The Glossy Beauty Podcast

When Harry's was founded in 2012, co-founders Jeff Raider and Andy Katz-Mayfield were trying to connect the dots between quality razors, affordable prices and a brand that could connect with consumers."I can tell you exactly where it was' it was a Rite Aid on 14th and Wilshire in Santa Monica, California. I had run out of razor blades and was wandering through the store, looking for somebody to unlock the case, because they were locked away," said Katz-Mayfield, regarding the brand's inspiration. on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "They're locked away because they're so expensive and they get shoplifted all the time. It was this absurd experience. ... I was looking at the shelf and the brands that were on the shelf, and they didn't speak to me as a consumer. There was like a picture of a razor blade flying over the moon on one of the packages. Obviously, what the brand was trying to communicate was, 'Oh, there's all this space-age technology in this thing, and therefore you should pay $25 for a four-pack of razor blades.' But I was like, 'Should I really, though?'"Katz-Mayfield Gchatted Raider, who had recently co-founded Warby Parker, another early DTC disruptor. The two met while in college as consulting interns at Bain & Company."We say he called me a lot, but actually, he Gchatted me. I was at work, and he said, 'Hey, I had this really bad experience in a drugstore, being overcharged for razor blades by these brands that don't really connect with me. Do you think you could take what you learned at Warby Parker, building [a] brand that people love, trying to do good in the world and for customers, and bring design and style to an industry that might have lacked it before, in razors and razor blades?' I remember reading that and thinking, 'Wow, this is an awesome opportunity,'" said Raider. Though the brand is just nine years old, Raider and Katz-Mayfield have lived many lives with Harry's. The brand has gone from a best-in-class startup to an acquisition target and the focus of the Federal Trade Commission, to now a different type of parent company that acquires and incubates its own brands. Those have included Lume and Cat Person."What Harry's and Flamingo both did was they found an unmet consumer need, an opportunity to do something that was actually better for somebody. … It started with delivering really high-quality products at a great value, and then also speaking to people how they wanted to be spoken to in these categories," said Raider. "We felt like we had the opportunity to build brands and unique products that differentially meet consumers' needs and do it on DTC. That could actually be applied anywhere in CPG."

As the barrier to founding a beauty brand is lower than ever, there is also more opportunity to spot the next big thing earlier in brands' life cycles.Private equity firm True Beauty Ventures "was really born out of a frustration ... and being restricted on the types of businesses [we] could invest in," said TBV co-founder and general partner Cristina Nuñez on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.Nuñez, the former gm and COO of Clark's Botanicals, had been approached by her co-founder, Rich Gersten, about building a beauty- and wellness-specific firm that could invest at the earliest stage. "[Prior, Rich] couldn't invest in any brand without a minimum check of $10 [million] or $20 million," she said.True Beauty Ventures' sweet spot is between the $1 million and $3 million check size, and it has the goal of further supporting brands with more capital as they grow. Since founding True Beauty Ventures at the height of the pandemic, Nuñez and Gersten have invested in emerging brands like K18, Maude and Crown Affair, and best-in-class brands further along in their journey like Moon Juice.

When reviewing the beauty landscape, there are increasingly fewer companies that are built as family businesses. Today, the market skews heavily toward building a company and selling it at a faster-than-ever clip. Though deal flow continues to be hot, NuFace's founders Carol Cole and her daughters, Tera Peterson and Kim Morales, are focused on building their brand while keeping themselves at the helm for as long as possible."My mom, my sister and I started NuFace back in 2005. My mom's been an esthetician since the 1980s. After business school, I decided to go to esthetician school. We created our first device out of our family home in Leucadia, which is a little beach community of Encinitas [outside] San Diego," said Peterson on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.Since founding the brand 17 years ago, NuFace has sold over 4 million devices. Peterson added that NuFace is up 24% in sell-through for 2022. The device category is typically a difficult market to create ongoing value, but NuFace has also avoided the fate of competitors, which saw initial buzz and interaction with their brands but never saw the repeat purchase."The innovation is key; that's where typical devices fail," she said. "They go, 'OK, I'm gonna do X and then I'm going to launch this completely non-related other device." Like, what are you? Are you cleansing? Are you microdermabrasion? It really confuses people, and that's where other devices have really struggled. They don't stay true to themselves."

There is no telling if beauty has reached its peak celebrity brand moment. But Lisa Sequino, co-founder and CEO of JLo Beauty, said that doesn't matter; her company doesn't solely trade on Jennifer Lopez's famous persona. In fact, Sequino said JLo Beauty is as much about pro-living as it is about Lopez."Over the past four years, at my old seat [at Estée Lauder Companies] — where I would sit and look at brands to potentially acquire [and see] where the market is going, where the customer is going — I always went to the same conclusion," said Sequino on the most recent episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "Most companies are focused on a certain customer who's younger, [ages] 18-25. They ignored the subset, which I became part of: the power 40- to 50-year-old. To me, [that consumer] is at the peak of their power."At 53, Lopez is arguably the most famous person exuding that power, making the thread of skin care and aging all the more impactful for JLo Beauty. Since launching in January 2021, the line, which is sold at Sephora and its own e-commerce site, has tripled in size, said Sequino. And it has over 1% market share."Any brand, whether it's celebrity or not, if it doesn't have a strong connection or reason for being with the consumer, it's not going to be as successful," said Sequino. "For us, one thing that rises to the top for Jennifer is her authenticity, in the sense of never giving up but also having a tremendous sense of self-worth, which took a long time for her to have and many of us can relate to. It's about making a discernible transformation in people's lives with an amazing product that works hard, feels good and makes a difference."Below are additional highlights from the conversation, which have been lightly edited for clarity.

