The Hardest Thing I Ever Did Was Start a Company With My Father
What is it like building a condom business with your dad? I’ve never answered that question honestly, until now.
I never imagined my dad and I would find ourselves sitting in a therapist’s office. How we ended up there — in Vermont, on a grey, bone-chillingly cold day in the middle of the winter — began two years earlier. My dad, Jeffrey Hollender, the founder of Seventh Generation, had handed me a business plan titled “Rainforest Rubbers,” a sustainable condom business. At the time, I was between my first and second year of Business School at NYU Stern. “Would you read through it and give me some feedback?” he had asked. I flipped through it briefly and looked up at him a little puzzled, “You really want to start another business?”
My dad and I had always been close. Both Scorpios, we met fire with fire when we fought, but our shared intense personalities also made us closer. We trusted each other, and most importantly, I felt like I could share anything in the world with him without ever being met with judgement. When I was dating someone and was unsure, when I tried drugs for the first time, when I struggled with my body image, each and every time I went to my dad first because I knew he would receive me with open arms and as much…
