About the Founder | The Story Behind Elixir MRE®

Tom Gianelli didn’t set out to build a wellness company. Elixir MRE was born out of survival, performance, injury, and a relentless search for better nutrition in the mountains, on the walls, and along the coast of Malibu, California.

Long before Elixir became a brand, Gianelli was a free solo climber — climbing without ropes or safety gear — beginning seriously around the age of fifteen. Influenced and mentored by legendary climbers including John Bachar and Michael Reardon, Gianelli spent years climbing throughout Malibu Creek, Point Dume, Stoney Point, Joshua Tree, and the rugged Southern California landscape. The climbing culture shaped everything: minimalism, resilience, focus, movement, and the understanding that the body performs best when fueled correctly.

At the same time, Gianelli was working as a child actor in Los Angeles, balancing Hollywood with a deeply physical outdoor lifestyle rooted in surfing, climbing, hiking, football, and performance training. But unlike the polished wellness culture that would later emerge online, the early Elixir philosophy was built practically — athletes carrying lightweight nutrition in backpacks, mixing shakes on the go, searching for foods that could fuel long days outdoors without slowing the body down.

That search became personal in 2007. The same summer Michael Reardon tragically lost his life off the coast of Ireland after a climbing ascent, Gianelli suffered a devastating fall while free solo climbing at Malibu Creek State Park. He landed directly onto rock, sustaining blunt force trauma to his lower spine, damaging his L4, L5, and L5-S1 vertebrae, along with severe nerve damage that partially paralyzed the left side of his body.

Doctors told him the injury was likely permanent. Surgical options involved spinal fusion and metal hardware — procedures Gianelli had watched fail in his own family. Refusing to accept that outcome, he chose a different path.

What followed became the real beginning of Elixir. Unable to continue stunt work or return fully to the physical life he once knew, Gianelli immersed himself in plant-based nutrition, raw foods, rehabilitation, supplementation, adaptogens, herbs, superfoods, and performance recovery. He became obsessed with sourcing the best ingredients possible from around the world — not to build a company initially, but to rebuild his body.

The products evolved organically through necessity. Friends, climbers, surfers, and athletes began trying the formulas and repeatedly asking for more. Every batch improved through feedback and experimentation, almost like a family recipe evolving over time. The now-iconic Mylar packaging wasn’t chosen for aesthetics — it was chosen because it protected the ingredients from light, oxygen, and moisture while fitting easily into backpacks and climbing gear.The now-famous Mookie Cookies® were also born on the rocks.

While climbing together, Michael Reardon once shouted down from above asking if Gianelli had any more of his homemade “meal cookies.” From farther down the wall, all Gianelli could hear was: “Do you have any of those mookies?” The name stuck.

Soon after, Gianelli was challenged by a friend to bring the products into Gold’s Gym Venice. With only a handful of bags in existence, he and a friend showed up to a Gold’s Gym parking lot event wearing freshly embroidered polos and hats. They sold every bag they had. Not long after, Elixir entered Gold’s Gym Venice, then expanded throughout the Gold’s Gym chain and into health-focused stores across Southern California, including Erewhon, Rainbow Acres, PC Greens, and Vitamin Barn.

What made Elixir different then still defines it now. The company was never built around flashy marketing, celebrity endorsements, or oversized margins. It was built by athletes searching for performance nutrition that actually worked. Real ingredients. Functional nutrition. Lightweight, practical packaging. Products designed for movement, recovery, endurance, longevity, and real life.

Today, Elixir MRE continues to reflect the world that created it: Malibu mornings, salt air, chalk-covered hands, long hikes, recovery after injury, performance without hype, and nourishment rooted in experience rather than trends.

From NOURISH™, CLEAR™, and REBUILD™ to Mookie Cookies®, Phoenix Tea®, and the expanding Elixir wellness system, every product traces back to the same core philosophy:

Support the body intelligently. Recover deeply. Move forward.