The ModBalls Story
It all started with a cause
Oct 15, 2026
Real food over stimulants. That was the mission before ModBalls had a name.
Stephen Story had spent four decades as a food scientist, and he kept seeing the same thing: kids and young athletes reaching for energy drinks, caffeine and stimulants to get through practice, games and long school days. Those products deliver a jolt, then a crash, with almost no nutrition behind them.
Stephen believed there was a better way to fuel a young body. Whole food. Real protein, real fiber, natural sweetness from honey. Energy that comes from nutrition and lasts, instead of a stimulant that burns out.
That became the clean energy cause: get kids and young athletes off stimulants and caffeine, and onto whole food that helps them perform.
The first use case: Allie
Make the third set feel like the first.
In 2020, Stephen's youngest daughter, Allie, was playing doubles for her local high school. She became the first real test of the idea. Instead of a drink, gel, or chalky protein bar before a match, she got whole-food protein balls that her mom, Jan, made every night in their Utah kitchen.
Before every practice and every match, Allie had her protein balls. The goal was steady energy that would still be there deep into a long third set.
It worked. That season Allie and her doubles partner won the Utah 6A state championship. Even before the title, the results were showing: her teammates kept coming up at practice asking if she had extras to share.
The athlete
Allie Story, Lone Peak High School tennis
The fuel
Whole-food protein balls, made fresh in Jan's kitchen
Instead of
Caffeine, energy drinks and stimulants
The result
2020 Utah 6A state doubles champions
The food scientist behind it
Stephen Story has spent 40 years creating products people can't stop talking about.
Allie's success wasn't luck. Her dad has been formulating hit products since the 1980s.
1989
Creates Stephen's Gourmet Hot Cocoa in his Centerville garage lab. At a Bountiful High fundraiser, he and Jan sell 2,000 pounds of cocoa in less than a day.
2000s
Develops Tahitian Noni juice. He co-founds Morinda Holdings, which grows to more than $500M a year in sales across 70 countries.
Ongoing
With longtime partner and BYU food chemistry classmate Jarakae Jensen, he formulates hundreds of products for nutrition brands worldwide. Together they bring 80+ years of experience.
When Stephen saw Allie's teammates asking for protein balls, he recognized the same signal he'd seen at that cocoa fundraiser decades earlier. This idea was bigger than one tennis team.
The formula
As much nutrition as possible, in about 100 calories.
Stephen's brief was simple and hard: pack as much nutrition as possible into roughly 100 calories, with no stimulants and nothing artificial, and make it taste good enough that teenagers would actually eat it.
98 calories per ball
Sized to Stephen's original 100-calorie target
8g protein per 2-ball serving
Protein to support steady energy
6g prebiotic fiber per serving
Fiber for fullness and digestion
0g refined sugar
Sweetened with cold-pressed honey from Utah and Idaho mountains
0 stimulants
Energy from food, not caffeine
Stephen's favorite way to explain it: a high-caffeine drink is like throwing dynamite into a steam engine. You get a big burst, and then it's gone. ModBalls are the wood that keeps the fire burning.
The tent years
Get off caffeine.Get on ModBalls.
Stephen, three of his sons (Nathan, Aaron and Ammon) formed ModBalls to take the cause beyond one tennis team. They refined the formula, figured out production and packaging, then took it to the people who needed it most.
For the better part of three years, they along with their team set up a pop-up tent wherever they could find room, handing out thousands of samples and collecting feedback:
Marathons
Pickleball tournaments
The CrossFit world championships in Wisconsin
Everyday events for families and anyone looking for a healthier snack
From Jan's kitchen to Costco
The same recipe, now individually wrapped and on shelves nationwide.
In early 2025, ModBalls moved from online-only sales into its first two Costco warehouses, in Salt Lake City and Lehi. Murray, Spanish Fork, Saratoga Springs and Orem followed.
Today the Happy Wholesome line comes in four flavors:
Real food.
Real function.Really delicious.
The cause hasn't changed since that first tennis match: whole-food fuel that keeps you going, so the last set, the last mile or the last meeting feels like the first.
