Ian Somerhalder is getting candid about his shortcomings in handling previous businesses.
The Vampire Diaries alum retired from acting almost ten years ago, and has since then focused on Brother's Bond, a bourbon line he shares with his former co-star Paul Wesley, as well as The Absorption Company, a sustainable powdered supplement brand launched in 2024 with wife Nikki Reed.
However, before those successful brands, a previous business left his family in "an eight-figure hole" of debt.
© Getty ImagesSpeaking with E! News, he recalled his decision to retire from acting seven years ago. "I left an insanely lucrative career in television after financial upheaval from building a business that I didn't build properly. And due to fraud, it put my wife and I into an eight-figure hole."
He recalled how "it all came crashing down" after he made eight figures worth of personal guarantees to a bank for an unnamed clean energy company.
"Eight figures is a hard hole to climb out of," he went on, crediting his wife Nikki, whose last film credit is also from seven years ago, for helping their family get out of it.
© Getty Images"Nikki and I did it. You know, she really negotiated us out of this deal but we sold houses, paintings, cars, watches, everything," he shared.
Nikki, who is the CEO and founder of sustainable luxury jewelry brand Bayou With Love, and Ian have been married since 2015, and are parents to daughter Bodhi Soleil Reed, eight, as well as a two year-old son whose name they have not disclosed.
Ian previously addressed his financial hole in a lengthy tribute to Nikki, again crediting her for helping him get out of it. "What many of you may not know is this woman is the reason I was actually able to build @brothersbondbourbon. I've never disclosed this publicly, but this woman worked selflessly for 2yrs to build me out of a terrible business situation I got myself into," he shared on Instagram in 2021.
"Before Nik and I got together I built a company while shooting TVD that was important to me," he recalled. "I invested heavily, I made huge personal guarantees to banks. However due to greed and fraud within that company and fraudulent activities from our biggest customer, not to mention the temporary collapse of the oil and gas industry — I was left in an EIGHT- FIGURE hole."
© Instagram"It was awful. A true nightmare day in and day out. I had to travel the world weekly to pay for massive monthly six-figure bank notes and ended up in the hospital 4 times in 2 years," he went on, further sharing: "This woman here decided that she didn't want to see her husband ruin his body/mind/spirit and pulled up her bootstraps and got down in the trenches assembling a team to get to the negotiating table to find a way out. She devoted her life to getting me out of that mess and it almost killed her along the way."
"Needless to say it's been the most eye opening and truly humbling experience. Painful as hell but as a family SHE got us through. It’s unreal. I owe her my health, my life and my sanity," he maintained.
