Transcripts
Well, Gracia, welcome to the Accrescent Podcast.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Thank you, Leigh Ann. Nice to be here.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I found you guys on Instagram a while ago and just kind of had you on my radar. And then as I do, I'll usually send different pages or profiles to my coordinator and be like, Kelly, we have to have them on the podcast. And she works her magic and somehow gets you guys on. So I'm really excited to learn more, especially because we were talking off air. I've been in the holistic integrative medicine world for many years now. And sulforaphane is something I've
never even heard of. So I'm excited because I'm really coming to this as a newcomer too, to get to learn all the ins and outs. But before we get into Brock shot and the product and sulforaphane and all that amazing goodness, if you're comfortable sharing a little bit of your origin story, what got you here? That just makes me feel, always makes me feel so connected to the guests.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, thank you. And I am incredibly proud of and love our origin story. And I will do my best to do it justice without my partner in crime, Benjamin, who is my co-founder. And our origin story does really start with Benjamin. Benjamin is based in Australia. And we met through a mutual friend back in 2019.
Our story really starts with, know, Benjamin was a wellness, just enthusiast. And interestingly enough, he was a true entrepreneur and just, you know, just deep down in his heart and has always wanted to bring innovation to people in a way that was just going to be really helpful and add sort of quality to their lives.
Benjamin actually started out in e-cigarettes because when e-cigarettes, I know, I know it's funny, but when they were first created, the goal was to help people quit smoking. And so when he first learned about, he's like, this is amazing, I know how so many people this could help, but quickly learned that that wasn't the sort of future of e-cigarettes and that they were gonna take their own
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:no way.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:pathway and weren't really quite helping people quit smoking, so quickly departed that space. And he was up in the middle of the night one night, as one does, about studies about longevity and wellness and such, and came across a Johns Hopkins study that was done in 2013, published in 2014. And the study was.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:you
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:was conducted in a heavily polluted area of China. had 300 subjects, 300 subjects. Half were given a broccoli beverage, and the other half were given a placebo. This Johns Hopkins group had actually discovered sulforaphane in the 90s, but this was one of the first large scale studies on humans.
And so in: Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:The group that took the sulforaphane group, their bodies within 24 hours excreted benzene at a over 60 % greater rate than the non-sulforaphane group, and acrolein, which is a lung irritant, at over 20 % greater rate. And so, and that continued for the two weeks of the study.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Benzene, as you know, is one of the gnarliest carcinogens found in air pollution, found in a lot of places and stuff. But air pollution is the one that most of us, especially those living closer to urban areas and stuff, have higher levels of exposure. So it was really a groundbreaking thing that demonstrated the potential for sulforaphane. Now, over the years, sulforaphane has been studied.
numerous times and also is found in over a thousand peer-reviewed studies and articles for its ability to help with number of different issues that many of us are facing. And that's from many of the chronic diseases we know of and think of from cancer, cancer prevention and treatment, to cognitive issues like dementia, Alzheimer's, autism and ADHD, and
even psoriasis, which is a big focus for us, and we'll talk about that. And so we really just, and in this moment, Benjamin was like, what is this thing called sulforaphane, and how can I get it? And initially, he just wanted it for himself. In that process, he realized that there really were no good sources of it. He found out in the process that getting it from
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:cruciferous vegetables, which is where sulforaphane comes from, getting it from those sources was really difficult because most people cook those to make them even palatable to eating and even palatable for your digestives or digestible. And so when you cook it, you actually damage the enzyme. And so that was one issue with it. And then in the supplement space, everything was pretty much just junk. It was a little bit of science and a lot of marketing hype.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:and many of them had very little sulforaphane, if at all. And so that really gave birth to the desire to like, well, I need this for myself, I need this for my family and my friends. And then along the process of really looking at how that could be something we could brought to market, he and I met. And I came from, I had worked at L'Oreal for over a decade, and
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:had been in a world where I was often experiencing, you know, marketing different products for different skincare needs, et cetera. And skincare actually is what made me so passionate about the ways in which we could have a preventative effect on longevity and on aging, et cetera. Skin being, you know, one of the largest organs, et cetera, and one of the most visible ones. And so when we came together,
I had never heard of and I think it took me like a good few weeks to even be able to like actually pronounce sulforaphane on a regular basis without stumbling and and so when we came together we both had like this desire to like wow this should be famous why isn't sulforaphane famous and and so that you know from there we really looked to like how do we bring this to market and also along the way
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:we started looking at our own value system and about what we were challenged with with the supplement industry. One of the things you'll find with sulforaphane is it's such an overt compound. When you're taking it, you can feel it. You can notice it. And you can notice it within days, sometimes within hours. And those benefits can be anything from more energy.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:more luminous looking skin, better bowel habits. These are some of the things you'll see very early on. And that made us say, well, wow, what if we've been taking all along all these supplements and vitamins with invisible benefits? We never knew if you took vitamin C and you still got sick, did you stop taking the vitamin C? Did you question, does this actually work? And so for us,
We then said, wow, we want to make sure that not only we bring sulforaphane to market, but that we are very clear about what this can do. We help educate people. We help them to challenge and ask of other companies, what is the quality of the source that you're using? Is it third party tested? Can you guarantee it has a level?
