Sometimes the best products are born out of pure necessity. When Alaina Moulton was pregnant, on bedrest, and married to a military spouse, she knew that a traditional plug-in bottle warmer simply wasn’t going to cut it. She needed something portable, something that could work anywhere. When she asked manufacturers if it was possible to warm a bottle using battery power, she was told no, repeatedly.
She asked anyway, until one manufacturer said yes.
That yes became The Baby’s Brew, the first battery-powered bottle warmer on the market, created by a mom who needed it to exist. Parents describe it as an absolute gem of a baby gadget, and it’s easy to see why. The Baby’s Brew warms 8 oz in just 3 minutes, which is 67% faster than competing warmers, and its smart sensor technology heats milk evenly without hot spots or nutritional loss. Parents love that it can be used literally anywhere, on a plane, in a car, at the beach, camping, or at a relative’s house, without ever needing to hunt for an outlet. Many families love it so much they come back for their second and third babies.
In this episode, Alaina shares the story of building a product from scratch while navigating pregnancy, bedrest, and military life, and what she’s learned about feeding, sleep, and the real challenges parents face in those early months.
Episode Highlights:
- Alaina was pregnant, on bedrest, and facing the reality of life as a military spouse when she realized no product existed that could do what she needed. We talk about what it took to keep pushing when manufacturer after manufacturer turned her down, and how one “yes” changed everything.
- A warm bottle at the right moment can be the difference between a baby who settles and one who doesn’t. Alaina breaks down why temperature matters, how The Baby’s Brew fits into a family’s nighttime routine, and why portability is a game-changer for exhausted parents, whether they are traveling, in the car, or just trying to avoid waking everyone up at 2am.
- Alaina didn’t have a business background or a big team behind her. She had a problem, a pregnancy, and a refusal to accept “it can’t be done.” We talk about what the early days of building The Baby’s Brew looked like and what she wants every parent to know about feeding and sleep in those newborn months.
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Welcome to the Kids Sleep Show podcast where we dive into the magical world of sleep and all things parenting join us as we embark on a journey filled with expert advice practical tips and heartwarming stories that will transform your little ones into sleep superheroes and empower you to navigate the beautiful chaos of parenting I’m your host Courtney Zentz and I’m on a mission to change how the world views sleep and provide accessible sleep coaching resources for all families to build healthy sleep habits in their home for children and adults of all ages as an award-winning speaker author and pediatric sleep.
expert myself and my team of consultants work intimately with families around the world to teach healthy sleep habits to children and adults I believe wholeheartedly that sleep is the foundation for which a happy home is built so let’s sleep together.
Hey everyone welcome to this week’s episode of the Kids Sleep Show podcast I’m your host Courtney Zentz and I’m excited to be joined today by Elena Multon she is the founder and CEO of Baby’s Brew which has been around for some time now but I want to take a minute and allow Elena to introduce herself talk a little bit about what Baby’s Brew is and then we’re going to get into it welcome to the show thank you so much for being here thanks I’m excited to be here finally we’ve all been back and forth with crazy mom stuff lately it’s the reality of it though I tell you you know it’s always sick kid or something.
happening but I’m glad we were able to finally get here and and chat through things because I’m excited this is definitely a product that I know in the pinch of the moment I’m like do I use hot water is that safe what can I do so do you use your thighs that’s I’ve done that many times like oh my God so talk a little bit about yourself what Baby’s Brew is.
And then let’s introduce our listeners to how you came up with the idea for this okay my name is Elena Molten I created Baby’s Brew in 2018 I was actually on bed rest when I started looking into this because I had nothing to do and I was bored in my mind so all I kept doing was making my registry at the time I was a military mom in San Diego my family lived on the East Coast so I was trying to figure out ways to travel because I knew we’d be traveling when she turns as soon as she turned 2 months and I knew I was going to bottle feed along with breastfeeding but how do I warm bottles on the go so I started.
googling that I went to the like hours search I was like this doesn’t exist I just like I don’t think I’ve ever you know googled something that didn’t exist that I really need and so then I went down the rabbit hole of well how do I create this how do I do this so it kind of spiraled out of control you know I talked to a lot of manufacturers asked them.
Is this possible everyone told me no every single U.S. manufacturer told me no you cannot make heat out of batteries it just doesn’t work and this is before heated jackets and heated cups and all that I was probably one of the first heated items besides Ember and then I you know I found a partner a manufacturer that made batteries and they said Yeah let’s try it and they were the ones who helped me do my first prototyping I mean I was so green to all this I had no idea and they were really a huge help for me when it came to it and then after that we launched and you know it blew up bebecause we were the first on.
the market and it was just playing catch up after that and so I know you know when you when you talk about the prototypes right and and just bringing a product to market you’ve been around for you know I would say what is it about eight years now you know give or take and you have the first prototype it comes and you go huh we’re onto something with this right.
