Julie Smolyansky became the youngest female CEO of a publicly held firm at the age of 27 when she took over leadership of Lifeway Foods in 2002. The company was founded by her refugee parents over 30 years ago with the mission of bringing Kefir, an Eastern European product, into the U.S. mainstream. Under her leadership, the company has boosted revenues to over $100 million today from $12 million when she took over.

For almost 30 years, Julie has actively worked to end domestic violence and sexual assault, creating and teaching the first teen dating violence curriculum in the Chicagoland with YWCA while in High School. She began her career as an in-home family counselor working with families in the DCFS system before leaving the professional field of psychology to join her family business. She is a certified rape crisis counselor and formerly on the board of Resilience, previously known as the Rape Victim Advocates here in Chicago. Her journey has taken her overseas to Uganda to work with survivors in a refugee camp, with mothers and teen girls in Bangladesh, and not long ago, she was part of a delegation invited to help rape victims and survivors of war gain a seat at the negotiation table during the Colombian peace process.

Julie has produced several films focused on social justice, including the Emmy-winning, Oscar-nominated documentary “The Hunting Ground.” Along with her production work on “The Hunting Ground,” she also shared the stage with 49 other survivors at the 2016 Oscars during Lady Gaga’s iconic performance of “Til It Happens to You,” which was written for the film. In 2013 Julie co‐founded a non‐profit, Test400k, an organization dedicated to ending the backlog of 400,000 untested rape kits in the United States. She also worked with the Obama White House on the “It’s On Us” initiative, an awareness campaign to help end sexual assault on college campuses. Julie was named to Fortune Business ‘40 under 40,’ Fortune’s 55 Most Influential Women on Twitter, Fortune Business ‘Best Instagrammers of the 40 Under 40’ and Fast Company’s Most Creative People in Business 1000.

Julie serves as an emeritus member of the United Nations Foundation Global Entrepreneurs Council and was part of the 2015 class of Young Global Leaders of the World Economic Forum. She recently released her first book, The Kefir Cookbook: An Ancient Healing Superfood for Modern Life, Recipes from My Family Table and Around the World in March of 2018. She lives in Chicago and is the mother of two girls.

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