By: Sixteen Ramos

A baby’s bottle routine can turn into a tiny logistics job, the kind that starts in the middle of the night and keeps going when someone’s running on two hours of sleep. That’s the moment Roxie Alsruhe, founder of HoopDee, ran into a problem that felt small until it didn’t.

Alsruhe didn’t know when stored milk expired, and the searches came with too many tabs and even more second-guessing. She built HoopDee around one clear goal for overwhelmed households: fewer mental calculations, clearer labels, and decisions that feel easier to trust, grounded in CDC breastmilk storage guidelines.

The Moment ‘Just Label It’ Stops Working

Every feeding routine rewards whoever remembers the most details. A bottle goes into the fridge, another comes out, time passes, and the burden stays with the adult who’s tracking it all in their head. Alsruhe’s concept for HoopDee arrived when her son was two weeks old, after she realized she was wasting milk because she couldn’t confidently track expiration in real time.

Tape and handwritten dates can cover one piece of the puzzle, yet the expiration math still sits on the parents’ shoulders. A busy day can swallow those tiny timestamps. That pain point shaped the brand’s tone. HoopDee aims for a system that feels quick, easy, and intuitive, with a color-coded approach that makes it easier to spot what’s what at a glance.

Building a System That Does the ‘Remembering’

The first build started as software. Alsruhe and her team began with an app, worked with coders, and iterated through user testing with parents, UX designers, and clinicians before finishing the app in March of 2025. The app can run without the physical product by prompting a user to write a number on a bottle so it still syncs inside the system, even on a day when the Hoops aren’t in the picture.

From there, HoopDee moved into product design. The silicone Hoops use NFC chips, with a tap-to-pay style interaction that pairs a bottle to the app without batteries or charging. The Hoops were tested for elasticity to stay secure while keeping the material flexible, and the company describes them as child-safe, food-safe, dishwasher-safe, and waterproof.

What HoopDee is Trying to Fix in Real Life

The bottlefeeding app is built to calculate supply based on how much a baby eats and what’s currently in inventory, including a frozen stash. It supports both breast milk and formula tracking. The app also aims to guide which bottle to use first based on the information a parent has logged, with storage timing following CDC breastmilk storage guidelines.

HoopDee’s reach has also moved into professional settings. Alsruhe says more than 40 practices, hospitals, doulas, and private practices in the U.S. currently use HoopDee. The system’s value relies on helping parents reduce guesswork around storage timing during busy routines.

The ‘Village’ Feature, With a Wink

A lot of parents’ hacks quietly assume one exhausted adult will manage everything. Alsruhe’s favorite detail is how HoopDee can spread the work across households. As she puts it, “My secret mission. This is something that dads can use.” The app can be shared with family members, including grandparents, so more than one person can stay on the same page when bottles move between rooms, bags, and hands.

The brand also has plans for expanded features, including light gamification and completing other phantom parenting tasks.

Where the Brand Story Lands

HoopDee has had early visibility, including a “Best Booth” win at the PREGO Expo in Chicago in May 2025. Alsruhe also appeared on local TV, but the brand’s most telling validation comes from how users describe the experience.

Alsruhe points to feedback like “The product was performing in line with what was intended” and “You guys really thought of everything.” She attributes those sentiments to building scenarios into the algorithm because households, parents, and babies vary so widely.

For parents who want a clearer system, HoopDee positions its app as a starting point. The company describes it as a breastmilk app tracker that could work on its own and as a tap-based add-on that makes labeling feel less like another job.