The first person I met at last month’s Pro Padel League (PPL) event in Los Angeles was Ben Blair, who ended up putting together an amazing photo essay of the weekend for our Padel Nation readers. The second was Carolyn Hamlet.
Given her upbeat, ultra-positive persona, I wasn’t entirely surprised to learn that she was the founder of ōku, an upstart brand of functional energy gummies that are “designed to work with your body rather than against it, without the jitters, spike or crash” of other more mainstream alternatives — which is a philosophy she dubs “Conscious Energy®.”
However, given the fact that she was sponsoring an entire PPL team (namely the Las Vegas Smash), I was rather surprised to learn that she is relatively brand new to the sport and doesn’t play regularly despite being a four year starter and the captain of her college tennis team at Brandeis University her senior year.
When I ask her about this, she explains:
Building a startup can consume 14 hours a day seven days a week, leaving very little time for anything else.
I have spent hours and hours watching padel at PPL events and other tournaments, so sadly, I am currently much more of a professional spectator than a player. I only wish all those spectating hours translated into playing ability.
I have been on the court a handful of times, and when I do play, it is at Padel N9NE in San Diego. My first clinic was humbling. As a former college tennis player, I could not imagine that I could be quite so bad at a racquet sport.
The second clinic was better, although I had a memorable encounter with the glass while attempting a shot I had watched several times but had absolutely no business trying. The resulting pain lasted for about a week.
The Unlikely Path to Being an Unlikely Patroness
So, how does a…
Computer science major…
Turned Wall Street financial analyst at Merrill Lynch…
Turned MBA in finance and entrepreneurial studies…
Turned president of MP3.com International (which was the first music platform on the internet, pre-dating the likes of Pandora, Spotify, and Apple Music)…
Turned founder of two registered investment advisory firms and one mortgage brokerage firm…
… get into the niche world of functional gummies, let alone U.S. padel?
In Carolyn’s own words:
Had you told me several years ago that this was what I would be doing, I probably would have laughed because I had never worked in consumer packaged goods.
That said, I have repeatedly found myself in situations with nearly vertical learning curves, often helping to carve out new territory. Apparently, that is an environment I enjoy.
The opportunity that eventually led to ōku came through my mortgage brokerage firm. I met an entrepreneur named Scott who approached me about helping him launch an energy shot with CBD. This was during COVID.
I told him candidly that I was not sure how helpful I could be: I had neither experience nor a network in consumer packaged goods, and raising capital was especially difficult when it was not possible to meet with people in person.
Nevertheless, I agreed to help and we successfully raised our first funds.
Having first stumbled onto Haribo gummy candies on a trip to Germany during college (long before they were available in the U.S.) and instantly falling in love with them, Carolyn also wanted to explore the idea of an energy gummy all these years later.
She recalls:
I saw significantly more white space in an innovative, functional gummy snack than in trying to compete with 5-hour Energy at the shelf, where a small emerging brand could never match the spending power of an established incumbent.
The gummy was a product I could speak about authentically every day because I had effectively been the consumer for years—the right product simply had not been available to me.
Powering U.S. Padel One Pouch at a Time
Carolyn most definitely can — and will — tell you all about the benefits of adding ōku gummies to your daily routine and the advantages they have over all the mainstream energy drinks you see lining the shelves of your local bodega.
Chief among them are the fact that, “ōku hits the trifecta of taste × function × convenience” combined with her belief that, “Mornings have coffee. Afternoons have ōku.”
(Oh, and in case you were curious the name ōku is rooted in Japanese is roughly translated as “restoring the essence within.”)
But given that my focus is padel, I steer the conversation back to how she got involved in the sport to begin with. To which she tells me:
My introduction to padel was wonderfully serendipitous.
Several years ago, I shared an early version of ōku with a woman in San Diego who runs a publicly traded women’s-health company. Unbeknownst to me, she passed it along to one of her board members, who was also an investor and principal in Padel N9NE, a beautiful facility that opened in San Diego in May 2025.
That investor later asked to be connected with me because she thought ōku would be an ideal sponsor for the upcoming FIP tournament being held at Padel N9NE the first weekend in November 2025.
I had heard of padel but had never actually seen it played. I agreed to meet her at Padel N9NE and was so impressed by the facility and immediately intrigued by the sport.
In addition to sponsoring that tournament (which was only the second of its kind to be played on U.S. soil at that point), Carolyn also, “gave pouches to the players so they could try ōku and determine whether it fit into their playing and training routines.”
One player who immediately took to what Carolyn had to offer was U.S. Women’s No. 1 Brittany Dubins.
As Carolyn proudly recalls:
Brittany loved the product. A few months later, I met with her and her father in Miami, and we structured ōku’s first sponsorship with a top professional padel player.
She incorporates ōku into her training and playing routine and serves as our lead ambassador. Brittany will tell you it has helped her win many third set matches…and not that there is a direct correlation, but she has gone from 99th in the world to 76th since incorporating ōku into her routine! Just saying…
From there, Carolyn took ōku to this past year’s RacquetX in Fort Lauderdale, where she distributed over 2,000 pouches, before eventually deciding to begin sponsoring the Las Vegas Smash for their 2026 PPL campaign. Of this decision she says:
[After RacquetX], I felt very much at home in the U.S. padel community and became even more committed to playing a meaningful role as more players began incorporating ōku into their training and match routines.
Forward Progress
When I ask Carolyn what she thinks success can — and will — look like both for ōku and U.S. padel she starts by telling me that she already plans to have a presence at both the upcoming U.S. Open in New York City and the PPL Finals and to help support the American Collegiate Padel League (of which, I’m actually an advisory board member).
She also tells me you can now find ōku in padel clubs around the U.S. including Padel N9NE and Taktika (in San Diego), Padel Up and Pura Padel (in Los Angeles), Park Padel (in San Francisco), Urban Padel (in Florida), Wakit Rakit (in Florida and Texas) and the Charlotte Padel Club, among others.
She then goes on to add:
For ōku, success would mean evolving from an emerging product into a trusted, category-defining Conscious Energy® brand.
By approximately 2030, I would like ōku to have meaningful national distribution across retail, food service, Amazon and specialty fitness, supported by strong repeat purchasing, healthy margins and the team and operating structure required to scale responsibly.
But, of course, I inevitably shift the conversation back to padel yet again, so she ultimately ends our conversation by telling me:
My ambition is for ōku to become synonymous with padel in the United States. I want putting a pouch in your racquet bag — and reaching for it before playing or between sets — to become as natural a part of the routine as packing your racquet.
As for U.S. padel, I would not measure success solely by big predictions about the largest number of courts or players. If it can reach a much broader population without losing the warmth, social connection, and community that make it so special, I would consider that tremendous success.
ōku and U.S. padel are two early stories developing alongside one another. I feel incredibly fortunate that we have been welcomed so warmly and have the opportunity to grow together.
To learn more about ōku Conscious Energy® gummies, including where you can purchase them, please be sure to visit their website and/or follow them on Instagram.
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Oh, and one other thing… my brand-new 352-page padel book was just released. So, if you enjoy the work I’m doing in the U.S. padel space, you can support me by ordering a copy (or two!) online at Amazon or Barnes & Noble.
Or if you’re a club owner and you’d want to carry a handful of copies in your pro shop for “padel curious” people who are interested in trying the sport out but don’t know quite where to start, let me know and I can connect you with my publisher’s wholesale department.
Many thanks in advance!