that of an active that will actually do something for me. So if I'm spending my hard-earned money and I'm doing what everybody, everyone taking supplements is doing it so that they can be healthier, they can age more gracefully, stave off certain chronic issues and stuff. can we be leaders in setting a new standard in the supplements industry?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, I love that. mean, we could spend an hour just talking about supplement quality and credibility and don't even get me started on supplements being sold on Amazon and how it's like so sketchy. So there's a lot there, which is why I'm always so excited and impressed having brands on that are going that extra mile to do the third party testing and to go, you know, so often you see, this is a good ingredient, but there, no one's looking at
Yes, but in what dosage? What dosage is efficacious? What frequency? You know, and a lot of companies just throwing an ingredient in there saying this has it. And really it's not an efficacious dose whatsoever. It's just so they, for that marketing ploy that they can say this has a superfood in there, but is it actually doing anything? And maybe you can resonate with this or not, but so many of my clients experiencing cancer or chronic illness, when you're in that
sometimes such a state of depletion, you don't have the capacity to sometimes do all those mental gymnastics to figure it out. And so already when I see someone says like third party testing for a blink, blink, blink, I'm already like, you are so far ahead of the majority of supplement lines out there. And that makes it a lot easier for me to start to make decisions, but also
When you're experiencing cancer or chronic illness there, mean, especially in the integrative world, there's a lot of protocols and a lot of supplements involved sometime. And being able to make sure you're taking ones that are super, super effective is just so important.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, You know, you really hit something that was also really important to us was, you know, we realized, wow, this industry isn't regulated. And so how do we move into this space in a way that we feel safe giving it to our family members and to our kids and, you know, and taking it ourselves and being a part of someone's wellness journey? That was
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:You know, that was really what led us to making sure, one, every batch we were testing had the sulforaphane level that we guaranteed was going to be there. We test every batch for that. Heavy metals testing and testing for contaminants. You may start with, and with natural ingredients, you may start with a crop and then through any manufacturing processes, we've heard these stories of...
certain things being introduced in that process. So testing along the way, testing at the early stages and your final batch being tested for heavy metals and contaminants to make sure that we have that purity promised there. And then the last piece being, while we don't use any pesticides and herbicides, we still wanted to be able to give people that assurance as well. We often get asked the question of,
you know, are you organic or, you know, or why are you not organic? And what we learned in the process, and, you know, this was an up-skilling education for me, is that organic doesn't mean pesticide-free. It means that certain pesticides are approved to use in that. And for us, we were like, can we produce this without pesticides and herbicides? And we learned we absolutely could. So this gave us another assurance we can say,
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I know.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:It's actually beyond organic. It has no pesticides, it has no herbicides, and especially we've tested for glyphosate, which is a big concern for all of us.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Well, especially when we start talking about chronic inflammation and some of those potential contributors to that. So, okay. I do want to come back to, cause we, we introduced this term, sul, sulforaphane. I'll probably stumble on it quite a few times today, but I do want to take us back to that. And just so it's super, super crystal clear, what is sulforaphane? And then we're going to get into the nitty gritty of how it can be supportive. Some of the mechanisms it's turning on or off within the body.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:You're doing great.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:I've got whole list of questions, but let's start there.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, Sulforaphane is one of the most powerful actives that you can find on the planet. And what is so fascinating about it is the way that it behaves in the body is so prescriptive to what your body needs in that moment. And so, sulforaphane comes from
