Exclusive Interview: Pop Culturalist Chats with Connor Saeli

After studying finance in college, Connor Saeli landed his dream job at Goldman Sachs—or so he thought. Working as a data analyst, Connor quickly realized that this wasn’t his passion or purpose in life and that his schedule and work-life balance were at the mercy of those he reported to. One day, he made the bold decision to take back control and left his position at the Fortune 500 company.

While trying to figure out what was next for him, Connor received an unexpected phone call from the casting department at The Bachelorette. He would go on to star in Season 15—an experience that taught Connor a lot about himself and inspired the mission behind Sael Wellness.

We caught up with the Dallas entrepreneur to learn more about his journey, the lessons he’s learned, and what it’s like soft-launching a company during a pandemic.

PC: The Bachelorette came to you at an interesting time in your life. For readers who may not be familiar, tell us about the weeks leading into the show.
Connor: I was working at Goldman Sachs doing some investment banking. I wasn’t happy with what I was doing. I needed a change in my life. I’ve always wanted to start a business.

Ultimately, it was the week before Thanksgiving of 2018. I walked into work and said, “I think I need to move on and do something different.” Essentially, I quit. They asked me to stay through the end of January, which I was fine with because I didn’t fully know what I wanted to do yet. I just felt like I needed a change of scenery in order to figure that out.

So all that happened, and then Thanksgiving happened. The week after Thanksgiving, I was going back to work and I got a phone call out of nowhere. It was a producer from The Bachelorette. They said someone had nominated me, and I had no idea about it. It turned out it was a friend from home who had nominated me without telling me.

I figured why not? It was a really cool opportunity. You get to travel the world and meet a lot of cool people. I was single at the time and was definitely looking for love. It was crazy how all those different pieces fell into place during that month of my life.

I went through the casting process and heard back on Valentine’s Day that I was originally selected. I flew out in March and started filming the show.

PC: How scary was that decision to leave Goldman Sachs? That’s a very well-known company.
Connor: It was really scary. Going through college and being interested in finance, Goldman Sachs was always that top place that everyone talked about. I’d always wanted to work there. It was interesting finally getting that job and being in that seat and working there. I just wasn’t happy with what I was doing. I don’t think it lived up to the expectations that I thought it would. I don’t know why. I just wasn’t passionate about it.

I was reading a bunch of books and listening to podcasts. I figured that I needed a change in my life. I needed to do something different. It’s something that a lot of people, when they’re right out of college, realize or go through that process. For the most part, you probably don’t love your first job out of college. I’d always wanted to start a business. I was twenty-four at the time. I was like, “I don’t have a lot to lose right now if I just go for it. I don’t have a lot of obligations or anything tying me down to do this. I might as well do it now because who knows if I’ll have the opportunity to do something later in life.”

PC: Has life changed drastically since your time on The Bachelorette and Bachelor in Paradise? What have you been up to?
Connor: Going on that show is definitely an interesting experience. The filming is crazy to be a part of. It’s hard to describe what it’s like watching yourself on TV. But after the shows, you’re like, “What’s next?” Do you go back to your job? Do you try and pursue this influencer career that a lot of the people from the show do? Or do you do something different?

It almost feels like a post-show depression in a way. I wasn’t depressed or anything, but I was trying to figure out my life. I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. So I went back to what I was passionate about before the show. I left Goldman to start my own business. The influencer life wasn’t interesting to me. Obviously, you can make a good living doing it, but it wasn’t fulfilling. That was the same thing that happened to me at Goldman. It’s like, you can make a great living doing this job, but is that the most important thing? Or do you want to do something fulfilling and something that you’re passionate about, and, hopefully, the money will follow?

PC: You’ve said in previous interviews that your experience on The Bachelorette taught you a lot of important life lessons. What was the biggest thing you learned?
Connor: There were two big lessons. The first is time. You have to cherish every moment and make the most of it. I only spent three hours with Hannah [Brown] over the course of a month and a half of filming, which is pretty crazy to think about now because I got pretty far and things were getting really serious. I was at the place where I was thinking, “I’m potentially going to bring this person home to meet my family who I’ve spent three hours with. That’s crazy.” The show taught me that you have these little fifteen-, twenty-minute conversations that mean so much to your presence and your relationship on the show. You have to make the most of those.

The second is there are so many things that are out of your control. Literally, everything’s out of your control. You have no clue what’s going to happen or what’s planned for you or any of that stuff. It’s very similar to life. There’s so much you can’t control. The only thing you can always control is your attitude. Even in the toughest situations, it’s important to always stay positive. That was something that I would say to the guys daily on the show. I wasn’t on a date the first week. It’s tough going through that. It’s like, “Why am I here?” Going through this whole experience, you expect to be on a date and to get to know the girl, and I wasn’t even on a date the first week.

