MEET OUR FOUNDER

HEATHER
BORN

MEET OUR FOUNDER

HEATHER BORN

Founder.
Creative Director.
CEO.

Founder.
Creative Director.
CEO.

Founder.
Creative Director.
CEO.

Heather Born is the heartbeat behind JOY RIOT! 
& the creator of the Candy Ass 
fragrance collection.

Heather Born is the heartbeat behind JOY RIOT! & the creator of the Candy Ass fragrance collection.

A former missionary turned entrepreneur turned founder, she is BRAZEN in the energy of JOY, self-expression, & mental + emotional health.

Heather designed Candy Ass for funsies in the summer of 2015 – long before building a brand was ever on her radar.

 

She created it for herself & soon realized that the sheer freaking JOY she felt every time she wore it was something worth sharing & shouting about.

Less than a month into selling the signature blend, her then boyfriend (now husband!) encouraged her to not stop at just one fragrance, but to create an entire line.

 

So the OG Candy Ass was soon joined by Kiss My Candy Ass & Red Hot Candy Ass – both of which he helped her design & formulate. Swoon, right?

500+ orders, wildly excited customers, a marriage + step babe, & a move to a brand new city later, she decided she wanted to build a brand for real.

 

Carnival Candy Ass, Melt Your Candy Ass, Crème De La Candy Ass, Love Drunk Candy Ass, & Shake Your Candy Ass were designed in one long ass night of creative vision.

In the span of 2.5 years, a cohesive collection of eight unique fragrances were created. 

Then, after playing with possible brand names for freaking months, JOY RIOT! was born on April 1, 2018 with a gasp & a shout during a car ride with her family to Easter service.

“JOY RIOT!” It’s “JOY RIOT!”

Heather spent the next few years working on e-v-e-r-y foundational angle possible to prep for launch – 

 

Trademarks, branding, logos, package design, compliance, formulation, manufacturing, financials, legal, mental health give-back initiatives, the website, raising capital, hiring, & vision, baby.

JOY RIOT! is infused with her outrageous optimism, rock & roll edge, deep care, & riotous JOY.

"My vision for JOY RIOT! is to

champion the mental health of an entire generation through JOY."

Heather Born

Founder, Creative Director, & CEO

FROM MY NEON HEART TO YOURS

FROM MY NEON HEART TO YOURS

FROM MY NEON HEART TO YOURS

I BELIEVE THAT FEELING GOOD MATTERS.

BECAUSE THE JOY RIOT! STORY COMES FROM MY OWN STORY.

Hey lovers, Heather here!

 

I’m so glad you’re here & want to share a little behind-the-scenes story with you – because this is what actually brought JOY RIOT! to life.

 

For nearly a decade, I worked exclusively with trauma survivors. The healing was beautiful.

 

The work to get there was often brutal.

 

Story after story from person after person eventually took a toll on my own mental health.

 

My hair started falling out. My shoulders constantly hugged my ears. I’d jump at the slightest noise. I could barely get out of bed.

So I changed careers, moved, & took my ass to therapy. 
Some days all I could DO was get out of bed & drag myself to therapy.

Terms like compassion fatigue, vicarious trauma, complex PTSD, codependency, narcissistic abuse, spiritual abuse, & clinical burnout were 

all introduced to me.

 

A lot of it was from my line of work. But there was plenty to process from my own life too.

 

A couple years into my healing journey, I flew back east. And like always, I stopped into our local apothecary to mess around with fragrances – just for fun.

But the summer of 2015 was different.

I started playing with gourmand oils that smelled good enough to eat. Just mixing them made me happy.

 

But the joy I felt afterward was WILD. 

Every time I wore my new peppermint, chocolate, vanilla cupcake perfume, I felt an unexpected LIFT.

Something in my mood – something in ME – would shift.

TBH, I hadn’t felt that good in years.

I started to recognize myself again. I started to feel GOOD again. And then I thought – “What in the hell did I just make?”

So I did some research & learned that our olfactory bulbs live right around the corner from our amygdalas – aka the part of our brains where our emotions are processed.

This means that when we smell something, there’s an immediate pathway in our brains to evoke an emotional response or mood change.

So, that unexpected LIFT I felt? 
It was REAL.

I created the original Candy Ass 2 years into my therapy journey & the first sparks of JOY RIOT! as a brand fired up 3 years after that.

 

I have seen the light – & the happy, creative spark! – return to people’s eyes after they’ve received the support they needed. And my own truth is that I’ve looked myself in the mirror & seen the same.

 

Maybe you can relate to finding joy in unexpected places. Maybe you’re still on your journey. Damn near all of us are healing or growing through something at some point. 

 

That’s why I’ve crafted my life’s work around getting creative & helping as many people as HUMANLY POSSIBLE feel GOOD.

JOY RIOT! is my creative offering to actively DO something to amp your JOY & support your mental health in a way that feels FUN.

So THANK YOU for being here – you are f!cking PHENOMENAL. 

 

This is truly the JOY of my life.

Get on the list, baby!

Thanks for contacting us. We'll get back to you as soon as possible.

YES. I’m totally down to get emails from JOY RIOT!

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Accessibility  |  Do Not Sell My Personal Information