family of plants called cruciferous vegetables, which is broccoli, kale, cabbage, even wasabi, cauliflower. And it is found to be most potent from, or yields the most potency from the broccoli plant. And we even found in our journey with working with broccoli, that the broccoli seed
was able to allow for us to harness the most consistent and the best dose of sulforaphane. Now, sulforaphane, the way that it works in the body, it works on three key mechanisms. And we like to call these the three key pillars of health. And that is gut health, that is detoxification, and that is inflammation management.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:If you focus on those three areas, you will do really well at identifying issues and identifying things in your life that may be contributors to chronic illness. And you will also be able to more closely target the best ways to be able to manage your health. And there's never a cure-all. There's not one thing. And I know you know this because you work
you know, with this group especially who are more advanced in dealing with chronic issues. But our bodies need to be protected and maintained. And we were given these really incredible systems, this really incredible system, this defense system that is built to be able to actually protect itself, to, you know,
rejuvenate cells and to have a healthy process as we make it through our lifetime. But what was not, I think, in the cards when the human body was designed was this modern toxic world. And our bodies really weren't made to deal with the level of exposure of toxic chemicals or even the way in which we work, the level of which
our bodies, we maybe don't get enough sleep, et cetera. So our bodies are really working harder to do their baseline thing that they're doing. And this is why sulforaphane becomes such an important tool and not a supplement, but more of an essential. sulforaphane, when it goes into your body, so sulforaphane, let me back up for a second.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Sulforaphane is an enzymatic reaction. There's two compounds. One is called glucoraphanin and the other is called morosinase. these are part of, sulforaphane and these two compounds are part of the plant's defense system. So when you damage that plant, sulforaphane is created and it is intended to help protect the plant. It has that protective effect within the body and that's what was discovered by Johns Hopkins in the 90s.
So when you take sulforaphane and when sulforaphane is activated in, you know, either before or within your own body, it switches on what's called the nRF2 receptor. So you can think of the nRF2 receptor as a gateway or sort of a door opening to over 200 protective genes in the body. And so what it's able to do at that point is to
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:be able to switch on a few different functions in the body that, one, help to normalize your gut microbiome. That's key. Key, key is the healthiest gut microbiome that has the right bacteria for you. It also can help to heal the gut lining so that what needs to be in the gut stays there. So those are two really key.
facets of what sulforaphane has been demonstrated to do. To be able to manage, I think managing inflammation is a really key thing because what we know is that an inflammatory response is actually an important part of our immune system. But too much of an inflammatory response is the kinds of things that lead to disease and chronic health issues.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-mm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:or an underactive immune response. So having a balanced immune response and one that is not continuous in a chronic way, so managing inflammation in the right way is absolutely key. so, soforaphane has been demonstrated in numerous studies to be able to calm and give an appropriate immune response in the body. And then detoxification being the third one and the one that was demonstrated in the
the Johns Hopkins study, if our bodies are not able to detoxify appropriately, then our body cannot function. And so oftentimes we think of toxic chemical equals cancer. It doesn't really work that way. Toxic chemical is...
