By Previnex®
In part 1 of this two-part series, we discussed the history of the Get Health, Give Health® program and our company, Previnex. One of the most important ways we push our mission forward is by partnering with you—our customers. Without our customers, the Get Health, Give Health® program would not exist to provide the critical resources it does for malnourished children. In this second part of the series, I will be discussing exactly that: how you get to be part of our mission every day, and then I’ll talk through the future and vision of Previnex.
Your Purchases Make a Difference
Every time an order is placed—whether a one-time purchase or subscription—a donation of our children’s multivitamin, Super Vites®, is activated to send to children around the world. So whether you’re aware of it or not, your purchase from Previnex makes a difference in a child’s life. If we have 72 customer orders in a given day or month, that’s 72 bottles of Super Vites® donated to children across the globe. You also have the ability to simply donate a bottle of Super Vites® along with a purchase, or on its own! So if you don’t need a refill of vitamins, aren’t looking to try something new, or don’t want any at all, you can still give a bottle of Super Vites® to a child in need. If you’re ever curious about what a difference these vitamins make, you can look at our Stories of Impact, which highlight ambassadors we partner with and children we donate to.
A Mission-Based Company
So, what does it mean to be a company “on mission” or a “mission-based company?” As the CEO of Previnex, for me it means that the company is an extension of my values. Creating health and flourishing—what Previnex exists to do—means that everyone deserves the opportunity to live the longest, healthiest, most active life possible. Unfortunately, the reality is much different for many people in less fortunate situations, and that's hard. That’s why we have a mission in mind at Previnex. That’s why we have a strong desire to solve vitamin deficiency-based malnutrition. We don’t believe that people should lack access to great nutritional products, or that children should be dying from vitamin deficiency-based malnutrition. If I can see that specific problem eliminated in my lifetime—especially since it’s 100% solvable and preventable—that would be so deeply satisfying and a big victory!
The Future of Previnex
I’m thrilled with the impact Previnex has already made since we started in 2013. And, I’m even more excited to see how much more we can accomplish. In many ways, it still feels like we’re in the very early innings and just getting started.
Long-Term Vision
I have a huge long-term vision for Previnex. I want to see vitamin deficiency-based malnutrition completely eliminated from the planet before I die. It is a solvable problem. It’s 100% preventable. We have the collective resources as a society to eliminate the problem, and in my view, it’s disgraceful that children are dying from something that is so preventable. If I had unlimited capital, we could figure out a way to solve this problem within a year if distribution was available to all children (which I also think is possible). My vision is that as Previnex grows, we can solve this problem (granted, we would have to be pretty enormous as a company). My goal is to see this problem go away, so children who are dying from vitamin deficiency, whose growth is stunted, their potential halted, have a shot at life.
Local Vision
While we have a long-term, global vision, I also feel called to serve our local community. Previnex is headquartered in Indianapolis, and we’re currently talking with community centers to come up with different ways we can make a difference in our local community. We have our Get Health, Give Health® program, where we’ve donated bottles of Super Vites® to malnourished kids in 20 countries, but there are also malnourished children in Indianapolis.
Now, the likelihood that kids in Indianapolis will die from malnourishment is unlikely since they have access to fast food and other not-so-healthy options that will at least sustain their lives. But they will not flourish, and our goal is to create health and flourishing. So the mission still applies to kids in our city!
A few things I’d love to accomplish locally are:
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Creating jobs. There are underserved people in our community who would benefit from having a job, and I’d love to create opportunities for them. Many people have a hard time working because of their circumstances, so we’re actively talking to an organization here in Indianapolis that specializes in creating jobs for underserved people. We’re exploring what it would look like, in relation to Previnex, to create jobs and opportunities for these people. Creating health encompasses more than just physical health, and creating jobs creates dignity and a path to flourishing.
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Previnex Cafe. I have a vision for a Previnex Cafe, where we can serve really high-quality food and drinks, and have a smoothie bar using Nourify® PLUS and other Previnex products. While we would initially launch these in more affluent communities that have strong demand for health and healthy eating, I would love to see this happen in a way that both benefits underserved communities that don’t have access to good food or high-quality nutrition, and incorporates education curriculum on the importance of health and healthy habits. We don’t know what we don’t know, and education and access can be powerful tools of change.
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Food education. As a society, we are severely under-educated about food, nutrition, and nourishment. In addition to the Previnex Cafe, I would love to do community education about food and nutrition. We can cover even the most basic things like antioxidants, complex carbs, simple carbs, etc.—things people don’t learn in school (sadly), but as mentioned, this information can make a huge impact.
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Mission Committee. As Previnex grows, I’d love to have a committee composed of a diverse group of our employees that can allocate capital to, and support causes that are aligned with our mission of creating health and flourishing. This is, again, an extension of my own values, thinking through how we can love and serve people well, and look out for the least of us, all while making the biggest impact we can.
Creating Health and Flourishing
Previnex exists to create health and flourishing for everyone we serve—customers, partners, employees, malnourished children—and every decision I make as CEO is filtered through this lens. Since day one, every customer review we have ever received is sent to my inbox, and 13 years later, that’s still the case. It’s a reminder for me of the meaningful work we get to do every day, creating health in our customers’ lives and the lives of so many across the world. As a Previnex customer, you make a difference in the lives of children across the globe. Your purchase or donation can mean the difference between life and death for a child who is not able to get the vitamins or nutrients they need. Our mission to create health and flourishing is only possible because of our customers. When you purchase from Previnex, you become part of something much bigger than creating health in your own life. I’m so excited for our future as a company, and I’m thankful we get to partner with customers like you to make it all possible.
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.
