What happens when health challenges in your 40s become the catalyst for a complete career reinvention? In this episode, Kimberle Lau shares her journey from 20-year beauty industry executive to founder of Bake Me Healthy, an allergen-free, plant-based baking company. After pregnancy-induced food intolerances and a breast cancer risk diagnosis, Kimberle left corporate America at 44 to build a mission-driven business serving people with food allergies and intolerances.

She opens up about being a self-described "risk-averse" founder, discovering that the average founder age is actually 45 (not 25), and learning to focus on "the next three steps" instead of needing the entire roadmap mapped out. We talk about balancing business building with raising teenagers approaching college age, why she tracks sleep like a KPI, and how "micro-wins" serve as signals to keep going when progress feels slow.

This is an honest conversation about midlife entrepreneurship women over 40, starting a business during perimenopause, women changing careers in their 40s, and building something meaningful when everyone's asking "but when will you break even?"

What You'll Learn:

• How to change careers after 40 with purpose — Kimberle shares how 20 years of beauty industry expertise transferred to food entrepreneurship and what made her finally take the leap at 44
• Starting a business during midlife with family responsibilities — Navigating the reality of building a company while raising teenagers, managing mortgage payments, and planning for college tuition
• Perimenopause motivation for women entrepreneurs — How health challenges became the catalyst for purpose-driven work and why midlife is actually the right time to start
• Women over 40 starting businesses — Why the average founder age is 45, not 25, and what advantages decades of experience bring to entrepreneurship
• Building confidence after 40 as a female founder — Overcoming the "am I ready?" question and learning to trust your next three steps instead of needing the full plan
• Midlife transformation through purpose — From corporate burnout in beauty to creating inclusive, allergen-free products that serve an underserved community
• Second act career success strategies — Practical wisdom about evaluating micro-wins, managing risk strategically, and making self-care non-negotiable

Key Timestamps:

0:00 - Introduction

4:00 - From beauty industry executive to food entrepreneur—the health crisis that changed everything

12:00 - "Am I too risk-averse to be a founder?" and discovering the average founder age is 45

18:30 - Managing the anxiety of building a business as a mom with college tuition looming

24:00 - The "next three steps" approach: why you don't need the full roadmap to start

28:00 - Listening to micro-wins as signals to keep going

33:00 - The sleep habit tracker: treating self-care like a business KPI

39:00 - Building a family business: working with her mother and involving her kids

Key Takeaways:

• For midlife career changers: The average founder age is 45—your decades of expertise are an asset, not a liability. Starting "late" often means starting with more resources, networks, and pattern recognition than younger founders have.
• For women over 40 seeking purpose: Health challenges and body changes in midlife can become catalysts for meaningful work. What starts as solving your own problem can become a mission serving thousands of others.
• For perimenopause entrepreneurs: Risk-aversion doesn't disqualify you from founding something. Strategic risk management—having financial cushion, supportive partners, and clear-eyed assessment—is actually smarter than reckless leaping.

Featured Quote:

"When I first started, I was like, oh gosh, can I do this? Aren't founders like in their twenties, working out of their garage? Like how many people in their forties, let alone moms or females, are starting businesses? And I started Googling and I found that actually the average age is 45 for becoming a founder. So I was like, all right, well maybe I can do this." — Kimberle Lau

Lift Her Up

Visit Join The Tryb to explore Kimberle’s allergen-free baking mixes and cookies. Use code uplifters20 for 20% off of your order! Follow @bakemehealthylove on Instagram to see what she’s creating and where you can find her products.

If you loved this story...

Start with Jenny Jing Zhu’s episode about building a $100M company after immigrating from a small village in China, then explore our conversations with women who turned personal health challenges into businesses: Konika Ray Wong’s episode (founder of Girl Power Science addressing puberty education), Sarah Krasley’s episode (transforming manufacturing education for women globally), and Kerry Brodie’s episode (founder of Emma’s Torch, training refugees in culinary arts).