a contributor, but it might not be the same contributor to you as it is to me. You might have the same level of exposure and you may not end up with tumors where someone with a very low level of exposure, that they may need a higher defense system against that. The detoxification piece too of sulforaphane is so fascinating because if you think about your detoxification system a little bit like a HEPA filter.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:completely.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:So you phase one and phase two detoxification. And so our bodies are taking a toxic chemical or a toxin, the two different things, but they're taking those things and processing all the time, processing them through. And if it's able to eliminate the toxic chemical or toxin out of the body, great news. It's doing what it's supposed to do. If it is not able to, so for aphane identifies that and says, nope, we're not done. We're going to send it through phase two and
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:help to remove that toxic chemical or toxin before it wreaks havoc on our cells. So those three mechanisms together are really what is why it's so fascinating. And then you can pathway any one of those into a deeper study of, why would someone have psoriasis and be reacting to
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:their environment or their own body's immune response, et cetera, and look at, how can sulforaphane be a piece of the wellness puzzle for them in helping to manage what they're experiencing?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, completely. I think the question I want to go to, even though you've already given us, here's the three main systems within the body it's affecting. What are some, I actually think I want to bring this in now. What are some of the maybe client or customer testimonials or stories you're hearing in different places? know, autoimmune, I don't know if you're allowed to publicly talk about cancer, skin health, kind of across the board. What are some of those things? Cause we're also hearing
Okay, it's gonna improve my gut health, it's gonna help with detox, it's gonna help with inflammation. You and I know that the ripple effect of that can be thousands of different benefits. But I do think it's helpful to hear some really specific things that you're hearing from customers saying.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, well, you know, the first things that we hear are the things that are most noticeable in the beginning, which are I'm more regular. And I never thought I would talk this much about bowel habits in my life. it's such an easy way to have a much better day. And there's also a lot of science to the connection between your gut and your
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:rain in actually, you know, being able to use the bathroom more regularly and just how much more alert you can be and mood improvements and stuff. So I won't go down that path too much, but that's one of the first ones we hear.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Well, bowel movements connect directly to detoxification because the liver releases that bile, that bile binds to the toxins, and then that bile gets excreted through the bowel movement. in cancer and chronic illness, we're always trying to get our patients more bowel movements, and a lot of them don't have regular bowel movements.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, yeah. that's one of the earliest ones. The skin luminosity and more plump skin was a surprise to us because it just wasn't... When we first started, we just thought, wow, this is a detox and a gut thing. And even from my skincare background, it was still just surprising that we would see that so soon. And I'm saying to myself, God, I spent over a decade in skincare and...
never occurred to me to tackle it from the inside out. so we do see that. And there are some studies related to sulforaphane's ability to help the body to produce collagen more like its younger self. So that is the reason behind why we would see a benefit like that. And then higher quality sleep, individuals saying, I
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:don't actually need my coffee in the morning. I still like to have it, but I don't need it. I don't need as much. So they're a bit more alert. There is evidence of sulforaphane's ability to help with muscle recovery. so individuals taking it in the morning before a workout and feeling more energized, that they were able to push it a bit further. Long distance runners even are some of them who come to us and say, wow.
you know, my numbers were improved, you know, could it be this? And that's always an exciting one. The cognitive benefits are ones that I'm really passionate about because I just see so many friends and family with kids with neurodiversity and individuals even like myself with, you know, I have a learning disability. And so to be...
to know that people are able to find alternatives to some of the stimulants and find that they are able to focus a bit better. There have been studies done around the reduction of inflammation and the adjustments to the gut microbiome that are directly connected to focus and attention issues and such. And so those are a lot of the things we hear. And I think finally,
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:One piece is we have a program called the Broc Shot Firefighter Protection Program. when we first sought out to do this, we weren't sure, would we get involved in philanthropy, et cetera? We didn't know what we would kind of really connect to. We have a really deep focus on sustainability. Were we going to dive deeper into that? And then almost immediately, we learned that there is an audience.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:is a community, which is firefighters, who have really high cancer rates. Two out of three firefighter-related deaths are from cancer. Over 90 % of fires have high exposure to benzene.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:And so when we found out this, were like, wow, we really need to reach this audience. And so we launched this program where when you buy a Brock shot, one is donated to a firefighter.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:And so along the way, we learned from the firefighting community that many of them were experiencing, you know, less, you know, better energy following, you know, they'll spend time, you know, even just in their fire stations where there's a lot of toxic exposure. Their turnout gear has two different very toxic chemicals on just in their jackets alone, water repellent and fire repellent.
And we found that we were hearing from them that they just felt a little bit better. Some individuals experienced headaches a lot, and they were just feeling, and it was like, wow, it really does feel like we're able to help their bodies, especially at their level, to detox better and give them just a bit more armor as they go out there and fight fires. That's a bit of the anecdotes around what we hear from our audience.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, and then I will ask you to talk specifically about psoriasis since you guys have gotten a lot of attention around that. I want to hear about that specifically. And then I think we'll get into some of the nitty gritty of how is Broc Shot different from other products on the market? What is the dosage we need to be making sure we're looking at? And also kind of the difference between natural and stabilized. So we'll get into all of that. But can you speak to psoriasis specifically for a second?