And I know you kind of iterate it afterwards like Baby’s Brew is a portable bottle warmer right so like you’re at the top of a mountain hiking and your baby starts crying’because they’re hungry you can warm the milk you’re in the middle of the airplane in the middle seat airplanes are huge and the baby is crying and you need water I don’t know that I would test or generally trust the water on the airplane just personally I’m sure it’s fine I used to bring all my own like you want to bring your own right so talk a little bit about you know you you you come up with this portable bottle warmer right you’ve got the.
first prototype I’m sure it is for a specific amount of water how much time it’ll work like take us through a little bit of that process bebecause I think people start to go oh my gosh really it didn’t exist.
Yeah and you know a big thing with this too because he said about the amount of water is you know every baby wants different bottles too and so I wanted to make it so a mom or a parent could bring in their own bottle whichever they chose and were able to use the warmer universally with everything and like you said the water on airplanes and coffee shops I mean I remember going to restaurants and they’d be like Yeah I’ll get you some warm water and it would be like the tinge of coffee bebecause they’re using their coffee makers to do it and so trying to make something accessible for moms that they didn’t need.
outside help to warm their water was essential for me I don’t trust people either haha they’re my baby stuff we did talk about that earlier but this allows you to do warm water any amount so if you have a 2 ounce bottle a 9 ounce bottle and it allows you to pick temperatures too so it you know you have battery powered bottle warmer which didn’t exist.
And then now you have four heat options which also didn’t exist for any bottle warmer it was on off high low so now we can do room temp which is 80 you can do body temp which is breast milk so those low two temperatures are meant for breast milk and then for my daughter specifically she colic so they always said at the time I’m sure it’s changed since then you know do as warm as you can and it helped and it did help her so you know then we had 103 and it went all the way up so you have two different four different temperatures which now allow the flexibility for moms to pick and not just be subject to one thing.
which is great and you can you can purchase adapters with Baby’s Brew right so you can have a bottle adapter for the Comotomo for the Dr. Brown’s like all the different types of bottles nipple sizes the tops of the you know the tops of the bottles like talk a little bit about that.
Yeah that was a learning experience let’s just say that bebecause I had no idea that every bottle has different threading different widths and so you know I said I wanted to bring to market to be able to use a universal warmer for everybody so at first we didn’t have adapters and we quickly Learned within like a month of launching you know hundreds of messages coming through with this one and so then we had to start sending bottles from our manufacturer to mold to match these different bottle types and that was a huge thing for our first year in business bebecause molds are not cheap and then we launch slow.
launched each one so I think the first year we launched about three different ones you know Dr. Brown’s which is a huge one and then Dr. Brown’s wide neck and Comotomo everyone loves a Comotomo hmm Yeah that’s why and we slowly just kept moving on and moving on so now we pretty much have 90% or more of all the bottles but you know they keep coming out with new ones too.
It’s it’s a hard catch catch up well and I would say you know from an ever evolving like you almost wish there was some standardization but I guess that’s what makes them Yeah you know unique now I know motherhood itself is overwhelming you had mentioned you were on bed rest doing your baby registry trying to figure out you know what products you needed I think the planning of a baby is overwhelming and then you bring this child home and you don’t know what you don’t know and I remember for me postpartum was a very challenging 12 weeks until I went back to work you had a bit of the emotional kind of ups and.
downs you have the like what the heck am I even doing with this small tiny human I’m trying to keep alive and then you add the stress in of like I was trying to nurse and pump and bottle feed and be a cow to store milk when I was on the go you know so that I had enough to go back to work and you know and then when you know as ebbs and flows we.
We were also formula feeding and then you have that and you have the baggies of that and the water and you’re carrying all the stuff right how has Baby’s Brew for new parents right portability wise like kind of change the dynamic of the emotional inclines that you’ve worked with bebecause I think it’s important that people understand like you’re going to come home and you’re going to feel totally overwhelmed and then you have to leave your house with a child to go to the well check appointment to go to the pediatrician to go to the OB to drive that first time to grandma’s house with the baby in the back and you.
go oh my gosh they’re hungry and I forgot the thing right Yeah and there’s so many different parts to your diaper bag I mean you don’t realize that especially with your first kid or you do and you overpack everything I mean you’ve got your formula your breast milk your coolers your this so I wanted to kind of make a all in one situation as easy as I could so.