About Kimberle Lau:

Kimberle Lau is the founder and CEO of Bake Me Healthy, an allergen-free, plant-based baking company launched in May 2023. After nearly 20 years in product innovation and marketing for major beauty companies, Kimberle experienced pregnancy-induced food intolerances and was later diagnosed as high risk for breast cancer, leading her to completely reimagine her diet. In 2020, she left corporate America to focus on her physical and mental health, eventually launching Bake Me Healthy to create inclusive, top-nine allergen-free baking solutions. A self-described "geriatric founder" who started her company at 44, Kimberle brings decades of consumer insights and product development expertise to the mission of making baking accessible for everyone, regardless of dietary restrictions. She lives with her husband and two children (ages 14 and 11) and works alongside her mother, who taught her to bake.

About Your Host:

Aransas Savas is a wellbeing and leadership coach specializing in helping women over 40 navigate midlife transitions, career changes, and second-act reinvention. With 20+ years of behavioral research experience partnering with companies like Disney, Weight Watchers, and Best Buy, she hosts The Uplifters Podcast, featuring women doing transformative work in the second half of their lives. Aransas brings both research rigor and personal experience to conversations about courage capital, midlife transformation, and building meaningful second acts.

Connect with Aransas:

• Instagram: @aransas_savas
• Podcast Instagram: @the_uplifters_podcast
• TikTok: @theuplifterspodcast
• Facebook: Aransas Savas
• Website: theuplifterspodcast.com
• YouTube: @theuplifterspodcast
• LinkedIn: Aransas Savas

Keywords:

midlife entrepreneurship women, women over 40 career change, starting business during perimenopause, menopause second act, perimenopause motivation women, women 40s new career, midlife reinvention female founders, allergen-free food entrepreneurs, mission-driven business midlife, beauty industry to food entrepreneur, starting over at 44, women changing careers 40s, building confidence after 40, second act career women, midlife transformation purpose, geriatric founders, average founder age 45, food allergy entrepreneurship, plant-based business women, midlife health catalyst business, women entrepreneurs over 40, female founders midlife journey, balancing family and entrepreneurship

As someone who's built my career around [00:00:30] rigorous science, I super love that Nutriful was the first brand to clinically study hair thinning on menopausal women, which is why I am so proud to have them as a sponsor. Nutriful takes a whole body approach to [00:00:45] hair health supporting you throughout your life stages.

We talk about not just what they've done, which is super exciting and inspiring in its own right, but really we focus on how they've done it because. Frankly, it's really hard to do anything new to Trailblaze to break [00:01:30] out of our patterns. But the way that we do that is to hear other people's stories and understand how they manage those obstacles and barriers.

Her business is called Bake Me Healthy. And she's on a mission to fight food allergies and food [00:02:15] waste with super yummy, top nine allergen-free plant-based baking mixes and cookies. We've been sampling them here at our house. They're so delicious. I met Kimberly through my friend Louise Ra, who you [00:02:30] might have heard about before via my substack.

I ordered something that's not right for me. Now, I'm stuck with nine more of them. But it also gives you a chance to just sample lots more fun things and really enjoy the discovery process of finding things that you love [00:03:15] and wanna make a part of your regular routine. Probably, hopefully, because not only do you love the product itself, but you love the founder and the story behind it, and you're supporting a mission that you believe in.

Kimberly, thank you so much for being here today. Hi Aransas. I am so thrilled to be here today. So take us back to like the genesis story of you and make me [00:04:00] healthy.

Kimberle Lau: Sure. So I started my career in consulting, but then moved into the world of beauty and spent almost 20 years doing product innovation and marketing for almost every major beauty company.

I had to get over it and, uh, figure out how to alter my [00:04:45] diet. I was always a home baker and so just kind of taught myself how to bake without dairy or eggs. Incredible.

Kimberle Lau: in 2020, the doctors discovered that I had become high risk for breast cancer.

And so I ended up leaving corporate [00:05:30] America wanted to take care of my physical, but also mental health. Then two, while I was taking this break, I discovered that I just wanted to do something bigger and better, and I knew I had a bigger and greater purpose in life. And that's when I decided to launch make me Healthy.[00:05:45]

Aransas SAvas: Amazing, amazing. I'm so curious to know about the process. This is a journey that a lot of us go on in midlife where we start to realize there are things in our lives that we wish existed or we wish were different, [00:06:15] and some of us go off and found a nonprofit to address a systemic issue.

Right. So we, there's like a bit of a dichotomy though, because there's the, we are also at a time where we are carrying more responsibility. For more people. [00:07:00] We feel like our parents are kind of relying on us. Maybe some kids are relying on us, maybe our partner's relying on us. There's a whole economic engine built around us.