Everyone always asked me, “Connor, how are you feeling? How do you feel about not being on a date? Are you sad?” Obviously it’s a bummer, but I can’t control that. The only thing I can control is being positive about the experience and making the most out of the time that I do have with Hannah next. That’s something that I’ve taken from the show and tried to apply to other areas of my life.

PC: Like you were saying earlier, it’s always been your dream to own your own company. Tell us about Sael Wellness and the company’s mission.
Connor: It’s really interesting because the show helped me figure out what idea I wanted to pursue. On the show, the filming nights are long. There’s a lot of stress and anxiety. You don’t know what’s going to happen next. We had these terrible sleeping habits. Some nights, you’re filming until four a.m. You don’t sleep a lot. That’s a way they get emotional reactions from you is because everyone is sleep-deprived. I was the only guy that brought melatonin. I was the guy that was handing out melatonin to everyone. It would help a little bit, but we still slept terribly.

It’s tough watching yourself on TV. There’s some anxiety with that. Once the shows were done filming and airing on TV, I was still having these sleep issues. Successful entrepreneurs have always said you have to look at some of the problem areas in your life and how you can fix them. I was like, “Is this potentially a good business idea?” I wasn’t sleeping well. I tried a bunch of products. Some of them worked; some didn’t. What I found is that a lot of the products felt like you’re taking medicine. No one wants to feel like they’re taking medicine all the time. Many of them are filled with ingredients which you have no idea what they do. There wasn’t a lot of education on what they did on the websites or anything.

I felt like there may have been a need to help people sleep better. I did some research on the issue, and it turns out that a huge number of people don’t sleep well. I think it’s at least forty-three percent of Americans don’t sleep well at least one night a week. There’s a huge potential market for it. I set out to try and solve that problem for myself and ultimately for people that have sleep problems. The company’s mission is to make living a healthy lifestyle fun, simple, and easy.

It really shouldn’t be so hard to be healthy, right? It should be fun. It should be simple. A lot of times living that healthy lifestyle is overcomplicated with all this information out there—all these different delivery forms and products. We thought a gummy is something that’s fun to take. It’s oftentimes associated as a candy, but you can make it healthy, fun, and simple for people to take. It helps solve a specific problem in their life so they can be happier and healthier.

PC: Love that. In addition to helping others live a healthy lifestyle, the company is also helping end childhood hunger. How did that partnership come to fruition?
Connor: I really wanted to be able to give back. I felt like that was a really important thing for the company to do. I’ve done a lot of things myself after the show with Children’s Hospital [Association] and some other nonprofits that I’ve worked with. For me, I wanted this to be at the forefront. We’ve had to scale it back a bit because there are some regulations with what partnerships can look like for startups. But ultimately, I do want to have that full partnership.

As a company, we’re helping people better their nutrition, helping them live a happier and healthier lifestyle. I thought it was a really natural fit into working with a nonprofit that helps people that don’t have access to basic nutrition get that access. I thought it fit really well with our mission and what we’re trying to do. I thought it was a natural fit. I love working with kids, so being able to help No Kid Hungry and Children’s Hospital as well was something great that I thought the company could work with.

PC: We’re living in these really unprecedented times. How has the COVID-19 situation affected your business?
Connor: We launched on March 3, I believe. Immediately after we launched, we were thrown right into this. It’s a pretty unprecedented time to launch a company. There’s definitely no playbook or right way to do it. We wanted to do a soft launch on March 3 and test the market a bit, get some products out there, and see what people think.

Ultimately, we’re shooting to do a bigger launch later in the year. It’s been pushed back a bit. It’s definitely been a tough time to navigate. I mean, starting a business—not what you would expect the environment and the world to look like.

PC: Has anything surprised you about owning your own business?
Connor: There’s been a lot that’s surprised me! I would say you go into it thinking you have this great idea and everything. For me, working at Goldman, I had this finance background. I kind of understand how to operate a business. But when you actually dive into it, especially being the person running it, you have to do all the marketing, the branding, help design the website—all that stuff ends up falling on your lap. I’m definitely not expert in any of those fields, but you have to learn that stuff.

At the end of the day, I’m twenty-five years old. I didn’t put a ton of money into this. I wasn’t able to hire lots of people or really anyone to help out. A lot of it fell on me. There have definitely been a lot of stressful moments and a ton of learning.

Pop Culturalist Speed Round

PC: Guilty pleasure TV show?
Connor: I’m a big Keeping Up with the Kardashians fan, actually.

PC: Guilty pleasure movie?
Connor: A favorite movie of mine is Elf. I could watch that anytime of the year. It’s such a good Christmas movie.

PC: Favorite book?
Connor: Man’s Search for Meaning

PC: Favorite play or musical?
Connor: Hamilton! It lives up to the hype.

PC: A band or artist that fans would be surprised to learn is on your playlist?
Connor: I don’t know if it’s a surprise to people now because it’s definitely out there, but I’m a big Justin Bieber fan.

To keep up with Connor, follow him on Twitter and Instagram. Support his business by checking out Sael Wellness.