Lisa Curtis

Lisa Curtis, 30, starts her day with a tablespoon of green moringa powder added to oatmeal with almond butter, chia seeds, and baobab, an African superfruit. It’s the moringa that gives her energy, she says, something she discovered in 2010 when she was in the Peace Corps, in Niger, West Africa.

Curtis got her first taste of moringa after she told some women at the community health center that she felt weak, malnourished, and they suggested she try it. She mixed the green leaves with a West African peanut snack called kuli-kuli and soon felt her vigor return. And yet moringa is caffeine-free. She had to learn more.

Moringa trees grow like weeds in tropical regions, are drought-resistant, and for thousands of years have been used in Ayurvedic medicine. The nutrient-dense leaves are a significant source of vitamin C, vitamin A, vitamin B6, potassium, protein, iron, and fiber. Studies have shown it to have anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. The taste is earthy and a bit peppery, similar to arugula.

Curtis’s Peace Corps stint was cut short after Al Qaeda kidnapped and killed two Frenchmen in Niger and everyone had to be evacuated. She vowed to return, especially to help the village women who had helped her. Introducing moringa to the U.S. marketplace became her passion.

“The best advice I got was, ‘Before you start a startup, go work at a startup,’” she says. Thus, for three years she worked in Oakland at Mosaic, a solar finance company where she was the communications director. By the end of 2013 she felt ready to quit her day job and work full-time on Kuli Kuli, the name she’d chosen for her moringa enterprise.

Crowdfunding campaigns helped launch the company in 2014. Curtis spent six months doing demos and convincing store owners to carry moringa, sold as a green powder and boost for juices, smoothies, and guacamole among a host of other possibilities.

Curtis worked with a team that trained moringa farmers how to wash and dry the leaves, then pound them into a powder with a mortar and pestle. The raw product is organic, vegan, and non-GMO. She raised another $4.25 million to build and expand the supply chain to 13 different countries, including Ghana, Uganda, Nigeria, and Ecuador. More than two million moringa trees have been planted, employing roughly 1,300 farmers, primarily women.

Last year, Kuli Kuli had $5 million in revenue. There are 15 Kuli Kuli SKUs sold in 7,000 stores nationwide, including energy bars, teas, and shots in flavors like Coconut Lime, Raspberry, and Ginger Lemon. Curtis is frequently on the road and if she forgets to pack moringa – or enthusiastically gives all her packets away – she feels a loss of energy, which reinforces how she knows she’s on the right path.

Highlights

• 2010: Lisa Curtis joins the Peace Corps in Niger, West Africa; tastes moringa leaves for the first time.
• 2011: Curtis is evacuated from Niger after a terrorist attack, begins work at Mosaic, a solar finance startup
• 2013: Quits Mosaic to work full-time on launching Kuli Kuli; crowdfunding campaign raises nearly $53,000 to produce Moringa Superfood Bars, introduced at Oakland Whole Foods.
• 2014: Kuli Kuli launches as a company; crowdfunding raises an additional $350,000 via Agfunder.
• 2015: Kuli Kuli announces an initiative with Whole Foods, the Clinton Foundation’s Haiti Program, and the Smallholder Farmers Alliance to plant hundreds of moringa trees in Haiti and sell a Moringa Green Energy Shot made with Haitian moringa.
• 2016: Nationwide launch with Whole Foods Market as well as Safeway/Albertsons; closes $4.25 million Series A funding.
• 2018: Curtis is named one of Forbes’ top 30 social entrepreneurs under 30 years old.