Previnex: Mission, Vision, Future - Part 1

Previnex has one mission: to create health and flourishing. We believe that creating health changes lives, that everyone deserves the opportunity to flourish, and that at our healthiest, we can make the greatest impact on our families, communities, and the world. But how do we do that? It starts with you, choosing to prioritize your health. 

Right now, approximately 17,000 children die every day from malnutrition. At least 45% of those children die from vitamin deficiency, not food starvation. At a minimum, 3.1 million children under the age of five are dying from this problem. As the CEO, I envision a world where vitamin deficiency based malnutrition is eliminated from the planet. I envision a world where families are no longer torn apart by a problem that is 100% preventable. 

But why should you care? Why should you purchase from Previnex? Why should you choose to buy our protein powder, muscle health supplement, greens powder, or children’s vitamin? How do you play into this global crisis? 

In this two-part series, I’ll be explaining the history of and vision behind Previnex, and I’ll explain why this mission is important to us. I’ll explain what our ideal future is, and most importantly, how you get to be part of it. 

The Beginning: It Starts With Kids 

I have always had a soft spot for kids, and have been involved in children’s causes and charities for a long time. I recognized early on that I was really fortunate to be born into a family where I had a roof over my head, always had food to eat, and had all my needs provided for. Through traveling, I became hyper-aware of the realities that many kids across the globe face. I always had the thought of, man, kids don’t choose their parents. They don’t choose the circumstances they’re born into, and there are children suffering and having hardships as a result. 

That got me involved in children’s causes and children’s charities. I started supporting children in need around the world just because I felt like it was a way I could give back. So when Previnex started, there was always a thought in my mind: could we use the business to invest into children and specifically, malnourished children? 

Pivotal Moments - Why the Get Health, Give Health® Program Exists

So, what exactly is the Get Health, Give Health® program? For every purchase made, we send a bottle of our Super Vites® children’s vitamins to a malnourished child in need. Every. Single. Purchase. So far, we’ve been able to donate close to 4 million bottles of Super Vites® to 20 different countries! It’s arguably the most important thing we do as a company. 

There are two moments that really solidified my commitment to having a vitamin donation program—our Get Health, Give Health® program—as part of Previnex’s DNA.

The first was when my daughter, who’s my first child, was born in 2016. I remember holding her in my arms, and thinking that she was the most amazing thing I’d ever seen. But I could not shake the thought that there were parents just like me, holding daughters just like mine, who were going to lose their child to preventable things like malnutrition. After realizing this, I decided that malnutrition—specifically vitamin-deficiency based malnutrition—would be something we could attack as a company, especially given that our mission is to create health and flourishing, and we know how to make best-in-class nutritional supplements that actually create health in people’s lives.

The second moment came early on with the first charity the company supported in Haiti. It was an orphanage that rescued children who were victims of sex trafficking, and seeing the joy and the health benefits these children were getting as a result of taking our Super Vites® children’s multivitamin as they were recovering from some atrocious things…you don’t forget that. 

This lit a fire in me as I realized that the orphanage only had 50 kids…what could we do as a company if we could grow and continue to donate vitamins to malnourished children across the globe? 

Why Global Children’s Health? 

There are so many global issues I could have chosen to attack as a mission-based company. But I chose global children’s health because I look at Previnex as a reflection of my values. How do you love and serve people well? How do you create health and flourishing?

The reason I chose children’s health is two-fold. I think children, on one hand, are a passion of mine. Children don’t control the environment they’re born into. That’s part one. Part two is that health is a mega passion of mine. Marrying those two things together and learning that there were children dying from vitamin deficiencies, not food starvation, made me think we had to do something about it. 

Executing the Mission

Practically speaking, what does it look like to send children’s multivitamins all over the world? We partner with the Catholic Medical Mission Board (CMMB) to make this possible! We never want to just drop off vitamins to an organization or orphanage, get pictures, and leave a place, never to speak to them again. Our commitment is to be partnered with children day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. We are truly investing in their health and flourishing.

CMMB was compelling for us to work with because they have boots on the ground in the very countries we’re hoping to reach. They build hospitals. They reach those in the malnourished populations. Since they have boots on the ground, they could execute the program that we needed, which was how to get the vitamins into the hands of the most vulnerable kids consistently. 

Another important part of the Get Health, Give Health® program is that we want to tell the stories. We want to show our customers what an impact their purchases make, and CMMB is able to collect that data since they work so closely with the populations. 

The Impact 

We get to see children’s lives changed through this program, through Super Vites®.  

Joseph is a boy we met in Haiti. A classic sign of malnutrition is red-tipped hair. We have a picture of him when we met him, and a picture of him 18 months later. When we met him, his hair was turning red strictly due to malnutrition and poor living conditions. He started taking Super Vites®, and he was like a completely different boy the next time we saw a photo of him. These vitamins were able to provide a source of nutrition for Joseph that he was otherwise unable to get. 

Millianny lives in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, with her grandmother. She had lost a lot of weight and had no appetite, so her family took her to a doctor. Millianny’s test results showed severe vitamin deficiency. She started taking Super Vites® thanks to a recent donation, and they helped give her the nutrients she needed to regain her appetite, strength, and overall health.

We met Christopher also in Santo Domingo. He was having severe bouts of itchiness that got worse at night, as well as varying stool patterns and a poor appetite. The doctor’s findings were consistent with scabies and intestinal parasitosis. Combined with antiparasitic medications, the doctor prescribed Super Vites®, and thanks to the program and CMMB, both were given to Christopher and his family at no cost to them.  

The Get Health, Give Health® program is truly changing the lives of children across the globe. These are just a few of the children out of thousands upon thousands that we can serve. Without these vitamins and the nutrition they provide, many of these kids would be part of the 17,000 that die every day from malnutrition. The impact this program and our partnership with CMMB provide goes so far beyond what we could do alone. The impact you have as you partner with us goes across the globe, caring for the most vulnerable population in our world. 

Looking Ahead: A Lasting Influence

I didn’t know the impact Previnex would have when I started the company, and I know this is only the beginning of the impact we can make. In the next part of this two-part series, I’ll walk you through your place in this mission as our customer, and talk about the future of the company. 

 

David Block started Previnex in April 2013, with the goal of leading a company that exists to create health and advance human flourishing in the lives of everyone we serve. Since its founding, Previnex has donated nearly 4 million vitamins to children across the globe as part of our Get Health, Give Health® program. Prior to Previnex, David was a research analyst in the nutritional supplement industry, where his job was to read clinical studies on supplements, tour supplement manufacturing facilities, meet with executives of companies, and immersed himself in all things nutritional supplements. This gave David a front row seat to how predatory and exploitative the industry was, and that sparked the idea for Previnex: to make best-in-class supplements with real clinical data that actually create health in people's lives.