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Absolutely. This was another surprise for us. we had a customer who started using our product had severe plaques psoriasis. And within five weeks, we saw significant change in not only the visible look and feel of their skin.
but also their joint health and just some of the other symptoms that someone with psoriasis would experience, is, it's a really, really tough one. The problem with psoriasis is not only the effect that it's having on the individual and what they feel like on a day-to-day basis, but the treatments all have side effects, and many of the treatments are only short-term solutions, if you want to call it
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:and
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:symptom management.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:It really is. And that just felt just so sad to hear that, you know, in this day and age, there just was not a better, you know, a better choice in the mix, you know? And so along the way, we said, wow, we need to help this audience to know that we are an option for them. And that process of interacting with that community, we met so many in
incredible people who have just been really challenged. It's a big draw on people's mental health especially as well. And so we've met so many people along the way and that led us also to being the first supplement to receive the National Psoriasis Foundation recognition and seal of recognition. And that was really exciting for us because it also showed us that, wow, this is a huge, huge audience in
the United States and even globally. And the fact that we were the first supplement that was even on their radar, it made us realize, no one had been talking to them. No one had really been there to be able to offer them something. And how it helps to support someone with psoriasis is really around enhancing your antioxidant defenses. So arming.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:up your antioxidant system. To give you a good analogy about sulforaphane, if you take an antioxidant like blueberries and you take blueberries, blueberries is a well-known antioxidant and its intention is to go into your body and fight the free radicals that are there. We have antioxidants in our body already and we have free radicals in our body.
But they're not always a match for each other and so taking antioxidants should in theory be able to help to to tackle those those free radicals But what? Antioxidants your body needs and what mine are could be different and it's very hard to know what that is Enter sulforaphane Sulforaphane switches on your antioxidant defense system. So instead of just handing you a weapon
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:it's handing you an entire army that is prescriptive to you. It's switching on and charging up your antioxidants so that they can fight the free radicals that are there. And it's why it offers such an effective means to tackling a lot of things, including psoriasis. Reducing inflammation and helping the body have an appropriate immune response. So psoriasis is an autoimmune issue.
And so the body is having an overactive immune response, so to speak. Even the skin, the visible skin issues are the body. The skin is turning over faster than in someone without psoriasis. so managing the inflammation, helping the body to suppress that
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:pro-inflammatory enzymes and that response and making a much more normal response is at the core of getting the body to be behaving in a much more normalized state, if we want to call it that, or into its more normal state or central state.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Right.
Right. You already answered a kind of sub question that I had in the back of my mind, which is there's, I mean, really, think nature equipped us so well. So there's many, many natural agents out there. I'm thinking of turmeric. I'm thinking of things like that that are anti-inflammatory and then can go over here and support the immune system. And a part of me was like, OK, so how is sulforaphane different than some of these agents? And you already kind of answered that with it's not just creating an acute
anti-inflammatory state, it's actually affecting us on, I would say, like epigenetic levels where it's turning on or off certain genes that are either contributing to, yeah, that are contributing to that overactive immune system, that chronic inflammation, et cetera. And that feels like one of the big differences.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:You nailed it. It's giving you, it's going more into the mechanism of it versus just entering in something to calm the situation. by no means do, you know, turmeric and other antioxidants are phenomenal components to a holistic diet and such. And numerous studies also
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:exist for the whole flavonoids, bioflavonoids, that whole space in general. so, but this, yeah, when we found out about this, we were like, wow, this is different. And for individuals who are using Broc Shot and who are seeing a significant difference from the day before or the week before and see it as an essential and don't want to be without it, it's because it is
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:you know, it is so effective in, you know, in getting a bit more to the, you know, to the root or cellular level of things.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, well, it's really, I see it as kind of the upstream. We're addressing the upstream issue. A lot of things are fabulous anti-inflammatories immune system supports, but it's still a downstream thing rather than going, well, upstream is where the issue is starting from. If we're not addressing some of those genetic issues and those pathways that are turned on or off, we're just, we're going to need to continually dampen the fire.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Absolutely. Yeah, you nailed it.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay. Let's get into some of the nitty gritty of what should people be looking for? Why Brockshaw is so different because there's a lot of intention behind the dosage, behind how you are delivering that sulfurophane to us. And can you talk about that?
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So in an ideal world, we could get everything we need from nature. But we live in a modern world where there's commercial farming and depleted soil and a number of host of things that contribute to us not really knowing how nutritious certain plants are as we're entering into a world. And for us,
you know, the broccoli plant, we were like, that just, it feels so inconsistent, you know, if we were to just get this from nature in our food, and then of course the cooking aspect of it. So we knew that to be able to protect our bodies better and offer a real solution for the host of things that people are trying to, we needed, you needed to be taking it consistently, and you also needed to be easy.