So take me through that, that moment of tension and how you found your way to keep moving forward through that. [00:07:45] Oh gosh, such a great

Kimberle Lau: question. So first. You know, it's, I always think I'm pretty risk averse. And so

Aransas SAvas: when you become a founder, that's the most, thank you for saying that, by the way, because I think most of us stop ourselves because we're like, no, I'm risk averse.

Kimberle Lau: thing, right? Game. Right. In terms of like, can I get past it? Can I take a bet on myself and with, you know, 2020 happening and me discovering, well, you know what, it's now and ever. I [00:08:15] try to live life with no regrets and it was a good break in my career. I'm like, might as well try something new.

But putting that aside, I've realized that like we have enough, I guess, financial capital to take a bet. But then even as you point out, like there's social capital. So I joke [00:09:00] around that. I'm like a geriatric founder. When I first started, I was like, oh gosh, can I do this? Aren't like founders, like in their twenties, they were like straight outta college, working outta their garage.

And I decided to launch baking mixes. I just figured like people are home. Again. It was, you know, during the pandemic, [00:09:45] people are home. They can easily bake through a baking mix, but how do I make it super easy for them? Developed a line of baking mixes where all you have to do is add oil and milk of your choice.

Aransas SAvas: And so that's kind of how it started. I love that. So really understanding your own experience and mining that experience to understand who your customer was and getting pretty specific about who your customer was. It's one of those things that hard work [00:10:30] upfront for easier work later on. And what I hear you doing here is saying, okay, I'm gonna get really specific about who I serve and really design for her life.

Because now when you answer these questions like, what do I do in this case or that case, it's like, well, I know who it's for and I know who she is and I know what she needs because she's me. Obviously that expands with time, but I think it's a really smart way to [00:11:15] start in terms of making it just a little bit easier and crispier what you're doing.

I was like, what's a problem here? And often I get the question, I was like, why didn't you go into beauty? 20 years of experience, why wouldn't you launch a beauty company? I frankly didn't see a white space [00:11:45] opportunity. And that's where, you know, for food here, that's where I saw there was something lacking in the industry where people could actually have something delicious, but that was inclusive for them and so that's why I ended up with make me Healthy.

My daughter's in high school now, my son's in middle school, but getting ever so [00:12:30] close her and so. My goal when I first started was like, okay, I'm gonna hopefully raise enough money that I can put my kids through college and every year, so that was two years ago. And as every year goes by, I'm like, oh gosh, am I any step closer?

And so that's always ongoing on my mind thinking like, am I doing the right thing for them? Mm-hmm.

Aransas SAvas: Yeah. And it's, this is

Can my [00:13:45] family bear it? And so that's, that's what continues away. But I think for at this moment, yes, we keep going. It's, it's a, you know, risk that we're managing.

Because I think one of the things that every founder's constantly asking is, should [00:14:15] I stop? When do I know that I shouldn't keep going? Oh gosh. That was a question in

Mm-hmm. Like, you get, like for me, there's been a number of, like corporate accounts at, or, or interested in ordering our dark chocolate chip cookies so that they could stock their pantries and so they're [00:14:45] giving their employees something healthy, nutritious, inclusive, to enjoy during the day in the office.

There's, I see the [00:15:15] light to keep going, and it was interesting. I was on a call with an advisor a couple weeks ago and she told me, she was like, you just need to know the destination and you just need to know the next three steps, but you don't need to know the full plan to get there. And so these little micro [00:15:30] winds are just kind like the next three steps.

Exactly how much revenue is gonna, you know, profit's gonna come in this year and it's not, not that that easy.

That's a major energy drain and has to be balanced by, okay, what is working, and that's the question I try to ask myself all the time. Where is the energy flowing [00:16:30] right now? What is really coming along and feels like easy and obvious and like, like it's the right thing for the right time and use that as my guide to where to go next and where to put more of my [00:16:45] energy and as an energy multiplier.

Exactly.

Aransas SAvas: and pick up on those signs.

I do think in every journey there are the voices that are really helpful and make us feel a greater sense of hope and energy. But then there are also the people that are like, what are you doing, Kimberly? So [00:17:45] how do you manage the unhelpful opinions or stories of others to help you stay focused? On that next right thing.

