The Glossy Beauty Podcast

It hasn't been the best year to start a whole new venture in beauty. But Victoria Beckham Beauty has done just that, launching in September 2019 and already tackling a huge market that brands with less star power might hesitate to tackle: China.Co-founder and CEO Sarah Creal (formerly of Estée Lauder) pointed to China's claim to have "the most advanced social media" as one of the big attractions to the region. "It will inform the rest of our digital strategy in the other parts of the world where we sell," Creal said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. Despite retail interest, the brand is sold exclusively online.Victoria Beckham Beauty is primarily selling skin care in China, alongside a few makeup items on Tmall, the Alibaba-owned e-commerce platform."We are seeing upticks in eye makeup, and that makes sense because of the mask-wearing," Creal said.The pandemic has meant an uncertain forecast for growth in the direct-to-consumer company's first full calendar year. But sales have grown by double digits in recent months, said Creal. "And I don't see that slowing down. I only see that increasing." Three-quarters of customers have returned to make a purchase, she said.

For skincare brand Youth To The People, the death of retail comes to what kind of store you're running. "I think the luxury stores, the specific stores, will actually do really well because people will want that customized, very succinct experience," said co-founder Joe Cloyes on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "Whereas I think the bigger stores, people are realizing how easy it is to buy online."The company's own pop-up store in Los Angeles, which only lasted a few months until January of this year, was in the former camp, said Cloyes. He and his cousin (and fellow co-founder) Greg Gonzalez are still planning on opening their own space at a later date.Youth To The People also sells through Sephora, it's biggest partner, but "we want people to come in and generally walk into something unique," Gonzalez said. "When you walk into a strong retail environment, especially one that's specific to a brand, you feel the essence of that brand. You know it. There's something specific you can call out."

Cara Sabin joined Sundial Brands as its CEO last December. That was when the coronavirus pandemic was a regional story rather than a global one, and before months of social unrest would renew the challenge for companies to hire and serve diverse groups."We are so fully in support of these conversations around supporting Black founders and businesses," Sabin said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "At SheaMoisture, we developed what we call a 'Shea List' -- a listing of over 100 businesses that we admire, first and foremost, but that we've also personally invested in to help cultivate and help them grow." SheaMoisture also announced a $1 million fund for founders of color.In addition to SheaMoisture, Sundial's brands include Nubian Heritage, Madam C.J. Walker and Nyakio. Sundial Brands was acquired by Unilever in 2017.One brand Sundial Brands recently partnered with is Brown Girl Jane, which was founded by three Black women. "Through that partnership, we're encouraging consumers to take the 'Brown Girl Swap' pledge, where they take five of their existing beauty products and swap them for products that are founded by Black women," Sabin said.

The pandemic has made Ulta Beauty's most progressive goals tougher to reach, but the beauty retailer's president, Dave Kimbell, doesn't want to put them on hold."Increasingly, guests of all ages and all types are making choices based on their values," Kimbell said on this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.This is coming to life most dynamically in Ulta's Conscious Beauty platform, which debuts fully in October and focuses on "five pillars:" "clean ingredients, cruelty-free, vegan, sustainable packaging and positive impact," Kimbell said.Sustainable packaging is the one Ulta Beauty (and the industry as a whole, according to Kimbell) can flex on most. "We probably have the most runway ahead of us to drive greater change and have a more positive impact as it relates to packaging," Kimbell said. Last month. Ulta announced that by 2025, half of its in-store packaging will be either recycled, bio-sourced, recyclable or refillable.As for economic headwinds, Kimbell is optimistic that beauty will enjoy a rebound after the end of the pandemic."There will be in some ways I think a new renaissance in beauty, a new resurgence in beauty," Kimbell said.

