How Julie Smolyansky built $200M kefir brand Lifeway Foods

Business Journals

6 hours ago

Story Highlights At age 27, Julie Smolyansky became the youngest female CEO of a publicly traded company after her father's sudden death.
Despite remarkable success, Julie has faced intense challenges, including a family power struggle and a takeover attempt by Danone.
She turned her father's kefir startup into a global wellness brand, championing female empowerment, gut health, and cultural authenticity.
Julie Smolyansky's journey is the kind of story made for headlines — and heartbreak.
At just 27, she became the youngest female CEO of a publicly traded company, stepping into the leadership of Lifeway Foods after the sudden death of her father. A Soviet immigrant, wellness advocate and trailblazing entrepreneur, she transformed her family's modest kefir business into a global powerhouse, championing gut health, female empowerment and innovation along the way.
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Under her leadership, Lifeway's annual revenue soared from $12 million in 2002 to nearly $200 million in 2024. In addition, the Chicago-area company (Nasdaq: LWAY) has expanded its distribution across the U.S. and internationally, reaching markets in Mexico, France, Ireland, and parts of Central and South America and the Caribbean.
Yet behind the scenes of Lifeway's remarkable growth — the company delivered its 22nd consecutive quarter of year-over-year net sales growth in the first quarter — Smolyansky has faced two incredibly difficult challenges as CEO: a deeply personal family rift in which her brother, Edward, and their mother, Ludmila, have launched a bid to oust her from the company she has led for more than two decades; and a takeover bid by French dairy giant Danone, which first invested in Lifeway in 1999 and currently owns just under 25% of the company's stock.
Despite those challenges, Smolyansky said she's proud of her determination 'to fight for what's right.'
'I know that I have the moral high ground in this situation,' she said. 'My father taught me to fight, and I didn't come this far to only go this far. I know that I am strong, I'm not afraid. I'm not going anywhere.
'We always were underestimated, yet here we are, 22 years later, about to be a $200 million company,' Smolyansky added. 'We have no debt. We have cash in the bank. We are sold nationwide, in every grocery store, and we are known for all the great things that we do in our communities and around the world.'
Bizwomen, an affiliated publication, talked with Smolyansky recently about her career journey, guiding a public company in the midst of multiple challenges and more.
Would you share more of your story from the time you and your family arrived in the U.S.?
My parents and I were refugees from a part of the world that is Ukraine today, but at the time it was called the Soviet Union. I was born in Kyiv at the height of the Cold War, and when I was born, my father made a promise to get me out of the country. He absolutely hated communism and felt stifled, suppressed and persecuted. So, he started a plan to get out of the Soviet Union, and when I turned 1, that plan was realized. We defected in the middle of the night, and we were exiled for three months while we waited for our green card and the approval to settle in the U.S.
We finally arrived in Chicago in August 1976 with just $116 in our pockets. My mother learned English watching 'General Hospital' like so many immigrant women. My father was an engineer by trade, and he was able to go through some of the Chicago alleyways and take broken electronics and repair them and then sell them for money. A few weeks later, he got an official job as a draftsman at an engineering firm, even though it was a demotion from what he was in the Soviet Union. But he continued to have aspirational dreams.
One day when we walked into the grocery store, my mother cried because she couldn't believe how much food there was. She and my father both grew up in scarcity in the Soviet Union and had to go to bread lines.
Knowing that there's a difference in the Slavic Eastern European food, she opened up the first Eastern European deli in Chicago's Rogers Park two years after we settled. Rogers Park really became ground central for all immigrants who were escaping from the Soviet Union. And that sort of started her entry into the food industry.
By 1985, she already had a handful of delis and was importing and distributing Eastern European food to other delis around the country, in places where Eastern European Soviet immigrants were settling around the United States.
Kefir is a 2,000-year-old staple from my ancestors, a recipe that was passed down generation to generation. It is an ancient fermenting process that has been known intuitively by my ancestors to have beneficial healing properties.
