Wondermind, a mental health startup co -founded by singer, actress and businesswoman Selena Gomez, is going through a crisis. He ran out of cash and could not pay his employees, suppliers and independent workers since the end of March. For now, the company, based in Los Angeles and about 15 employees in charge of publishing articles, interviews and podcasts on mental health, remains afloat thanks to Mandy Teefey, mother of Gomez and executive director of Wondermind.
Teefey informed the employees that he had asked for a loan with his house as a guarantee to pay off debts. Although they have already received a pending payment, they still expect another. In addition, the company owes hundreds of thousands of dollars to suppliers and self -employed workers.
A Wondermind spokesman said the company “rectified” the situation and that all creditors will receive money on Monday. “Like many startups, Wondermind beat his own growth problems,” said the spokesman in a statement to Forbes, adding: “In the next few days we will start a new stage for Wondermind and we will continue our important work in the field of mental well -being, which helps hundreds of thousands of people.”
Teefey did not want to make statements, and a Gomez representative did not respond to the Forbes consultation.
The beginnings of the company
Gomez, 32, is one of the richest entrepreneurs in the United States, with an estimated fortune of US $ 700 million. Most of his heritage is in Rare Beauty, his makeup line launched in 2020, which billed almost US $ 370 million in 2023. In 2021, Wondermind created with his mother and Daniella Pierson, founder and executive director of the Newsette Bulletin. At the time, Pierson described Wondermind as a more attractive and entertaining competitor than sites like Psychology Today and Webmdinspired by the mental health problems of the founders.
“The truth is that it arose from a conversation we had about our experiences and we ended up connecting a lot, which was a turning point,” Gomez said during a panel at the Austin SXSW conference, last March. Then they asked: “How can we do that for others?”
In 2022, Wondermind raised US $ 5 million in a series of serial financing led by Serena Ventures, by Serena Williams, with the participation of Capital Sequoia, Lightspeed Ventures and the family office of multimillionaire Barry Sternicht.
Despite the initial enthusiasm and having a famous and wealthy co -founder, Wondermind fell into a desperate financial situation. This is demonstrated by recordings, mails and interviews that Forbes maintained with three current employees, who asked for anonymity for fear of reprisals. In addition to debts with employees, two of them They ensure that the company must US $ 60,000 to a press agency and tens of thousands of dollars to autonomous writers, some of which did not charge in more than three months.
According to those employees, the problems began in January 2023, when Teefey assumed as the only executive director. Pierson, who shared the direction, resigned at that time, without knowing the reasons. Since then, Teefey took the reins. His LinkedIn profile indicates that she was president of July Moon Productions, who managed Gomez’s career until 2014, and then executive director of Kicked To the Curb Productions, producer of the Netflix series For 13 reasonswhere Gomez appeared as an executive producer.
The first signs of the crisis
These employees argue that Teefey did not have the necessary knowledge to handle the operation. They claim that he rejected important agreements if they demanded the participation of their daughter, including a millionaire with Airbnb, which would have deepened the crisis.
Emma Wright, Teefey Cabinet Chief, described that version of the Frustrated Agreement with Airbnb as “extremely misleading”, although it did not give details. He also defended Teefey’s leadership: “He led with pure grace. He focused exclusively on maintaining everyone’s support and company growth.”
For his part, Gomez does not have an active role in Wondermind. It appears as director of impact on the website, but, according to an employee, “we have to fight with his agent to do something for us, and he rarely does it. And with ‘doing something’ I mean publishing something on Instagram or lending himself to an interview that generates traffic.” The company’s spokesman denied this and said that Gomez’s participation “speaks for his own.”
The problems exploded on March 31, when the company did not pay the second fortnight of wages. That same day, Teefey sent employees a mail entitled “Important Update.” He informed them that the medical care provider Sequoia had canceled the medical, dental and view benefits since March 15.
“We apologize for the mail on a day of well -being,” Teefey wrote. Then he attributed the problems to the delay in the arrival of funds from an investor. He said that the B series was about to close and that they already had US $ 8 million committed. (Until now, no series b) was announced. He also told them that, for the moment, they should resort to Cobra, the federal law that allows to maintain medical coverage paying the costs directly, although he promised reimbursements “after we raised our round.” The next day, during a meeting recorded and reviewed by Forbes, Teefey said the problem was legal and that they would soon solve it. He did not identify the investor, but said he would have covered the payments if he could.
When an employee questioned the low amount of series B, Teefey said they planned to raise it between US $ 20 and 30 million. He pointed out that, with that money, debts would settle and relaunch the company with an app, profitability and growth.
A few days later, at another meeting, Bhavik Trivedi, operations director, said the funds were “in process” and would arrive shortly. Teefey added that they managed to get money to cover the expenses until the end of the month, but that they had to suspend all the projects. “We are not going to spend a dollar in the month of awareness of mental health,” he said. Although the company paid the pending salaries of March and the first half of April, it failed to comply with the payroll on April 30. Since then, employees did not charge.
A solution that does not arrive
The last update arrived last Thursday, when Teefey announced that he obtained a loan with his house as a guarantee to cancel debts. He promised that payments would be made on Friday and that the company had cash to operate until the end of the month.
However, on Friday, Trivedi communicated in Slack that the money had arrived after the bank transfer schedule, so the payments would be made on Monday at noon. This left employees with uncertainty. “Even if this loan is specified, considering the debt and what is owed to all, maybe we receive the payment … But then what?” One of them wondered.
Another added: “Mandy believes a lot in this company. It has good intentions. Even so, there were many unfulfilled promises. They always announce a new great opportunity, but it never comes. It gives sadness to see things like that.” On Gomez’s participation, that same employee concluded: “Until recently we felt safe because she was co -founder. But it seems that her participation is minimal or non -existent, or we would probably not be here, right?”
*With information from Forbes Us.
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