That's another thing too, as if we need one more thing to prepare and such or wonder about. And so we wanted to make that experience convenient. We wanted to make sure that you knew what dosage you were getting and that you could have an effective amount of sulforaphane every single day to just feel armed and protected, et cetera.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:And that also just experience would be one that was enjoyable that you looked forward to doing and could fit very easily into your lifestyle. So those were a bit of the key things we were looking at that were really important for us. And the other benefit that came out of this whole thing was like, remember saying, wow, look at all the things I'm taking. I can actually cut this down and simplify because so for a fan is going to cover a lot of.
my bases and so I've got Broc Shot here and I just have a couple of other things that are complementary to that in my regimen versus having tons and tons of different vitamins that I don't know if they're working or
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, completely. So what is that minimum effective dose? And then can we talk a bit about natural versus stabilized sulforaphane?
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah, absolutely. in consulting with the experts that we work with, we have an advisor at the University of Melbourne. He's been working and studying sulforaphane for over 15 years. And we actually worked with individuals to help develop our current formula, who had worked with Johns Hopkins back in the 90s and so has been working with sulforaphane for that long.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Wow.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:And between that and then our assessment of the existing research and studies that were out there, the experts we were working with said, you know, your optimal dose is going to be around this like 12 to 15 milligram serving for most people. Individuals who are larger in size or smaller in size, et cetera, there's the option to be able to dose up and down for that. There's even studies that have been
done for individuals with much more chronic health issues who are tackling, especially cellular health that may go into the 30 milligrams, cetera. But that level of that 12 to 15 milligrams really is good for most people. And so that was our zone of, how do we bring something out that is going to be good for most of the audience that comes in?
And then when individuals contact us with their specific nuanced issues, we're able to ask more questions. And we're able to say, here's what we've learned along the way. And of course, everyone should be working with a health care practitioner who's familiar with their own specific needs, their own blood and urine panels and such, and have that guidance along the way for it to be the most
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:prescriptive and healthy. Everyone is so different. that's really how we landed at that place. And we found that our audience is such a significant audience and are really managing a lot of things quite well at that level.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay, I love it. That was gonna be one of the questions I asked, which is for someone in a cancer or chronic illness state, is there a higher level that has been studied or that is at the very least safe to go to that they could experiment with a little bit of course in conjunction with their main healthcare provider? And so you kind of said that 30 milligrams.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Yeah.
So the 12 to 15 milligrams is for most people. Anything above that is really dependent on so many personal factors. so I think we should focus on with that sort of core customer or core person who is tackling a bit of these things on their own and using a supplement with their own.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:understanding of where they are. I will add one thing that's really important to note here. We are one piece of our users who are on a cancer journey. We are one piece of that puzzle.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Tony.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Sulforaphane has, in studies, has been demonstrated to be able to be highly effective in both cancer treatment and prevention. There's a number of different studies that you can look at as to the effect on tumors and cell growth, et cetera, detoxification being one component of that. One thing that we're often, that we'll always caution anyone who's on that cancer journey is to understand
Are you doing a chemo or radiation treatment, et cetera? And when is the best time for sulforaphane to be a part of that experience? Because sulforaphane's really smart. And unfortunately, sulforaphane can also identify chemo as an aggressor to the body. And so what you don't want to do is have sulforaphane at a juncture where you do need the chemo to be
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:effective within the body, do what it's there to do, and you wouldn't want the sulforaphane to make that less effective. And that's why working with a health care practitioner who's familiar with how things can complement each other in the cancer journey is long, as you know, and it's one that is preventative, you've got your middle state, and you hopefully get to a remission place.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Finding the right appropriate time is a very personal thing for a healthcare practitioner individual to identify. so it's, yeah, and so we're like, we're really glad to be a part of that process with individuals who are on a cancer journey.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, completely. I love that. think that's such a great reminder. I do think most of our audience has their own practitioners, usually a whole team of practitioners they're working with, and also really understand that nuance, that there's a time and a place for things. And sometimes there's a time and a place to not have something as a part of the routine. So I love that.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Absolutely. And I did want to answer about stabilized. Absolutely. So we get this question a lot, and it was one of our first questions when we were looking at the space. so stabilized sulforaphane is basically, it's made in a lab. And so sulforaphane, as we talked about earlier, sulforaphane is an enzymatic reaction. So it's happening in that moment where
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yes.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:you're combining our powder with water, enzymatic reaction is happening, the sulforaphane is created right then, right before you take it. And so to use a stabilized sulforaphane, to stabilize it, to basically stop it in time and make sure that it's in a pill or in some form for a year, month, in a bottle.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:you have to use chemicals and solvents to actually stabilize that. And so for us, when we looked at how it's made, it felt so disconnected from the mechanism that we were looking at about, how do we, with those chemicals and solvents that are used for it, well, it felt counterintuitive to inflammation reduction, gut health.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, well now it's just as inflammatory as it is anti-inflammatory.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Right, right. So for us, just didn't make sense. And for the audience that we were really set out to support, and knowing that we could have a natural source, is broccoli seeds that are like, we get them from our source, they're gently milled and ground, and we add a small amount of horseradish fruit to it to add an additional morassanet source.