My first one that came out it actually all connected but we still have it’s like a formula dispenser so you know instead of scooping this out and doing this it actually can fill the powder up with the formula dispenser and then flip it over and has a button and it pushes out exactly one scoop of formula so you have everything all compact in there and before then you would have to you know they did have the little measuring ones you have that and then you would have some I’m not really sure how you heated up bottles back in the day I mean you got a thermos and hope for the best but just making it more all in one.
and so you don’t have all that anxiety of having to pack every single thing you own so having that ready a lot of moms just use it for portable reasons so they’ll have that ready charge in their diaper bag and all they have to do is throw a bottle and they’re good to go and some mom use it at home too and you can use it at home.
You can be at home warmer or can be on the go warmer I mean it’s really the best of both worlds bebecause I mean when I remember at home I would leave it plugged in at night and leave the war the warmer on with the war the heat going and so whenever baby woke up it was ready I didn’t have to go heat anything I didn’t have to get out of bed I didn’t have to do anything obviously can’t do the breast milk but what I would do is I tried a little mini fridge that keep breast milk in and so I could I never had to get out of bed at that point if I needed to do that way because in the beginning I was a great breast.
feeder but in the end it was brutal she ended up having I can’t remember what it was called something where they couldn’t latch on oh did she need like a lip or tongue tie revision she had a tongue tie that’s what it was Yeah so long since I had a baby haha it’s so common and I think so commonly missed because their mouths are so tiny when they’re born.
That like you do your best to check but no offense like no 2-day-old is letting you get all up in their grill and they told me she was fine and then it was like not until a month or two later there was like I’m bleeding things are not right like what is happening and I finally like oh she’s got a tongue tie I was like how many times have I been to this doctor Yeah good to know and then after that it was fine but at that point you know your milk production’s fan down and I’ve been pumping but the pumping only does so much my opinion for me at least.
And it’s such a balance I think there’s so much pressure to be perfect with it you know I I will say with my first son I you know I was like I’m going to breastfeed for 12 months because that’s what they say and at 10 or so months he bit me and all of the recommendations were like you you very like not like I don’t know it was like a term that was basically like without a ton of emotion but sternly you pop them off and say no well I did that based on the feedback on Dr. Google and he never nursed again ever oh I laid in bed I laid in the tub I mean I sobbed and saw and I was like you know what I had to let it go.
but it’s very like you feel like a I felt like a failure I feel like a failure with this like I can’t do this like I’m supposed to naturally be like able to do this and I and I was pretty diligent about it like I pumped every three hours I was working full time you know and in my mind I had some like imaginary like level of perfection that I had to meet in my own mind.
You know and then when I had my daughter for the first two weeks they could not figure out why anytime I you know I fed her she would scream for like six hours and and I was a lactation counselor by that point right and even the lactation counselor the pediatrician I’m like something is wrong and I don’t know what it is she had a lip and tongue tie and then but she would slam Costco formula like a boss my husband’s like just give her a bottle of formula see what she does she was totally fine and I’m like what is wrong with you like what’s wrong with me what the heck you know it’s not a lactose thing because the.
Costco formula was just regular formula and so we kind of equated it to something in my breast milk based on my diet which was very heavy in like greens and you know like and I’m like I’m sorry I’m not living on butter and lettuce or butter and noodles for nine months like that’s not healthy for me.
Yeah so I mean I had to like I pumped every three hours for six months with her and just froze it my whole chest freezer downstairs was breast milk and finally at six months the doctors like you gotta let it go like she’s not taking every time I would try to like reintroduce it or give her an ounce or two she would flip out and I and I finally just like put it up on Facebook I was like there’s 7,000 ounces of breast milk you know wow free for anyone who would like to come get it and some lady came and took it all and I like I just you know I think I let myself like with the first one I let myself get a little.
postpartum with the second one I was like I’m doing the best I can and you know nobody looks at my kids now and at 10 and 12 goes hmm breastfed formula fed you know what I mean and I think in my mind like we’re so hard on ourselves as parents and I’m sure I’ll get hate for saying that but I don’t really care because it’s the truth.
It’s oh no that’s true it’s a balance man it’s like you gotta try to figure out like having a newborn is hard it’s a hard job and you know I think something like Baby’s Brew makes like it takes one less anxiety or stress or out of it my husband used to freak out about warming the bottles and some of these bottles no the bottle warmers that were electric like no disrespect but sometimes they like get that milk pretty hot I mean boiling which is crazy because then you cut out all the nutrients in breast milk so you kind of just like negated the whole bottle fee thing and that’s what I was thinking too because I.