While health tracking devices are not new, Ōura, best known for its $300 Oura Ring, has somehow seamlessly bridged the worlds of technology, wellness and design, so much so that Kim Kardashian, Jack Dorsey and Prince Harry are all fans. That unlock happened largely due to the ring’s focus on sleep, according to Oura CEO Tom Hale.“Most fitness wellness trackers are oriented around ‘get more activity,’ ‘get going’ and ‘get out there,’ and we’re like, ‘Hey, relax and recover, make sure that you’re well-rested,'” Hale said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.CMO Karina Kogan agreed, “There is now a movement in culture, a move away from sick care to self-care. Historically, when you think about tracking anything in your health people tended to count calories and count steps. It was all about weight loss,” she said. “Now, consumers are thinking about longevity. They’re thinking about their immunity. They’re thinking about how can I live longer.”Ōura, the Finnish parent company of the Oura ring, launched in 2013 and on Kickstarter no less. While the original Oura ring was bulker in design, much like any piece of technology, the ring became sleeker and more technologically enabled. To date, the company has sold nearly 1.5 million rings and has a $2.55 billion valuation.This week, the company launches its latest innovation, the Oura Gen3 Horizon which is reminiscent of a wedding ring and comes in a rose gold finish. It continues to track Ōura’s hallmarks such as daytime and live heart rate, advanced temperature sensing, blood oxygen sensing, all while providing consumers more options.Below are additional highlights from the conversation, which have been lightly edited for clarity.A culture shiftKogan: “It’s all it’s a broadening the definition of health, so it’s not just about how many steps you took and how many calories you burned. It’s also about how well you slept, how much time you spent in REM or deep sleep, how much stress you’re undergoing, whether it’s physical stress or emotional stress, it’s about tuning into other aspects, other biometrics or biomarkers. I think consumers are very comfortable with metrics and there’s a certain gamification to scores. Oura gives you three daily scores, your readiness, sleep score and your activity, and those help guide you. The range of metrics that consumers are looking at are expanding, consumers want to optimize their life”Future-proofing for uncertaintyHale: “[With] all the things that are going on in the world today, Covid, a war, more economic upset, inflation, all the things, I think our mission is more important than ever because people are stressed out more than they’ve ever been. If we can do our part to help people understand where they are, meet them where they are, and provide them support for where they are, that’s immensely rewarding. It’s not about some giant outcome. It’s about doing good for the people of this planet, who are right now facing some really, really stressful times.”

Mara Beauty founder Allison McNamara was surrounded by beauty growing up — her father Michael McNamara is a longstanding executive in the space. But beauty wasn't an obvious career path for her, at least not at first."I was actually a television host and reporter before doing Mara," said McNamara, on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "I worked at Popsugar, and for a long time, I did everything from fashion to beauty to entertainment, and hosted a show that was taken from digital to linear television. … I thought I was going to be the next Ryan Seacrest."After that show got canceled, McNamara had a rethink, which led her to revisit her childhood notebooks. There, she found page after page of beauty brand and product ideas."I thought of the idea for Mara and I didn't know what would become of it," she said. "I went on the journey of creating the business but had no true intention of like, 'I'm going to build this type of brand.' It happened organically," she said.Mara Beauty officially launched in 2018, DTC first before launching in Credo. In the four years since, McNamara has been sure to keep a thoughtful eye on what she delivers: new, innovative luxury products with a clear sustainability component. "When I started the business, it was a side hustle. Now it's become a true business, which is really exciting. But at the same time, I have such a clear idea of the products I want to create and where I want to go."

