Approximately 1 in 4 Americans will be afflicted with cancer in their lifetime. Cancer is an overwhelming disease with many logistics and unknowns, all of which can be pretty daunting. While working through her mother’s cancer diagnosis and treatment as well as her own, Liya Shuster-Bier is now helping others care for cancer patients with a solution to help aggregate all of a cancer patient’s needs in one place. Alula, which launched in January 2021, is a radically honest resource that supports people, families, and friends through the entire lifecycle of cancer.

We interviewed CEO and Founder Liya Shuster-Bier about her journey with cancer, closing her fundraising round, and creating a new product in a niche category.

“We are really colliding consumer health with traditional consumer DTC to build a modern anti-cancer lifestyle brand.” -Liya Shuster-Bier

It is fairly easy to shop for your friend’s wedding or baby shower since you can access a registry, but what if your friend receives a cancer diagnosis? Cancer is also unfortunately a life moment that many may encounter in their lifetime, and one that many loved ones struggle to shop for. As a cancer survivor herself, Liya Shuster-Bier was determined to solve this problem of shopping for a cancer patient and thus, Alula was born.

Alula features a marketplace of products guided by medical experts and curated by cancer patients who have been there. It serves as a place where a cancer patient can have all their shopping needs met without the hassle -- a place where loved ones can help purchase new favorite items for their cancer patient to help them throughout their cancer journey.

“A discovery platform for patients and caregivers.”

“Alula is organizing your support system outside the hospital room. We like to say that doctors treat cancer and Alula treats living with it,” said Liya. Alula is truly the one stop shop for everything a cancer patient needs; where you can register for products/services you need, organize logistical care across your support network, read about cancer and lifestyle content, and connect with others in the community.

The Aha Moment

Imagine hearing that your mother got diagnosed with cancer, and then a few months later, you also received a cancer diagnosis. Liya Shuster-Bier knows this firsthand, and wanted to help make it easier for cancer patients to shop for their new lifestyle.

After her mother’s diagnosis, Liya would shop a lot with her mother to help her purchase new products, and what was most surprising was the amount of time spent shopping for a variety of OTC products/services that were never utilized before. She found herself shopping for all types of products in different aisles like the baby and geriatric aisles, and realized this burdensome experience could be made much easier. Liya’s mother also kept asking why there was not a one stop shop for everything related to cancer patients, and this began to spark Liya’s curiosity of this untapped consumer segment of the cancer patient. When Liya herself got diagnosed with a rare form of lymphoma while her mother was rendered in remission, she felt this pain point on a grander scale – not just for herself personally shopping for things she needed, but also for her support system that wanted to show love to her on her journey battling cancer. It was then that Alula was born.

“Alula is reframing and curating different types of products for the cancer patient and is the first brand that is organizing the cancer patient as a consumer segment,” said Liya.

Alula currently operates through an affiliate program with the brands selling through its marketplace. The platform aims to help brands discover a new consumer segment in cancer patients and acts as a discovery platform for patients and caregivers. Alula also adopted a medical advisory board that is blessing everything from an oncologist's perspective, in addition to frequently collecting data on patients and caregivers through interviews on what they are using to get through treatment and recovery. “Our patients needed these products yesterday and we want to focus on optimizing for speedy fulfillment and educating them on what they need,” said Liya.

The Childhood

Liya, the oldest of three, was born in Baku, Azerbaijan in a Jewish enclave, and left as a political refugee at just 18 months old. After moving around the world, Liya and her family were granted political asylum and found themselves settling in Forest Hills, Queens in New York. Attending public school in the city her whole life, Liya decided to make the switch to a more rural location, moving to Hanover, New Hampshire to enroll at Dartmouth College.

Both parents had civil engineering degrees, but Liya wanted something different. At Dartmouth, Liya majored in Geography and Government because she “was really obsessed with how capital shifts across place and creates inequity in various forms,” ultimately dreaming of a job at the World Bank. Her first job out of college was a coveted spot on the corporate derivatives team at Goldman Sachs, where she worked on major companies like Walmart, Apple, Google, analyzing currency fluctuations on their balance sheets and income statements.

“I loved the pulse of the trading floor and the analytics that helped these companies protect their earnings. I loved translating what was happening politically in a certain country to what that meant economically,” Liya said. After a few years in the corporate world, Liya fed her social impact appetite leaving Goldman in 2013 to join a startup in Boston where she designed social impact bonds with governments across the country. After a couple of years, she then decided to pursue her MBA for more managerial experience and got accepted into Wharton.

Six months into Liya’s MBA, her world was forever changed. Liya’s mother got diagnosed with breast cancer, and a few months later, Liya got her rare cancer diagnosis. It was this time, and everything leading up to this moment that she knew she had to do something to help other cancer patients adapt to their new normal. Liya started Alula during her cancer treatments, and was inspired by her community and loved ones to keep following her dreams of creating the business, while also fighting cancer.

As a cancer patient and founder, Liya found it difficult to decipher between what was bringing her down -- was it the cancer or the grind? However, she found that she needed to prioritize her health, as well as ensured that her team also prioritized their health for the business to run smoothly. It was a challenge to balance the overall business needs during treatments, but even in difficult times, Liya’s strong conviction to getting things done and helping people proved successful. Her inspirational story, life experience, and strong appetite for helping others paid off. In 2020, Liya had spoken to 95 investors and closed $2.2 million in her pre-seed round.

The Advice

Liya’s advice for launching a startup:

Your deck has to give your elevator pitch for you. Put your personality into your deck because investors will invest in the founder as much as the idea.
Invest in the technology for investor pitches. Do the $15/month Zoom subscription because it's more important to have a seamless meeting experience. Make sure you are also investing in a Wifi booster so you can present your pitch seamlessly.
Build a fast-growing startup, while taking care of yourself and your team. Have specific work systems and architecture in place to keep you and your team healthy.

What’s Next for Alula

“We are really de-stigmatizing and democratizing everything a cancer patient needs to heal and to recover. There is a lot of focus on the medical bill component, but what I was stunned by in my own treatment was how medical bills were a singular part of my many, many expenditures. It took me getting cancer twice and also living it with my mom to understand the universe of things you need and what you need to pay for. Alula is organizing this all into a singular place,” Liya said.

In the future, the team is also planning to build registries for users to raise money for specific care. Alula is also aiming to make the overall transaction and registry process easier, like automating patient thank you notes and other small features to help facilitate transactions within the platform.

Lastly, Alula will be a space for the community, where patients get a shareable profile as part of a dashboard of their cancer treatment. The patient will have the ability to customize knowledge, products, their registry, and more, to different parts of their community. “We are building the foundation for patients to share each other’s profiles through the Alula platform because we believe the community of content-led and commerce strategy is what will keep the patient and their loved ones buying through Alula,” said Liya.

Do you know someone diagnosed and suffering from cancer? Show your support and care by sharing Alula with them.

Photo courtesy of Alula.

Written by Christina Chao.