Why Jules Miller traded filler heavy capsules for traced formulas

A customer who keeps a small jar by the kettle told Miller she took the same two capsules each morning. That habit sits at the center of The Nue Co. view, a short ingredient list with clear doses, lot files in the background and no added bulk inside the shell.

A shopper described keeping the jar beside the kettle and taking two capsules each morning for the long haul. That account is a good entry point to Jules Miller. Pre + Probiotic holds 60 capsules and sells for 75 dollars, and the use pattern is direct.

Miller started The Nue Co. in 2017 after coping with IBS from her early twenties. She recalls testing both natural and prescription options that made her feel sicker, then assembling her own pattern around food and a few supplements. The company name draws on nue, which she renders as stripped back or naked, and the first premise stayed narrow. In her view, about half of what filled common supplements was synthetic filler and bulking material, so she sought blends free of those additions.

What the label offers today reaches beyond gut capsules. The collection covers ingestibles, topical magnesium, hair support and a sizable functional fragrance arm built with perfumer Frank Voelkl and firms that include Givaudan and Firmenich. After a 2024 rebrand tied to mood states, fragrance represented 65 percent of turnover. What many overlook is the role of delivery in that change. Capsules and powders lacked immediacy, so Miller looked to scent, which she portrays as a straight path to awareness, memory and mood.

How does that idea of nue as stripped back or naked show up in the other ingredients line on a jar like Pre + Probiotic.

Our base rule at The Nue Co. is to make supplements that avoid harm to people and to the planet. Sustainability sits at the core of our work, since we regard health as a single linked ecosystem. We join science with nature through sustainable and clinically studied ingredients in order to make health goods that serve people and the planet. In label terms that means we turn away artificial colors, flavors, fillers, GMO ingredients, refined sugars and preservatives in ingestibles. We also turn away toxic preservatives, additives, flavourings and sweeteners, and we keep a banned set of more than 200 ingredients. Pre + Probiotic ranked among our earliest formulas and remains a bestseller. It joins a prebiotic with spore bacteria, which rest dormant until arrival in the small intestine where they become active. Take two capsules each morning daily for sustained gut health. That is what the panel states, and the files behind the lot are what allow us to support it.

You started The Nue Co. in 2017 after IBS arrived in your early twenties and market supplements left you feeling worse. What did those early labels show you about fillers and the quality of a formula.

Health always felt instinctive to me. I was raised in a Colombian home grounded in plant based healing, I visited the herbalist alongside my mother, and I learned of vitamin B12 through my grandfather, who worked as a chemist. When IBS appeared, I gave much time and money to products that left me feeling sicker. As a rule, I saw that 50 percent of ingredients were synthetic fillers and bulking agents. My grandfather had brought probiotic supplements into my life and shown me that formulation plus ingredient quality decides everything. I had held roles in the supplement trade and I witnessed the lack of transparency and effectiveness. I feel as if my whole life had collected insights for The Nue Co. No role ever felt like mine, so I built one myself. Nue means stripped back or bare and open to the root. That formed the brief. Pure active botanical ingredients at studied dosages, with nothing extra to bulk the capsule.

You describe probiotic blending with a gentle slow blender to keep the cultures stable. Why does blending speed matter for a two capsule dose taken in the morning.

Because the capsule must supply what the label claims when you swallow it. Strong shear makes heat and fractures particles in a manner that may lower viability. A gentle blender safeguards bacteria stability during the mixing phase, then we manage moisture and fill weight during encapsulation so every capsule carries the planned level. This reflects what my grandfather meant when he taught that formulation plus ingredient quality decides everything. A blend can appear correct on paper and still shed potency in production if the method runs too hard. We check for purity and potency and we retain batch records, so when a customer asks about a jar of 60 capsules we can refer to the lot and the lab page. Our products are meant to sit within each portion of your day and each room of your home. They are meant to feel pleasant to use, never a chore. The morning dose gives the clearest case. Two capsules, steady hour, steady glass of water, no complex stack.

Your brief states that over half of ingredients are organic or community grown and tested for efficacy, purity and potency. Where exactly does the Pre plus Probiotic material begin, and what happens between harvest and encapsulation.

We work with clinically studied and ethically sourced ingredients at proven dosages, and more than half are organic or community sourced. Every lot is tested for purity, potency and effectiveness. With probiotics, the chain carries weight since living organisms react to heat, moisture and shear. Our probiotic mixing employs a special slow blender to defend bacteria stability. That may sound minor, yet it determines whether fill weight inside the capsule aligns with the count on the Supplement Facts panel when you take it. The botanical part begins on farms listed in our sourcing files, then moves to drying to a defined moisture target, milling, and extraction where an extract is needed. Extract ratio and standardisation appear on the certificate of analysis. Next the material is blended, encapsulated, and sealed jars are kept until third party lab outcomes arrive for heavy metals and microbes. I favor clean and clinically proven ingredients instead of synthetic fillers and additives. Clean, for us, must rest on a document behind the word.

You work with Givaudan and Firmenich and you refuse phthalates, nitromusks, polycyclic musks, parabens and synthetic fixatives in scent. What does that refuse list change at the bench where the scent is compounded.

