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Pasadena Woman’s Prescription Reminder Invention Picked Up by Walmart

Published on Monday, July 12, 2021 | 5:00 am
 
Pasadena-based tooktake founder and CEO Leeanna Gantt, pictured undergoing chemotherapy for breast cancer in 2018. (Courtesy photo)

A prescription reminder label system invented by a Pasadena woman is expected to be hitting the shelves of Walmart stores across the nation this fall, according to the company founder and CEO.

Leeanna Gantt and her company tooktake were among 167 businesses out of 900 selected to advance in an “open call” by Walmart seeking products from small companies made in the U.S., according to Walmart and Gantt. Seventeen of those selected are from California.

“We’re going to be in stores this October of 2021,” Gantt said.

tooktake is a label kit meant to make it easy for patients to keep track of their medications.

“You don’t have to program anything. It’s basically a little label that you peel off the backing and stick onto whatever you need to remember to take,” Gantt said. “Then when you take your dose for the day, it has little tabs on the side and you just pull off the tab when you take your dose. So later, if you’re walking through your kitchen or sitting on your table and you’re like, “Oh, I don’t remember if I took that today. You know, because you pulled the little tab off.”

It was born from Gantt’s own experiences while undergoing treatment for breast cancer in 2018, she said.

“I had everything: Chemo, radiation surgery. And all of the treatments came with a ton of side effects. And those came with like dozens of medications,” Gantt said.

“I found that they were all on different schedules,” she explained. “So I started to make these little labels so we could keep track and I didn’t stress out my husband and my daughter when we didn’t know when I had taken something. And by the end of the year, I’d really refined the system and thought it was pretty cool and helpful.”

Gantt said she figured if she found the system helpful, others might, too.

“So I decided to go for it and started tooktake,” she said.

Gantt said she has since been declared cancer-free.

She hoped the new exposure provided by Walmart would be a boon to her newly formed company.

“They really want to support small companies like us that are growing, so they’re willing to scale up with us. We’re not going to be in every Walmart, but we’re going to be in a lot of them. And then as we grow, they’ll expand as our capabilities ramp up. They’ll expand our footprint within Walmart,” Gantt said.

“It’s going to be great because it’ll help us help more people, which is ultimately our goal,” she said. “And it makes me feel really good that other people see the thing that I invented while I was sick and want to help make it a real company and want to help get it in front of other people.”

The new partnership is part of Walmart’s effort to support American business, Walmart Senior Vice President of Customer and Business Development and U.S. Manufacturing for Global Sourcing Laura Phillips said in a written statement.

“Open Call supports Walmart’s overall commitment to U.S manufacturing and small businesses,” she said. “In March, we announced an additional spend of $350 billion on items made, grown or assembled in the U.S. over the next 10 years.”

More information on tooktake is available online at tooktake.com.

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