BeautyBio's Jamie O'Banion on a CEO's responsibility to plan for the 'worst-case scenario'

BeautyBio founder and CEO Jamie O'Banion describes part of her job as "always thinking through worst-case scenario and planning for it." With the coronavirus pandemic overtaking consumers' health and simultaneously slowing down the U.S. and global economy, that scenario is now -- with one respite, according to O'Banion.

"Most beauty brands are really seeing this hockey-stick revenue uptick, the back half of the year," she said on this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "So from a timing perspective, I think as an industry we're all grateful. If there was a time for this to happen -- which god forbid, we would never wish it upon anyone -- I think we're all really grateful that this is the time of year."

BeautyBio, which sells skin care products and a micro-needling tool, had been looking to expand considerably into brick-and-mortar this year. That included plans for 50 Sephora stores this month with the the remaining 400 Sephora stores in the U.S. by fall. It had also planned launches in Australia through Mecca and Sephora’s Southeast Asia in Q2.

Now O'Banion sees her company's omnichannel sales capability as a strength against the pandemic's devastating blow to physical retail. "That was a really important initiative to me in the last five years. My number one goal was making sure that we were never totally exposed by single-channel distribution," she said. "And I think [now] it's going to help brands really pause and think about their overall distribution strategy."

In the episode, O'Banion also talked about the importance of keeping the company's team together and the test of marketing and messaging in today's climate.