The Glossy Beauty Podcast

After becoming a mother in 2017, Sarah Paiji Yoo cut out all single-use plastics from her life for the sake of her family. In 2019, she took that practice a step further by creating Blueland, a brand offering sustainable home goods and hygiene products. Blueland sells hand soaps, home cleaners, dish soaps and laundry products, made with respective plant-based formulas. And all products come in a reusable bottle and are shipped in recyclable cardboard. Its newest product, body wash, released in May, further expands the brand into beauty. "Blueland tackles the bulkiest products people use in the personal care and beauty space," Yoo said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.In February 2022, Prelude Growth Partners, a female-founded growth equity firm, led Blueland’s fundraising round of $20 million. Blueland has raised a total of $35 million to date from investors including pop star Justin Timberlake; Nicolas Jammet, CEO of Sweetgreen; and Jennifer Fleiss, co-founder of Rent the Runway. 

After 15 years in the beauty industry holding various positions, Alisa Metzger founded Innbeauty Project in 2019. This clean beauty brand, which is aimed at Gen-Z consumers through an accessible pricing strategy, sells its products in major retailers like Sephora and Credo, as well as on its direct-to-consumer site."If you think about the average [skin-care] product price and even the average [skin-care] routine being $100 and up, and then you match that with the average U.S. salary being less than $45,000 a year, it became really evident that clean skin-care was not something that most Americans can afford," Metzger said on the latest Glossy Beauty Podcast. Metzger worked with Jen Shane, co-founder of Innbeauty, at Tula when they noticed, “The wellness movement had taken over [beauty],” Metzer said. The early pioneers of clean beauty were at the forefront of the industry because the ingredient messaging resonated with consumers within the wellness movement. However, Metzger and Shane said they noticed that clean products at an accessible price point seemed nonexistent. The two were passionate about democratizing clean beauty. Innbeauty's prices range from $15 for a single lip oil to $120 for a 6-piece kit, which is still more affordable than the prices of individual products from some competitors. “We wanted to create a brand that spoke to [Gen Z] that didn’t exist. This industry is driven by innovation, which comes in many forms, including creating something that doesn't exist for an audience that's starving to consume," Metzger said.Metzer spoke to Glossy about the clean beauty industry, Gen-Z skin-care marketing and Innbeauty's future goals for further innovation in the beauty space.

“We're in a makeup [and] a self-expression renaissance right now," "Euphoria" makeup artist Donni Davy said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty podcast.After three years in development, Half Magic, the beauty brand by Davy and A24, debuted this week to extreme fanfare. Davy sees the brand to be an expression of "dopamine makeup," where it encourages its users to experiment with their self-expression and identity through makeup. Half Magic is selling DTC to consumers and will stay that way in order to maintain Davy’s direct and close relationships with customers. Despite the bold colors and glitter rhinestone masterpieces seen in "Euphoria," Davy wants to showcase all types of looks with Half Magic. With a wide variety of beginner-friendly lip kits, rhinestone packs, eye paint and applicator tools, Half Magic reassures customers that the "magic" of a makeup look is within oneself. 

Created for BIPOC in mission and purpose, Tristan Walker’s health and beauty brand, Walker & Company, has been instrumental in shifting the norms of the beauty industry since its conception in 2013. At W&C, Black women and people of color hold the majority of leadership positions. It's changed the diversity in beauty aisles of department stores like Walmart and Target by putting razor and hair-care collections for all different hair textures on the shelves. After almost a decade of simplifying beauty and grooming for BIPOC, hygiene and home goods corporation P&G acquired Walker & Company in 2018 for an estimated $20 million to $40 million. Walker & Company's business has often been led by technology. But Walker, founder and CEO, said on the latest Glossy Beauty Podcast that, moving forward, the business will be led by culture. Walker’s perspective on how closely culture affects business was instrumental in the creation of Bevel and Form, W&C’s grooming and beauty brands, respectively. And prioritizing the needs of BIPOC doesn't stop at W&C's products. W&C has partnered with various community outreach programs, like Urban Prep academies in Chicago, where it donated laptops for students forced to remote-learn during Covid. Plus, it provides free mental health resources on Headpsace for W&C customers. 