to ensure that we have a consistent yield of sulforaphane, the fact that we could do that with a natural source and we did not need to add any chemicals to that mix, it just made the most sense. It was what we wanted to take, we felt most comfortable taking and felt like it was just, wow, this is so much easier. You can read the label, you know exactly what's there and...
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (gray-sha) Walker (:Again, we were like, do we want to take this? Do we want to it to our kids? Do we want to give this to our family members? That was the lens for everything for us.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm. Yeah. And to that end, I'm, cause I've been taking it. You guys were so, so generous to send me a pack that I've been taking. I read on the instructions. It's like, you have to drink this within 15 minutes because those enzymes are alive and active and you want to get those in the system.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hi.
Gracia (:Yeah, yeah, I got her. I'm on my phone now.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay, I promise we'll land this plane.
Gracia (:Thank you so much for your patience.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:my God, you're totally fine. Honestly, it happened. So not a problem at all. We'll just, it'll all be here and it'll be totally fine. And I think we really, I mean, we got the core of everything. So this will just be to kind of help us land the plane.
Gracia (:Yeah, yeah, do want me to repeat anything from the...
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Okay, so the last, what was the last question I gave you? I feel like I said something and then it froze and I couldn't hear your response at all.
Gracia (:So we talked stabilized. Do you think we got that? Okay.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
We got all of that. Yeah. So maybe that was it. what I closed with, I was saying, on your, on the packaging, cause you guys were so kind to gift me some, it says drink within 15 minutes because it's live.
Gracia (:yes.
Gracia (:yes, yes. Yes, absolutely. Yes. So the goal there is it's natural and you freshly activated it right then and there. so sulforaphane is being an enzymatic reaction. It would lose potency over time. And so we really want to make sure that people get in the habit of taking it right away and making sure they're getting the full effectiveness of it.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm. And then the last, last really specific question I wanted to ask you was, you take it with other supplements? Can you take it with food? Is it better to take it on an empty stomach? Is there anything that might make it less effective other than maybe you leave it sitting out after you've mixed it with water and too long?
Gracia (:Yeah, that's the incredible thing about it is it's quite complimentary to most supplements. I think what we usually guide people on is, you know, look for redundancies so that you're not wasting your money. So that's kind of one area. The other area I think to look for is we do caution anyone on
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Gracia (:blood thinners should not take a sulforaphane supplement. And individuals on blood thinners have a ton of warnings because there's a lot of food out there and things that help improve blood flow. And so you don't want to overextend the body in that way. so, and then what was the second part of your question?
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Can you take it with food? Is there anything that makes it less effective?
Gracia (:Yeah, absolutely. So honestly, really any time of day, the thing that some people notice is they do find that there's a clean energy feeling that comes to the body. And so it is quite exciting for people to be able to experience that clean energy throughout the day. It's not a stimulant, like won't keep you up, that kind of a thing. sometimes when I'm feeling like
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Gracia (:I might be a little bit under the weather. I may have taken one in the morning and then I'll add in, you know, and have a second one before bed and I usually feel really good the next day. So you really can take it any time of day. Individuals who have more sensitive GI tracts may want to start with a lower amount and titrate their way up and allow for their body to adjust or take it even with food so that, you know,
you again, if you have a more delicate GI tract that, you know, that experience is, you know, is a little bit easier. And people with sensitive GI tracts tend to take vitamins with food anyway, because some of them can just, you can just feel it a bit more. And so, yeah, I think that that's the exciting thing is it's really kind of can fit in with your, you know, kind of your own system and your needs around it.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. Well, like I said, you guys were so kind to send me a couple boxes actually, and I've been taking it for maybe a week now and it's honestly come at such a good time. I'm in the middle of mold detoxing. And so this is a real, I'm like, this is such an amazing product to add to the mix right now. so I'm really excited to be able to see, like I said, I may be a weekend, so I'll be excited.