Yeah mainly pumped and then I would do it I’m like this is boiling and all you read is don’t go over body temp don’t go body you lose every nutrient that’s in it Yeah shaking it too hard my husband would shake the breast milk I’m like don’t do that you’re breaking up the like the microwave I mean there’s so many thing but there’s a lot of standards out there too.
And Yeah I do believe the overheating thing in certain like oh my gosh I’m for sure the microwave doesn’t isn’t great for breast milk but well and I mean you think about like the overheating like that’s what you do when you’re trying to like purify water when you’re camping is like true or when your well breaks or something and they’re like there’s a boil alert like there’s a reason that there’s a boil alert you know so I mean I think to your point like this also would be a product I would see for my husband where he could manage knowing that it was done and I don’t want to say done right I’m not trying to like.
discount the fact he’s not like a smart human but you know what I mean like it’s just different and sometimes it’s like just do this and it’ll heat it to the right piece of mind for you and it’s good Yeah like I I can kind of no you can put the button on 98.6 and it’s not going to go crazy just hit the button you know like we were joking before we started recording.
Like my husband came home yesterday and I was like happy anniversary and he’s like oh you know damn we should have got married on a holiday but like we joke my husband I like we’re not like big you know gift people anything but sometimes like I kind of have to just like spell it out like here’s the thing to do you know without getting a fight too just like hit this push this button and don’t you can’t mess that up and that’s Yeah so it’s a really good thing for you know babysitters who you know a lot of babysitters are younger nowadays they don’t know the importance of that well I think it opens up everybody.
Yeah huh it opens up independence right like you talked about babysitters or taking like grandma taking the baby for a walk to the park it’s like grandma throw this under the stroller and if the baby’s hungry you can heat the milk and it’ll be done yep you know so you know I think the portability aspect of what you’re doing and then all the people that are involved.
In raising a child it it takes away the guesswork from it and again it becomes one less variable which I think in the space of parenting and the constant to do lists that we have in our minds you know makes it easy.
Now from a recharging standpoint so I know I’m not like electricity expert right but how do you charge it just based on like do you guys sell just in the US do you have the adapters if you were to fly overseas on vacation and the plugs are different like you know how does it charge like just so people know if they’re like hey this is a great idea we travel a lot as a family my we’re going to Taiwan next month like can we charge this hog over there you know Yeah.
So we wanted for that exact reason it’s meant for travel so I would took that into consideration and it’s actually just a USB-C to USB-USB-C port so if you buy any adapter for your iPhone charger that has a USB-C port you just plug it right into that it works with any adapter but it’s kind of like a an iPhone charger the same exact thing and then you know recharge it it’s good for the day and you can get about four to six heatings as it also depends on is that are you heating 9 ounces that’s refrigerated or are you heating 2 ounces that are room temp and that’s where we have a little bit of issues too it’s it.
can heat but you have to heat keep in mind is it cold or room temp Yeah well and I think so you know I use a lot of times those portable charging docks like for my iPhone I’ll keep one if I know we’re like doing an Irish dance contest all day or something and they have a pretty solid amount of power like some of them do I mean could you in a pinch.
If it was running low and you were on the airplane but you had a portable dock can you recharge it with something like that you can even with the newer planes they have a USB-C port in the plane you just plug it into that it’s so cool I mean I’m just so fascinated because I think this just opens up like throw it in your bag if you’re going to go hiking or go out for a walk or like I used to take my kids to the zoo to get out of the house in what ways in your mission right from where it was in 2018 to now we’re recording this in 2026 like what ways have you seen the mission of Baby’s Brew change over the you know.
just over the course of building the product I mean adapting because you know I had my way of parenting and moming and I built it for my personal use to be honest and then you know you start selling it and that’s when you realize you know that the other bottles and people want longer times faster times this and more I used to only have 3 temps on it.
And then I added another 4th one because someone wanted just to warm breast milk up to room temp so I’ve adapted in listening to mom’s input and fixing the problems that were with it in the beginning you know we’ve made it a lot faster that we made the battery a lot longer I mean it used to only last it was not great in the beginning it probably last about four hours and two heats and now you can like I said it last it’ll last all day long and you can get a lot of heats out of it and so we’re constantly improving constantly adapting trying to keep up with the ever changing world of technology and all the.
different bottles that are coming in that’s a different bottle that’s really our biggest challenge like I need a Baby’s Brew for my office as my coffee that I’m sipping while we do this interview is now cold because it’s my sister was heated a hottie toddy in it one time and she sent me a picture of she works for me she’s like look what I’m making oh my gosh.
I feel like this weekend we have a uh travel baseball tournament I’m like this could be helpful if I need something warmed up in the middle of you know what we also use it for our puppies so whatever we have puppies that don’t nurse or we actually have we get the goat formula and we warm it up with that and feed it to the newborn puppies that is amazing I mean there’s so many you know if you think about it like so many practical uses in that way too I mean from your perspective what do you hope new moms feel when they use it.
