Elise Stephens — 30 Under 40 2026

Elise Stephens started at The Spa and Sauna Co. in accounting. Then she kept learning.

As she became familiar with more areas of the business, Stephens assumed responsibility for purchasing and inventory. The timing has made that education particularly useful: The Spa and Sauna Co. has been growing, bringing more people, more products and more space for Stephens to help manage.

For a purchasing and inventory manager, growth creates a particular set of pressures. More sales require more inventory. More inventory requires more space and tighter controls. A larger operation needs processes that can keep up with it.

Stephens says streamlining those processes has been essential.

The company has responded with retraining and new procedures, giving the team clearer ways to track improvements in efficiency and operations. For Stephens, the payoff becomes visible when everything behind the scenes works well enough that customers never have to think about it.

There is still plenty Stephens wants to improve. Her goal is to keep refining processes until The Spa and Sauna Co. becomes “the easiest place in the world to buy a hot tub.”

She also has her eye on a problem that extends beyond her company’s operations: waste.

“We have to do something about these covers,” Stephens says.

More broadly, she would like the spa industry to develop better recycling options for the waste it produces. Stephens isn’t waiting for an industrywide solution to begin making changes locally. She points to cardboard recycling and growing The Spa and Sauna Co.’s used hot tub program as practical places to start.

That combination of big-picture thinking and incremental improvement suits a career built by continually learning another piece of the business. As the company evolves, Stephens intends to keep evolving with it.

Living in Reno gives her plenty of reasons to step away from inventory on the weekends. Stephens spends much of her free time hiking, getting outdoors and enjoying the lake.

Locations refer to company headquarters; honorees may work remotely or live elsewhere.