NYC-based makeup artist Meredith Duxbury is a well-known digital content creator among the TikTok beauty community with over 14.8 million followers on the platform. Referred to as “the complexion queen of TikTok,” she is also the face of the Morphe Making You Blush collection, which launched in March 2022.Duxbury grew up following beauty creators like Jacqueline Hill before deciding she wanted to post her own beauty content on social media. “I started on TikTok. I would stack up some cardboard boxes and make a random tripod out of whatever I could find, and I started doing [before-and-after] transitions here and there," Duxbury said on the latest Glossy Podcast. "My videos took off when I started doing rap lip-syncing videos to Nicki Minaj’s 'I’m Legit' song. And I created a trend called #thefoundationchallenge where I would smear foundation all over my face. It would get hundreds of millions of views.”The TikTok star hit 1 million followers in December 2020, and one month later, she reached 7 million followers.“I created three videos a day during quarantine and learned so much about the [influencer] industry. But I’d say 2019 was when I [first] immersed myself in the beauty world,” said Duxbury. “[The TikTok algorithm] shows that, if you’re consistent, you can grow."

When Pinterest launched in 2010, it was pegged as a supplemental platform for bloggers. Fast forward to over a decade later and it's now a regular go-to for beauty brands, beauty fans and far beyond with its buzzy ecosystem of content creators.At the helm of Pinterest's beauty division is Rachel Goodman, head of beauty partnerships, who has been with the company for seven years. During her tenure, she has witnessed the evolution of how Pinterest fits within people’s social media consumption. It has gone from being a special-occasion platform for people decorating apartments or getting married to becoming an “always-on” website for seeking inspiration and shopping. With this in mind, Pinterest has focused over the last two years on connecting the dots from providing inspiration for an idea to facilitating its realization through a purchase.“People aren't coming to Pinterest to broadcast their thoughts and opinions to a social network,” Goodman said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. “People come to Pinterest to look for ideas, to discover [ideas], to save them, and to go out and do them.”In the last 12 months alone, Pinterest has launched an inclusive beauty search for hair inspiration for Black, brown and Latinx people. It launched the Creator Fund in April 2021, which aims to recruit and amplify creators of color on the platform through a mix of education, tools, free advertising and income-generating opportunities. Pinterest also became more shoppable through a new program called Idea Pins and launched a daily live-streaming show called "Pinterest TV" in 2021.Goodman spoke further with Glossy about how Pinterest is working with creators differently, which beauty brands perform well on the platform and how Pinterest is helping brands adapt their tactics.

After a wide range of beauty collaborations under her belt from her 12 years as a beauty influencer, Desi Perkins finally took the plunge and became a beauty founder herself a year ago. Launched in April 2021, her skin-care brand, Dezi Skin, now has four products, with names such as “Claro Que C” and ingredients inspired by her Mexican heritage. With over 3 million YouTube subscribers and 4.3 million Instagram followers, Perkins is focused on Instagram for her brand’s marketing but is eyeing TikTok, too. “[Instagram] is targeting its platform toward brands and a shopping experience. For brands, this is still a really, really great platform. But I would also like to dip into TikTok with the brand, in a more casual sense. That's definitely in our forecast,” she said on the latest Glossy Beauty Podcast. Check out the entire podcast episode to learn about Perkins' development process for her brand and the way she uses audience feedback to develop products. She also shares her views on the beauty social media landscape and how it’s changed over the past decade. 