When co-founders and partners Matthew Herman and David Kien started developing Boy Smells, they weren't exactly sure they had a brand. In fact, Herman said the process of making candles in their living room in 2016 was a side hustle. Both Herman and Kien were working in fashion at the time; Herman was a designer at Nasty Gal and Kien worked in production at The Elder Statesman."We didn't have a ton of high aspirations for the brand when we first started it because we really wanted it to be a recreational little side hustle. It was in years two and three that we really started to get serious. We left our jobs. We were running the entire business out of the living room, then it was the living room and kitchen, and then the living room, kitchen and sunroom. All of a sudden, there was inventory in the hallways," said Herman on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.While "genderful" Boy Smells launched at Sephora this month, it first launched into retail via independent stores like Boy George in Austin and now closed Barneys New York, positioning the line as for a fashion savvy person but sold at a more accessible price. Equally thoughtful is the brand's perspective on collaborations. After the runway success of Boy Smells' Slowburn candle with singer-songwriter Kacey Musgraves, it would have been easy for the team to take a rinse and repeat mentality to other partnerships. But Herman said whoever Boy Smells works with has to represent what Boy Smells is all about, which led the brand to its latest work with Grace Jones.In essence, Hermand said, "[We asked ourselves], 'If we could choose one person that represents our genderful values and who we are as a brand, who would we want to work with?' And we went after that person, who is not the person that the digital people who want to inform every decision about ... audience reach or whatever [would choose]. We went after the person that we really felt represented our brand values," said Herman.

The beauty industry is filled with experts, dermatologists, aestheticians and makeup artists, all trying to leverage their expertise in an increasingly crowded market. But the cosmetic chemist — the person who formulates products and oversees development — has long stayed behind the scenes. That changed when Ron Robinson debuted his skin-care brand, BeautyStat, where he is founder and CEO.After working as a cosmetic chemist at nearly all of the major beauty companies — including Estée Lauder Companies, Avon, Revlon and L’Oréal, for 25 years — Robinson decided to strike out on his own upon arming himself with compelling data. Robinson saw that there was a lack of stabilized vitamin C serums on the market and simultaneously saw strong Google search data for vitamin C. Thus, BeautyStat debuted with its hero product, the Universal C Skin Refiner in 2019, which Hailey Bieber now calls her “Holy Grail.” The brand, which started as a pure play DTC company, is sold at Violet Grey, Nordstom and Dermstore. Earlier this year, it launched in Ulta Beauty, where it is expanding nationwide.While Robinson was at ease formulating high-quality products, he didn’t expect to be such a forward-facing founder.“I had no idea that I would have that type of consumer reception,” said Robinson on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. “I launched the brand with content creators and influencers being the face of the brand, but every time I stepped out in front of the camera and I showed consumers, ‘Hey, this is our vitamin C, this is why it’s important to use, this is why you need a stable form,’ consumers listened in. They asked questions, they were intrigued. They wanted to try it, they wanted to buy it.”

When Andrew Stanleick left Coty in February to become president and CEO of The Beauty Health Co., the parent company of Hydrafacial, some in the beauty industry were surprised. Stanleick was responsible for much of Coty’s recent turnaround, including the revamp of Covergirl, as well as leading the company’s joint ventures with Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics and Kim Kardashian West’s KKW Beauty. In other words, he had a dream job. But then again, the role of public beauty CEO doesn’t come up often.“I turned 50 last year, and I think what I realized was that it was a real milestone; I wanted to build and create a company and take it internationally, really leverage all of those experiences I’ve garnered from living all over the world and use that to build a company, a culture and a brand,” said Stanleick on the most recent episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. “Truth be told, I hadn’t heard of HydraFacial, which … I think you know, [awareness is] our biggest opportunity.”Though Stanleick has only been at the company for six months, The Beauty Health Co. has seen impressive results in his tenure — namely, the organization’s first $100 million-plus revenue quarter. Additionally, Hydrafacial has been thinking outside the box with partnerships, including with Galeries Lafayette and Jennifer Lopez’s JLo Beauty.But as Stanleick explained, there’s much more he wants to accomplish. “We feel we’re just at the start of this journey ahead of us,” he said.

Like many beauty entrepreneurs, Rachel Roff, founder and CEO of Urban Skin Rx, came up with the idea for her brand after a workplace epiphany. As a trained aesthetician, she discovered that the tried-and-true treatments found in dermatology and aesthetics environments were not suited for darker skin tones.“When it came time for me to do practicals [hands-on experience to graduate and receive a license], you have to service friends and family. I would bring in my group of friends and family, many of whom had melanin-rich skin. I would get from teachers, ‘Don’t do this, don’t do that. Darker skin burns so easily. We have to keep it very basic,” Roff said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.Unsatisfied with the limited skin-care solutions that were offered for people of color, Roff opened the Urban Skin Solutions Medical Spa in 2006 in Charlotte, North Carolina. After seeing demand in that environment, Roff spun out the Urban Skin Rx brand in 2010 to serve more people. Today, it is sold in Target, Walmart and Ulta Beauty.Part of its more recent success was largely due to a viral TikTok moment in 2020. An unpaid influencer posted a before-and-after of the brand’s hero cleansing bar that forever changed the brand’s trajectory. Last year, Urban Skin Rx hit $30 million in sales.“One day at the office, my head of e-commerce [was like], our sales are triple what they should be at noon,” she said. “This girl ended up emailing us and was like, ‘Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I posted this on my TikTok, and it’s now at like a million views.’ We were not on TikTok at this point as a company,” she said. “It really has been a wild ride since, even to this day, the positive and negative effects of that moment will have forever changed our brand. It has given me a lot of life lessons as a leader, as a CEO, on what I would do if it happened again.”