Gracia (:I'm sorry.
Gracia (:Yeah, yeah. Well, I'm really excited. I'm always excited to hear just what the experience is like. Everyone's is so different. And that's been a really exciting experience for us at the company to just understand its behavior and how usage and the individuals who are experiencing it, what do they notice first? And it also just makes us happy and proud to be able to improve.
just the way people are just experiencing the world, you know, in a way that they can show up more for their families and show up for their jobs and themselves in a stronger way.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, 100%. Well, Gracia, is there anything we didn't cover that you feel is really, important for the audience?
Gracia (:You know, the one thing I just I'm so, so, so proud of is that we, you know, another thing we saw in the supplements industry was the sheer number of plastic bottles and even sachets and sachets, the little envelope, you know, that kind of package comes in. The amount of sachets that are produced in the world, it's something like over 800 billion sachets.
are produced a year. It's enough to wrap around the earth so many times. It's really sick. And they're just sitting in landfills. so, and then plastic bottles, you know, we have this perception that recycling is an option for things and it is, but only 9 % of bottle of plastics are actually recycled. And so, and even recycling just kind of staves off one round. It still ends up that you're back here with more waste. And so we
we're like, wow, we really have to do this better. When you're starting a company at this stage with what we know, it came back down to like, what kind of world are we gonna be living in if we don't start to tackle this plastic problem? And so our packaging is BPI certified compostable, 90 % compostable within six months. You can throw it in a compost bin if your city has those, you can throw it into the garden.
if you so choose and you're actually composting in that way. that just, at the end of the day, just felt like, when you're starting a company like this, we all need to be thinking about the responsibility that the company has and not putting that on the end user, which is what all these companies have done. They put the responsibility on your hands to take care of the waste and stuff. And we felt like, we can...
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Hmm.
Gracia (:be responsible for that. And sure, it costs us more money to do so, but I know that I am helping for there to be a better world for my son to grow up in. Or when my son is asking, when he goes to school and they're talking about Earth Day and sustainability, and he comes home, he's like, wow, you know what? This company that my family started that we are doing our part.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah, completely. I love that. And those are those small details that you might not know immediately about a brand. And it's so powerful to hear there was intention in every single component of this. And I think that translates into, I do, I think there's a shift in kind of the consciousness of the world of wanting to be a part of something bigger and knowing that I'm buying this product that's so supportive for me. I'm then supporting these firefighters over there and I'm supporting the earth over here and
Gracia (:Yeah, yeah.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:this reciprocity in all fronts. So I love that.
Gracia (:Yes, yes. and I love that word so much. Reciprocity. I love that. Yes. Yeah, thank you.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Yeah. my gosh. Yes. We'll make sure it's all linked in the show notes, but just so the audience can hear it here, where can they find you? Where can they learn more?
Gracia (:Yeah, so Broc Shot.com is where we sell Broc Shot and Broc Shot is available either on subscription so you make sure you don't miss a day and it gets to you, you know, just, you know, and your routine is really seamless or even we have a try once option if you're low commitment and you want to see first as well. And I'm really proud that we stand behind that.
We're so confident that you're gonna see and feel benefits and have a great experience that we will give you your money back if you're not happy with it and stuff. So you really can just have that assurance and experience it without feeling like a risk.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:Mm-hmm. I love that. Well, Gratia, thank you so much for coming on. This has been such a joy.
Gracia (:Thank you so much. Yeah, thank you so much. you know, your clients are in patients, they're just really lucky to have someone who is just so invested in, you know, in problem solving for them and being a part of that stage of life. So again, congratulations. And congratulations on the podcast. It's great.
Leigh Ann Lindsey (:you are so sweet. Thank you so much.