MusicMusic: Mm-hmm.

But it, it's hard because you, you have to like figure out what to filter out. [00:18:45] Mm-hmm. What are those filters for you? First and foremost, as. To align with our core values. Does it lead to sustainably sustainability for us is, is a core value, but it means in so many different ways, not only being better for the planet, but also as being a small business.[00:19:00]

And so what does it mean for financial stability and sustainability? And so looking at it through that lens of like, does it actually lead to being profitable? Because if we're not profitable, we're not sustainable,

So you are consciously [00:19:30] carrying sort of the weight of can I pay for my kids' college? You've got the, I'm sure your team, you're. Space, your partners, there's the financial relationships, there's investors, there's advice, right? Like there's all [00:19:45] these people that you feel like you, I'm sure are caring for, and certainly your customer first and foremost.

Kimberle Lau: Great question. For [00:20:15] me work, because I'm such a type A personality and I'm workaholic.

I certainly have, but it's, I'm being very intentional and trying to listen to my body. And [00:20:45] so last week I had a, I, when I work in the ca commercial kitchen producing or making your cookies or long 15 hour days. And so I. Usually come back the next day. Pretty like burnt, pretty exhausted. And then I had a conference on [00:21:00] Friday and anyhow, long story short, on Saturday, I was like, exhausted and I just, I just, I took a nap, I slept, I just, I was like, all right, I need to go to bed early.

MusicMusic: Mm.

So I lean on [00:22:00] him like, and I'm like having these moments, so that's good. And my kids. What's interesting about being a Iatric founder, I'm gonna just throw that raise out again. Is that my kids are a little bit older, so they're 14 and 11 and they've been along with me for the ride for the business. They come to [00:22:15] events with me, they work events.

Aransas SAvas: I love that so much and I love this very intimate aspect of a family business.

And I, I just can't imagine how difficult any of this would be without a community of support. And the most, one of the things I really love about your business is that you center both your mother and your [00:23:15] children and create this sort of multi-generational brand experience. Right? And like I. I have grown up so close to my mom and my grandma and my children.

Yeah,

Kimberle Lau: so my mom was actually my baking teacher. She's the one who taught me to bake. She made our birthday cakes every year. She would make ice cream cakes for us. Carrot cake. So actually I launched a carrot cake

It was delicious. Yeah,

And so it's just, it's kind of like a nice excuse to just spend time with her. I mean, again, granted they're long days and we're like hustling, but it, it's nice to have that time with her. [00:24:45]

Aransas SAvas: It's really special. Mm-hmm. And I imagine you're getting to know things about one another that you never would have had your relationship simply been.

Kimberly?

They work, you know, you can like, she's got these customers who just are just a advanced because they really make an impact on their health.

How can we best lift up you and make me healthy?

Share any feedback or networks. Our goal is [00:26:30] really. School safe. So we're really focused on colleges and universities, corporate offices, holiday gift, corporate giving. Again, we're just trying to be a great option for, for people who wanna indulge, but more mindfully.

I'm really excited to try more of your products and to share more of them. And I feel like they make great holiday gifts too, wouldn't they? Oh, yeah. Maybe, maybe new mom gifts given this story. So I'm just [00:27:00] thrilled to see where you go with this. It sounds like you are approaching this with so much love and wisdom, the kind of wisdom that we can only gain through lived experience.

Kimberle Lau: agree more.

Now that I'm in my mid [00:28:00] forties, I'm like, she was absolutely right. Yeah,

MusicMusic: this is right. That,

And so it would not be make me healthy 10 years ago as it is today. So I feel like, you know, and I [00:28:30] think you probably say this, the like, you're right where you need to be,

Aransas SAvas: right Where we need to

Kimberle Lau: be.

Aransas SAvas: That's exactly right. Thank you so much for being here. Kimberly. Best wishes to you in this big endeavor you're on.

Oh, thank you so much. It's been such an honor just

Aransas SAvas: Thank you for listening to the Uplifters podcast. If you're getting a boost from these episodes. Please share them with the uplifters in your life and then [00:29:00] join us in conversation over@theuplifterspodcast.com.

MusicMusic: Big love painted water, sunshine with rosemary. And I'm [00:29:30] dwelling. Not perplexing though.

Lift you up.

Lift you,

lift.