow me on Twitter @fredsoda, on Medium @fredsoda, and on Instagram @fred_soda.