Hair care has been a passion for Annie Young-Scrivner, CEO of Wella Company, since she was 13 years old when she started a side business cutting and perming hair. So when the executive was recruited from Godiva where she served as CEO for three years to join the 140-year-old hair-care and nail company, she jumped at the opportunity.Private equity firm KKR named Young-Scrivner as the CEO of Wella Company in Oct. 2020 following the announcement of its acquisition of 60% of the company from Coty. Wella distributes hair-care brands such as Wella Professionals, Clairol, Nioxin, GHD and nail polish brand OPI. In Dec. 2021, the company celebrated its first anniversary as an independent company. KKR and Wella Company have noted the ambitions to IPO in approximately four years.“We have a tremendous opportunity to be an incredible company. The first thing we're focused on is making sure we have the right [products] to meet the needs of the consumer,” said Young-Scrivner on the Glossy Beauty podcast. “The second thing is making sure we're growing in the right way. There's going to be lots of [exit] options for us.”When it comes to building a product and brand portfolio that stands the test of time, Wella is focusing on storytelling across all of its brands. This includes Wella Professional. Its Shinefinity long-lasting color glaze speaks to the health of hair, with the tagline “Shine you can feel." Wella has over 1,000 patented products and technologies it can use to position itself as a superior beauty company offering innovative products, Young-Scrivner said.OPI has also looked to unique opportunities to capture new customers and communities by partnering with Xbox in January. So far these efforts are paying off, as Wella’s professional sales channel has experienced a double-digit sales growth compared to the fiscal year 2019, and both its e-commerce and retail channels are growing substantially, said Young-Scrivner.

Starting out on Etsy and made by hand in the kitchen of co-founders Alex Kummerow and Julia Wills, skin-care brand Herbivore is now a rainbow-colored powerhouse with $15 million in Series A funding and distribution at Sephora.The brand’s Instagram-friendly aesthetic, emphasis on plant-based ingredients and glass-heavy packaging have attracted a loyal following. It has recently been rolling out a range of new products focused on active ingredients, including its latest vitamin C launch, as well as its bakuchiol Moon Fruit Serum, which launched this week.For this Glossy Beauty Podcast, Kummerow joined us from his home base in Hawaii to talk about Herbivore's founding story, growth and next steps. He shared details on how Herbivore went from a homemade brand to being stocked in top national retailers, how it's approached sustainability, and where he predicts beauty is headed. 

After 26-years in business, Greek beauty brand Korres has a rich history to tell.Korres began as a homeopathic herbal remedy brand within a Greek pharmacy that was founded by George Korres in 1992. In 1996, the beauty brand was born, and it has since built up a portfolio of skin care, body care and fragrance products. They include staple Greek ingredients like olive oil, Greek yogurt, white pine and Assyrtiko, a white grape variety from the Greek island of Santorini.After first selling through Henri Bendel department store in 2000, Korres relaunched in the U.S. market in 2018 with a digital-first approach. This shortly followed Morgan Stanley’s investment of over $56 million into Korres in Nov. 2017, allowing the brand to push further into international markets. More recently, in Jan. 2021, the 26-year-old brand entered Ulta Beauty stores through the retailer’s Conscious Beauty program, following its Ulta.com launch in Dec. 2020. Korres is also sold at Sephora, HSN and Dermstore,With Ulta Beauty, the Korres team hopes to reach Gen-Z customers, which is a big focus for the beauty brand. Additionally, Korres plans to set up livestream shopping on its DTC e-commerce site in April. The goal is to better control its brand story and introduce people to its history as a Greek apothecary-pharmacy brand, while focusing on ingredient harvesting within Greece, in-house formulations and productions.“My vision is not to sit here and tell a story. My vision is to bring people in,” said Lena Korres, Korres co-founder and gm of North America, on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty podcast. “That’s why livestream shopping and being able to show things and introduce people [to Korres] and [let them] ask questions [is important]. That’s where I see our brand heading toward and making a difference.”In 2020, Korres earned $30 million in U.S. sales and $97 million globally. Korres expected to earn $120 million in 2021 global sales, she said, in a Glossy Jan. 2021 story.