Today we’d like to introduce you to Rebecca Pytell
Rebecca, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
I started reading healthy living blogs when I was in high school and in 2013, due to my love for health, wellness, fitness, and cooking. I was diagnosed with celiac disease in 2008 so I was also looking to connect with others like me, I decided to start my own free wordpress.com site called Strength and Sunshine. I blogged about fitness, food, and my everyday life and ended up building a large organic presence online. After the first few years, I started to niche down into just food blogging, seeing that recipes were the most popular content and my love for cooking.
I like to say I “accidentally” started a brand and business, launching my career from my passion. Strength and Sunshine has become the authority in gluten-free and allergen-free cooking, helping a worldwide audience reclaim their love for food and empowering families to get in the kitchen regardless of their restrictions or skills due to celiac disease and food allergies. Every recipe I create is gluten-free, top allergen-free, and vegan.
Over these past 11 years, I’ve doubled down on dedicating my life to the celiac and food allergy community, and hold a BSc. Public Health, NASM-CPT (certified personal trainer), CNC (certified nutrition coach), CPB (certified physique and bodybuilding coach), and RYT (registered yoga teacher) with over a decade of award-winning and nationally acclaimed gluten-free and allergen-free recipe development experience.
This has also led to me taking my skills and experience in marketing and business to offer consulting to small businesses and brands with a specialization in the food, beverage, restaurant, hospitality, and health & wellness industries.
I’ve more recently delved into carving out a space for a personal brand on YouTube, a platform that I’ve always loved but never really tried for myself. I share my life in South Florida, career business, health/fitness, and gaming.
My Brand: https://strengthandsunshine.com/
Marketing Services: https://rebeccalynmedia.my.canva.site/
Fitness & Nutrition Services: https://rebeccalynmedia.my.canva.site/rebecca-lyn-fitness-nutrition
https://instagram.com/rebeccagf666/
https://www.facebook.com/strengthandsunshine/
https://pinterest.com/rebeccagf666/
@strengthandsunshine
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC5-z2X_c4vtwHyBntVcpB1Q
My Personal Brand
https://www.instagram.com/rebeccalynpytell/
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCtTYEvM4UA-EEkUWyj6s3Q
@rebeccalynpytell
https://www.linkedin.com/in/rebecca-pytell/
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
As a solo founder and business owner, it hasn’t been easy! I’m the jack-of-all-trades in my business and do everything myself, from recipe development, photography, content writing, SEO, social media, etc. It’s scary to rely on yourself for your livelihood, but I can’t image my life without Strength and Sunshine now. You have to be constantly learning, testing, and growing to keep up with the changing online space (blogging in 2013 vs 2024 is so wildly different!). Looking back it’s easy to see where I could have done things differently, but I’ve always done the best I could with the knowledge and resources I had at that moment.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
I love my work, not only because it’s challenging, but because it helps others like me. Food blogging is a hyper-competitive niche, so being a gluten-free, allergy-free, vegan blogger helps me standout and really know my super specific audience. While I always say my recipes are for any and everyone, they solve the problem of someone who may have celiac disease but also have a nut and egg allergy. I love challenging myself with recipe development, creating allergy-free versions of classics and fun childhood favorites like Goldfish or Spaghettio’s all while being healthier with complete nutrition and taste in mind.
Homemade Gluten-Free + Vegan Goldfish (Allergy-Free, Grain-Free)
Is there a quality that you most attribute to your success?
Consistency! The first few years I was blogging because I loved it, I wasn’t making an income. It took years to build up the kind of audience and traffic required to generate a real income and now I’m with the top ad network for publishes. I have been doing this for 11 years. People tend to quit things after a few months if they aren’t seeing the results they want. You have to be in it for the long game and because you love it. If you don’t love what you’re doing, it’s not sustainable and you’ll burnout.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://strengthandsunshine.com/
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/rebeccagf666/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/strengthandsunshine/
- Twitter: https://x.com/RebeccaGF666
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCtTYEvM4UA-EEkUWyj6s3Q (Rebecca Lyn Personal Brand)
