The Whole Blate Papes Story
Hannah Barrett and Harrison Cohen officially launched Blate Papes® edible films in June of 2020. But it started long before they met.
What Motivated Harrison
Harrison in 4th grade
I got into health and fitness at 18 because I was self-conscious. That all started in 4th grade when I began carrying more weight than other kids.
It wasn’t terrible, but kids are honest. That honesty never leaves you.
By college I was very into health and fitness, except the “health” part never mattered much.
I had all the trending proteins, pre workout powders, pill packs, soft gels -you name it. I lived and died by my diet.
One year into that restriction I developed an eating disorder. “Jacked,” tan, and bulimic. You could have destroyed me with a single comment.
But I kept trying harder to control my body because it felt like that was my problem.
Harrison in 2010
I spent years weighing every meal and logging the calories of mustard packets. Artificial sweeteners were a part of every meal and drink.
Nothing mattered as much as my physical appearance. Yet no matter how much progress I made, something was always wrong. I felt bloated, tired, anxious, or just off. And the more I tried to control my dieting and supplementing, the more out of control I felt.
My anxiety led me down a rabbit hole of pain, drugs and loss. It wasn’t long before I dropped out of school. My 20s became the disaster I hid on the inside for so long.
Over the years, I was humbled by the results of my poor decisions, becoming a more raw, honest person.
While working to get my life together in 2016, I met Hannah.
What Motivated Hannah
I never thought about my body or cared much for what others thought growing up.
Hannah in 2012
Then in high school I got into my first serious relationship. Not long into it, he was openly comparing me to other girls. That really affected me.
I started counting calories and running. Soon I was doing 10+ miles a day and not eating over 800 calories.
Hannah at Europa in 2015
When the comments became about how skinny I was, I made more radical changes. I started going to the gym for 2 hours a day 7 days a week because now I had to gain muscle.
This got more obsessive as the years went on.
At 18, I competed in my first bodybuilding show. That sort of thing feels really good, and it makes you proud of yourself.
But even though I looked the best I ever had, mentally I was more a mess than ever. After the show, I started to binge eat. Then I’d take fat-burners and do more cardio.
My anxiety was through the roof, and I had no self-esteem. I remember thinking,
“Why can’t I eat like a normal person?”
Harrison and I met in 2016, connecting over our similar, unspoken insecurities.
The first time we made food together, I took out my food scale to weigh my portion. He took it and threw it in the trash. I felt my heart drop out of my chest.
Stronger Together
The years of weighing portions and constantly counting every calorie proved how neurotic and unsustainable it was. Together, we made each other want to be better people.
So we worked hard and saved money, which forced us to get creative in meeting our fitness goals.
To eat healthy, we began budgeting and buying our foods in bulk. We couldn’t afford the fad diet foods, which ironically have less calories and aren’t as healthy.
The Change to Bulk, Whole Foods
Our switch to whole foods sparked it in us to focus on the health side of health and fitness. One by one, we cut out certain things.
We Cut Out:
Processed foods
GMOs
Hydrogenated oils
High fructose corn syrup
Artificial sweeteners, colors, and flavors
Dairy
Wheat and gluten
High parasitic meats
We Ate:
Our diets changed to foods we could afford, and we’d cook them from scratch. Things like:
Rice
Chicken
Grass-Fed Beef
Fruits
Vegetables
Seeds
Nuts
Oats
We didn’t cut out sugar, but if we ate it we made sure that it was the real stuff.
To save time and effort, we’d cook a big mix every few days and eat it for most meals until it was gone.
The Switch to Single-Ingredient Supplements
Likewise, we found that you could do the same thing with health supplements.
Our first pre workout mix
We started buying kilograms of the main single-ingredients that were in the top-selling products we used.
We’d find the dosages recommended by doctors in relevant studies, measure out those in large amounts, and mix them together in a blender.
It’s disturbing to realize how much less you can spend on the few ingredients that actually work.
We were also able to leave out things like creatine and stimulants from the mixes. Which allowed for more flexibility in how and when we used them.
The difficulty only came when taking it… it tasted terrible! We tried capsules, but they took too long to make, even with a filling machine.
Drink mixers helped, but still we couldn’t stand the taste.
The Trick that Could have Stopped Us
We kept suffering through it. If you’ve ever taken unflavored BCAAs or arginine powder, then you understand. It doesn’t matter if you hold your nose.. your tastebuds know.
Months into this, we discovered if you take very thin paper, wrap your powder and swallow it before it breaks open, you don’t taste anything!
It was a neat trick, and we started using it often. Unfortunately, we learned it had big problems.
Most paper is bleached with chemicals and not meant to be eaten.
It was scratchy and hurt on the way down.
They broke many times
This led to two intense choking scares… but nobody said life was easy! We kept improving it.
The Changes that Followed
Up until then, we both had deep-seated insecurities that made us want to restrict our eating. Oddly, we noticed that we obsessed less about our diets after cutting out the last of our old proteins, BCAAs and pre workout powders.
Top-Selling Supplements
The insecurities didn’t disappear, but how much they affected and clouded our judgement did.
After the improvements we made around the foods we ate, we still hadn’t thought twice about what was in our workout supplements.
So we took a closer look. Was it possible that supplements could affect us that way?
No one thinks the products you buy to become “healthier” could do the opposite.
Imagine how we felt when we realized that’s exactly what was happening. The additives in those products were known health risks, carcinogens, and even could impair our mental well-being.
It all felt backwards.
to Inspire Change in the Industry
With those last harmful additives out of our diets, we looked and felt better than we ever had before.*
We told our friends and family, but it’s rare that someone is quick to change their habits. And that wasn’t a big enough difference anyway. We wanted everyone to realize and feel what we did.
So we thought about what it would look like if you and everyone else cut out the unnecessary additives in their foods and supplements.
That was when the idea to turn our papers into a true product was born. We wrote down our mission.
The BlateCo mission:
To inspire change in the quality of today’s food and health products by providing the most effective tools and knowledge for avoiding harmful additives and improving individual well-being.
*This still holds true 5 years later
TO OUR CUSTOMERS AND FRIENDS
Hi! We created Blate Papes because we want you to feel what it’s like to be free of the common harmful ingredients in so many of today’s food and health products. Most of all, we want to help everyone live a healthier and happier life. We are so grateful for all of you who continue to make that possible.
Thank you for being a part of our vision!
