Published: September 28, 2021
Peloton Equity, LLC (“Peloton”) announced today that it recently entered into a partnership with a management team led by Harvey Diamond, Richard Kolodny, Mitchell Yoel and Charles Valentine to launch Journey Health & Lifestyle Brands (the “Company”). The Company, headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, will develop and acquire direct-to-consumer, premium branded health and lifestyle products and services for senior consumers. The Company’s formation occurred concurrently with the acquisition of firstSTREET for Boomers and Beyond, Inc. (“FirstStreet”).
FirstStreet represents the initial acquisition of the Company, and its family of senior-focused brands is now unified under the Journey Health & Lifestyle umbrella. These brands include the Perfect Sleep Chair®, Zinger®, Zoomer™, Perfect Walker®, WOW! Computer™, UPbed™ and many more. These brands offer innovative products that provide customers an enhanced quality of life and enable them to continue safely, independently, and gracefully on their “journey” in life.
Mr. Diamond and Mr. Kolodny were co-founders of Drive Medical (“Drive”), a leading manufacturer of healthcare products that were distributed in over 100 countries worldwide. While at Drive, they completed more than 25 acquisitions and grew the business to nearly a $1 billion in revenue. Drive was sold to Clayton, Dubilier & Rice in 2017. The predecessor firm to Peloton Equity, Ferrer Freeman, was the lead investor in Drive. Mitchell Yoel, a close associate of Mr. Diamond’s and Mr. Kolodny’s for nearly 15 years, and most recently SVP of Global Commercial Operations at Drive, is Journey Health & Lifestyle’s new CEO. Charles Valentine, a former Discovery Communications executive and direct-to-consumer retail consultant is the Chief Marketing & Strategy Officer.
“Rich and I have watched the shifting dynamics in the healthcare sector for years, and we believe strongly in the growing opportunity to bring innovative, premium products and services directly to seniors,” said Mr. Diamond. “We are very impressed with the business built by the FirstStreet team, and we saw this business as uniquely positioned to help launch the Journey Health & Lifestyle platform,” added Mr. Kolodny. Mr. Diamond and Mr. Kolodny will serve as Executive Chairmen of the Company.
“Healthcare has changed. Consumers are no longer willing to tolerate waiting weeks for clinicians, case managers, and insurance companies to approve bare-bones equipment for the home,” said Mr. Yoel. “Aging Americans want and deserve direct access to high quality, feature-rich products and premium solutions that will facilitate mobility, independence, and engagement with loved ones and their communities. FirstStreet has built a successful business, with an experienced team and growing brands. We will use our industry experience in the healthcare sector to build a broad and purposeful product portfolio, expand into more channels, and ensure world class customer experience across all our touchpoints.”
With the global senior population expected to grow nearly 50% by 2030, there is a great opportunity to bring significant design and manufacturing innovation to many health and lifestyle product categories and related services to enable healthier, more comfortable, active and connected lives for seniors. In addition, the growing trend of consumers buying directly has expanded into healthcare. Seniors are relishing the efficiency and choice that comes with buying products and services directly from their favorite brands.
The Peloton Equity team has been investing growth capital in the healthcare space for more than 25 years. “The growing consumerization of healthcare reflects an important shift in our industry, and we are excited to be backing a world class management team pursuing this strategy,” said Ted Lundberg, Founding Partner of Peloton Equity.
White Oak Financial provided debt financing to the Company for the acquisition of FirstStreet.
About Journey Health & Lifestyle
The Company was formed as a partnership between Peloton and the management team of Harvey Diamond, Richard Kolodny, Mitchell Yoel and Charles Valentine. Our mission is to help seniors live healthier, more comfortable, active and connected lives by providing them premium, innovative products and services. The Company’s brands include Perfect Sleep Chair®, Zinger®, Zoomer™, Perfect Walker®, WOW! Computer®, UPbed™ and many more. We strive to deliver the highest quality products and experiences to our customers to forge productive, long-term relationships.
Visit: https://www.journeyhealthandlifestyle.com
About Peloton Equity
Peloton Equity, LLC (http://www.pelotonequity.com) is a Connecticut-based private equity firm that focuses exclusively on growth capital investments in the healthcare industry. Peloton is the successor firm to Ferrer Freeman & Company (“FFC”), and the team has over 70 years of combined healthcare investing experience, including investments in companies across many major healthcare subsectors. Peloton seeks companies with the management team, market opportunity and business model to grow revenues meaningfully over the life of its investment and leverages its extensive healthcare network and portfolio management playbook to add value to its portfolio companies. While at FFC and Peloton, the Peloton investment team has been responsible for over 30 portfolio company investments across the healthcare industry representing over $800 million of invested capital. Recent investments made by Peloton include AeroCare Holdings, AeroSafe Global, Arcadia Solutions, ClearSky Health, Friday Health Plans, HPOne and IDX.
Journey Health & Lifestyle Contact:
press@journeyhl.com