Just so they’re not so nervous I mean I was horrible postpartum too and I was nervous about everything and leaving the house and then it just becomes so overwhelming and I mean I’m a theme park junkie so you know we went to theme parks a lot and as soon as I got my portable warmer I just felt so much better I I felt like I didn’t have to plan every step of my day like okay well I know baby’s going to eat in two hours so I need to go find make sure I stop at a coffee shop or this or here and now you just you don’t have to plan all that you can just go about your day relax knowing that you’ve got the feeding down.
and you’ve got diapers so what more do you need well I think there’s the emotional benefit right like I had postpartum and it was just like oh my gosh like I’m I you know I joke back to Anchorman like I’m a glass case of emotion all the time it was awful it was it’s a lot like it’s a lot and I don’t think people talk about it enough.
You know they don’t but it I always tell parents like in the space of sleep consulting I’m like take what you can control like what can you control there’s always going to be variables but what in the situation can you control with Baby’s Brew you can control the aspect of feeding which is obviously a critical one like you could make do with not having an overnight diaper if you go to grandma’s house you know Yeah it’s a regular diaper but with this like you gotta have a way to heat it or they just won’t take it a lot of times you know so I feel like it’s just a neat way to to emotionally like remove something.
from the arsenal of the overwhelm that is up in many times Mom’s brains more than Dad’s no offense if my husband was but you know it’s just parents can feel more confident more prepared you know and just ready to kind of tackle the day of whatever it is in that journey at what age and stage they’re in you know and like I said.
I feel like a product like this has longevity because I’m like I can heat up hot chocolate for my kids at the soccer game this weekend like Yeah you mean you can do a lot of stuff with it and we get a lot of people tagging us in fun little things Yeah.
Oh that’s cool so where do people find it right in stores online like talk about where they can get Baby’s Brew how they can add it to their registry yep so we sell on our website at TheBabysBrew.com and we’ve actually even implemented a new little button that you can buy with prime through our website which I thought that was so cool which just launched a little bit ago we also are Amazon we have Target.com we have Nordstrom and we’re getting into a few of the stores in Canada currently right now too so that should be launching sooner than later I love it and I’ll make sure in the show notes for this that.
everybody can find you and get access to putting it on their registry or ordering one now if they’re home with a newborn and this is really great I’m excited for this type of product I think and again it it’s things that are helpful to new parents and this is certainly one of them so I’m glad you’re able to come on today and talk about Baby’s Brew.
And just you know I always kind of ask each guest when they come on like what’s one piece of advice for a new parent that you would give as a mom as a business owner in the parenting space that sees a lot of it like what’s just one piece of advice you’d give to somebody listening today who might need a little something positive Yeah and I’m sure people have heard it before but I mean just don’t beat yourself up the baby will be fine you’re not just bebecause you forgot one little thing or got we’re 30 minutes late it it they will be fine there’s no reason to stress you don’t have to keep onto such a calculated.
little schedule like I did I mean I thought if I was a minute late you know I would just go into a full-blown panic attack but you know as you get older and you have more you’re like you know what they’re going to be okay Yeah there’s no reason to stress so much about it but I get it being a first time mom you want to be perfect you want to do the things you want.
But be adaptable you gotta learn to adapt because that baby that your first one’s not going to be the same as your second one your second one’s not going to be the same as your third one they’re going to want different things so if one breastfeeds one doesn’t by all means your boobs just got free up I was going to say give yourself Grace because it is such a journey you know and and I like you know as I have two kids and I parent them the same and they’re both two totally different kids they were two different newborns you know it’s like give yourself Grace with it because you can go down a spiral if you don’t.
so just I I totally agree with that and I think it’s I think it’s great advice but I’m excited to share the Baby’s Brew I hope everybody goes out and adds it to their registry I thank you for coming on the Kids Sleep Show and we’ll be sure to to tag them and tag you and make sure everybody can find you when this thank you Courtney you’ve been amazing thank you.
I appreciate you coming on today and we’ll share this shortly with all of our amazing listeners.
Thanks so much everybody for tuning into the Kids Sleep Show podcast be sure to leave a review if you find these podcast episodes helpful and as always every week we’re here putting out new episodes so thanks so much for tuning in.
One more thing before you go don’t forget to subscribe leave a review or share this episode with someone you know who could use a little more sleep in their life for tips and resources be sure to visit us at TinyTransitions.com or follow us across social media here’s to better sleep brighter days and healthier happier families.
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