So, my father was like, 'Wow, America has everything, but it doesn't have kefir.' Someone told him, 'Why don't you design a plant, and I'll sell the kefir through my distribution network?' And just like that, six months later, Lifeway Foods was incorporated.
My father started making kefir in our basement. I was 11 years old the first time I tried the very first spoonful of Lifeway Kefir in America. He was able to get in touch with my grandmother, still in the Soviet Union at the time, and ask her to send bacterial cultures through a care package, and then we recreated that bacteria. It was real, authentic cultures that my ancestors really nurtured.
My father continued to grow Lifeway and became the first Soviet immigrant to take a company public in 1988.
Did you always dream of taking over the company one day?
I actually was going to be a psychologist. I was an in-home mental health family counselor with kids. I also was a certified rape crisis counselor.
But then serendipitously, I ended up in my father's office and found out about the impact of kefir and all the good things that it could do for people. Something went off in my head where I realized I could actually channel my passions for helping people and improving the world by bringing positive things to people through a for-profit business.
It made me proud to help my dad. I really saw all the good that he was doing. Instead of resisting his queries about coming to work with him and helping him, I left grad school after my first year, went to work with him side by side for five years and got to know him in a new way. He was my greatest advocate and encouraged me go as far as I could.
Lifeway was growing at the time and was a $6 million company when I came to work for him. But in 2002, he had a sudden heart attack and passed away at the age of 55. I was I just 27, and I became the youngest female CEO of a publicly traded company. But it was devastating.
My father's best friend said there's no way a 27-year-old girl could run this company and encouraged people to sell their stock. The next day, Nasdaq halted trading because the stock was collapsing. Despite all that, the board eventually voted me in as CEO.
What differentiates Lifeway Kefir from its competitors?
Our original recipe, for starters. That's No. 1. We have a whole variety of different kinds of milk, so whether you want grass-fed or organic or conventional, there's really something for everyone. We have a very diversified portfolio, making sure that no matter who you are, you can have access to our products. We have the most active culture product out there in the marketplace. We also are laser-focused on what we do.
There are a lot of dairy companies that have a surplus of dairy, so they make milk, and they make butter, and they make this, and they make that, and they're just like, 'Oh, let's put kefir in the mix,' but it's just another dairy product for them. We're 100% laser-focused on kefir.
You've had several challenges in your career journey, including the ongoing battle with family members for control of the company. How do you handle challenges as CEO of Lifeway?
One of the greatest challenges any CEO faces is leading through uncertainty while staying true to a clear vision. Over the years, we've had to navigate everything from global disruptions like the pandemic to rapidly shifting consumer preferences and economic headwinds.
For me, effective leadership has meant staying adaptable, fostering resilience within our team and communicating transparently, even when the path ahead isn't clear. Balancing short-term pressures with long-term strategy is never easy, but Lifeway's mission to nourish communities and promote wellness has always kept us grounded and focused.
Are you doing anything new for 2025?
We have a series of new items. We're launching a probiotic kefir-based salad dressing. We're also launching a collagen kefir that's got 5 grams of collagen. And we're launching a whole milk conventional line and premium dairy. We are introducing 10 new flavors that are really cool and trendy, like pistachio, rose vanilla and pink dragon fruit.
Any advice for other women entrepreneurs?
Don't give up. Keep going and know what you stand for. And always trust your gut. It won't steer you wrong.
Lifeway Foods
Top official: Julie Smolyansky, CEO
About: The Morton Grove, Illinois-based company — founded in 1986 — is a leading U.S. supplier of kefir and fermented probiotic products to support the microbiome.
Q1 data: Net sales were $46.1 million for the first quarter ended March 31, 2025, an increase of $1.5 million or 3.3% from the same period in 2024. The company reported net income of $3.5 million or 23 cents per basic and diluted common share for Q1 2025.
Cindy Barth is a freelance journalist based in Lexington, Kentucky. Reach her at [e-mail].
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