It alters the palette and the files. We craft fragrances with Givaudan and Firmenich and world class perfumers, and we decline phthalates, nitromusks, polycyclic musks, parabens and synthetic fixatives. Those substances often add tenacity and lift, so in their absence the perfumer must reconstruct form with alternate aroma materials and check stability across the 50 ml and 10 ml sizes. Functional Fragrance is priced at 125 dollars for 50 ml and 38 dollars for 10 ml. First Milk, Us, Good Spirits and the rest share those sizes. Every edition carries a stated mood intention on its page, and ingredient disclosure follows cosmetic rules. I founded The Nue Co. to spread that view, helping people link with their bodies via products and rituals that are both beautiful and effective. In fragrance terms that means a scent worth wearing, with a credited perfumer, a credited house, and a formula record that notes what was left out as well as what went in.

In 2019 you launched Functional Fragrance direct to consumer with perfumer Frank Voelkl, expected little, and watched a small order sell out before Black Friday. What did that teach you about scent as a path into the body.

The first time we released functional fragrance, I assumed it would do absolutely nothing. The year was 2019. We sold direct to consumer. Many mentors and investors warned me it makes no sense to discuss stress or mental health because they had nothing to do with wellness. Capsules, powders and tinctures could not supply the immediacy we sought. That is when we looked to the olfactory system, which is essentially the highway to your brain. The debut scent was warm, smoky, fresh and spicy, created with Frank Voelkl, meant to calm the nervous system. You spritz on pulse points ahead of stressful moments with slow breathing. It sold out. That showed us people sought instruments for stress and sleep and mood that suited a day, not one more routine to handle. Even though our fragrances are function first, I wished them to endure as icons. Fragrance then rose to 65 percent of revenue after our 2024 rebrand around six mood states and eight fragrances, and in 2025 we joined with Ulta Beauty as exclusive retailer focused on fragrance.

I would rather use clean and clinically proven botanicals than synthetic fillers and additives.

Jules Miller

Your Magnesium Ease spray pairs magnesium chloride with lavender oil and arnica oil for joints and stomach before bed. What can you trace in that bottle, and what remains harder to prove.

Magnesium Ease is a topical spray, 60 ml for 45 dollars, and it serves as a bestseller that links fragrance buyers to ingestibles and body care. The panel lists magnesium chloride with lavender oil and arnica oil. You mist it onto joints and stomach before bed as a nightly ritual. What we can follow is the mineral origin, the lot, the essential oil vendor and the heavy metals screening on the finished lot. Lavender and arnica travel through botanical chains with harvest dates and distillation or extraction logs. What stays harder to show, candidly, is complete field tracing for each minor aroma part at every moment, since fragrance and botanical markets combine lots to hit specification. I prefer to translate niche rituals for the masses rather than hold wellness exclusive, and I prefer to gain customers via fragrance rather than via supplements alone. Yet the bar holds. When we cannot identify the grower or display the test, we state it, and we keep pursuing the paper.

You often repeat that health is an ecosystem and you speak of whole body health. For a careful buyer reading Supplement Facts, what should they seek on your labels to judge that claim.

Check the Supplement Facts panel first, then the other ingredients line. Seek the dose of each active, the capsule total, and the directions. Pre + Probiotic states two capsules daily in the morning for long term gut health. Debloat Plus offers 60 capsules for 55 dollars with digestive enzymes and listed actives. Growth Phase offers 90 capsules for 65 dollars with daily intake for 90 days as part of a 360 hair approach. Then notice what is missing. We decline artificial colors, flavors, fillers, GMO ingredients, refined sugars and preservatives in ingestibles, plus more than 200 banned ingredients across the range. I believe we should join science and sensibility with products that support the physical and emotional body. Support is the correct term. The label states what sits in the capsule, in what amount, in what manner to take it, and what we left out. The remainder is routine, sleep, food, movement. Health is an ecosystem. Take great care. That forms our code, The Nue Co.de, and the art of feeling well, in simple words.

You closed a 25 million dollar fundraise in 2021, entered Sephora that year, launched Forest Lungs after COVID and sold three months of stock in a week. How did scale test your testing strength and lot discipline.

I consider my superpower in our first year to have been my naivety and lack of experience. During that period, and for some time after, nothing else in my life mattered. Then scale came fast. We entered Sephora in 2021, we closed a 25 million dollar fundraise, and we introduced Forest Lungs after COVID and cleared three months of stock in a week. When volumes climb, the discipline must remain. That requires locked specifications, reserved raw lots, kept samples and release solely following lab results. It also requires refusing a shortcut that might allow faster shipment. I prefer not to over engineer health in a manner that breeds anxiety. Our products are meant to sit within each portion of your day. That functions solely when each lot mirrors the prior one. Forest Lungs drew on the Japanese custom of forest bathing and was shaped through olfactory chemistry. The surge in demand tested planning, not principle. We held the same order. Source, make, test, release, document.

Closing note from the desk

What lingers from this talk is Miller comfort with particulars. She cites a dose, a count, a perfumer, a house, a gentle mixing choice, a banned set. The path from root to bottle stays concrete. It involves growers and distillation dates, extract ratios kept on a certificate, a gentle blender preserving viability, a lab hold prior to release, a lot code binding it together.

The Nue Co. aimed to reshape the bond with health by stripping away excess and naming what stayed. Stripped back or naked, to use her phrase. The capsule, the spray, the scent, each must earn its spot on the panel.

Product spotlight

Pre + Probiotic, 60 capsules in a jar for 75 dollars. A prebiotic with probiotic built on spore bacteria, among the earliest blends and still a bestseller. Take two capsules each morning daily for steady gut support within a regular rhythm.

Functional Fragrance, 50 ml for 125 dollars and 10 ml for 38 dollars. A warm, smoky, fresh and spicy unisex blend made with Frank Voelkl and shaped for stressful moments. Mist onto pulse points while breathing slowly.