Good morning, Broadsheet readers! New York Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a bill into law that paves the way for reparations, Vice President Kamala Harris will start a reproductive freedoms tour, and Selena Gomez’s mom and Wondermind cofounder wants to bring “mental fitness” mainstream. Have a wonderful Wednesday.
– Mental fitness. Two years ago, singer and actress Selena Gomez announced she was launching a new mental health company, called Wondermind, with her mom, Mandy Teefey, and the Newsette founder Daniella Pierson. In mid-2022, Wondermind raised $5 million led by Serena Ventures, valuing the startup at $100 million.
This year, Teefey has led Wondermind’s effort to raise additional funding (still in progress) and find its footing in the mental health space. (She serves as CEO and Gomez as chief impact officer; Pierson doesn’t currently hold an executive title.) The category is a crowded one, with startups like Real and Alma; mental health was the fastest-growing category on Andreessen Horowitz’s annual marketplace report earlier this year. But funding for mental health startups peaked at $5.5 billion in 2021 before dropping by about half in 2022.
Unlike most startups in the category, Wondermind is not starting with any form of therapy (whether that’s virtual care, a marketplace for providers, or prescribing medication). The startup initially launched as a content platform, publishing articles ranging from gift guides to information about ADHD, complex PTSD, and borderline personality disorder. It also seeks to distinguish itself with a focus on what it calls “mental fitness”—or everyday attention to and exercise for the mind—rather than overall mental wellness.
Today, Wondermind is still mostly a content platform, with 400,000 Instagram followers. Eventually, Teefey sees Wondermind selling products like those often used in in-treatment mental health programs for people to use at home. Those product ideas include anti-anxiety breathing tools and balloons (for an exercise that involves blowing up balloons, writing on them something you want to let go of, and popping them.) While many of those tools are already available for purchase, Teefey sees room for a more aesthetic version of those products that celebrates, rather than hides, the need for them. She wants to create a “mental fitness aisle” at the drugstore.
Mandy Teefey, cofounder of Wondermind. Courtesy of Wondermind “I’ve done treatment, which is why this is an important thing for me—and also to Selena,” Teefey explains. “We’ve both been in treatment, and these tools really came at an important time to help us get through emotions.” (Gomez has discussed her mental health struggles in the documentary My Mind and Me.)
While the vision for Wondermind includes products, Gomez and Teefey’s Hollywood backgrounds influence their approach, too. (Teefey has served as a producer on projects with Gomez including 13 Reasons Why.) Teefey says fundraising is like producing. “You’re always asking for money for something that doesn’t exist yet,” she says. And she’s still producing too; Wondermind is set to make a documentary with Venus Williams about mental health in tennis.
As Teefey and Gomez continue to build Wondermind—reaching an audience of 18- to 34-year-old women, including Gomez’s 429 million Instagram followers—they aim to open up more in-depth discussions around mental health. “I grew up in a community that was either you’re ‘crazy’—that was the term they use—or you’re not,” Teefey says. That’s a viewpoint she hopes to challenge. “We would treat any physical ailment we have. Why wouldn’t we take care of our mind in the same way?”
Emma Hinchliffe
emma.hinchliffe@fortune.com
@_emmahinchliffe
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