Before joining Sephora, Sol de Janeiro's premium body products had another retailer stumped. "They said, 'You know, we don't know what to do with you guys,' recalled Heela Yang, one of the company's three founders and its CEO, on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. The company's butt cream, foot cream and body hair lightener put them apart from brands in beauty. "And then she said, 'You know, I think Sephora might be really into you guys.' And she was right."Yang founded the company with Camila Pierotti and Marc Capra in 2015. It partnered with Sephora the following year, going into stores nationwide weeks after its Bum Bum Cream for the derrière and its foot cream performed well on Sephora's site.A few years ago, Yang said, it was unclear whether the market for upscale products for the body was even sustainable. "If we had made a decision based on the size of the premium body care category back then, we probably wouldn't have launched this brand," she said.According to Yang, the company started with the idea of sharing Brazil's inclusive beauty culture before it started a product line. Yang lived in Brazil for a time (as did Capra), and Pierotti is from Rio de Janeiro. "There is something that starts in the beach culture of Rio -- that beauty is not any sort of universal standard to achieve, it is a feeling. Feeling comfortable in your own skin and feeling happy in your own skin. Brazilians love taking care of their bodies," said Pierotti.In the months since the Covid-19 pandemic went global, Sol de Janeiro has pivoted from in-person promotion of its products and events to a DTC-focused model. Its first fragrance, launched in mid-March just as the world came to a halt, had to be quickly shipped back from Sephora stores to fulfill online orders. But, the company's digital business is three times what it was last year, Yang said, and now makes up almost half of its total business.

Skin care isn't just for the face, according to Nécessaire co-founder Randi Christiansen. Christiansen founded the company with Nécessaire co-founder Nick Axelrod in 2018 and debuted digitally first. Their original lineup of clean products -- a curated assortment of body washes, body lotions and sex gels -- was quite unorthodox for the beauty industry just two years ago."Nick and I really felt philosophically that skin doesn't stop at the neck," she said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast.Christiansen saw a gap in how much money people were willing to spend on skin care for the face, as well as for their favorite matchas. "It was very clear to both of us that there was just room for what we call real ingredients in body," Christiansen said.Nécessaire's now expanded product line <a href="https://www.glossy.co/beauty/clean-beauty-brands-revert-to-self-care-focused-marketing">entered Sephora.com last month</a>, and pandemic permitting, will debut in its stores in August. The company plans to grow 300% to 400% this year, Christiansen said, in part thanks to this new relationship with Sephora.

The age of ongoing confinement seems tailor-made for the industry's clean beauty segment."We couldn't be in a more timely position in terms of what we've been pushing for as a brand," said Kosas founder Sheena Yaitanes on this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.Kosas launched in 2015 with lipstick before moving on to a full clean color assortment. It recently flexed its personal care muscle by debuting deodorant. The company closed a series B in January, on the tail of revenue in the $50 million to $60 million range in 2019. It's expected to triple that business, according to previous reporting by Glossy."I have long believed that the look of beauty was changing. I have long felt alienated from the beauty conversation when you're talking about a makeup routine that requires 15 products or an hour and a half. And I'm a makeup lover, so I know I'm not alone," Yaitanes said.

Some beauty products trickle down from medical use to everyday consumers by happenstance, but Augustinus Bader's skincare line is the opposite, according to the company's CEO Charles Rosier.Rosier first learned about Professor Augustinus Bader's research around a "wound gel" in a case study involving a young burn victim. "Basically, using that wound gel [Augustinus] was able to prevent skin graft and scarring to that child," Rosier said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "I was really shocked that the thing could exist, but was not widely available."As Bader -- a professor of stem cell biology at Germany's University of Leipzig -- told Rosier then, he felt that pharmaceutical companies weren't as willing to fund clinical trials because "the number of cases of burned people in the Western world was not so high. Most cases are actually in the third world," he said. "For a pharmaceutical group, it's not necessarily the most valuable customer."Rosier decided to step in and co-found a consumer-centric version of the company in 2018. He thought a skincare brand could help fuel Bader's greater work -- "he's the brain doing the research, I'm the guy behind the scenes," he said. The line has gone on to earn accolades among Hollywood celebrities for its rejuvenating effect, not just its medical expertise. That was by design -- in lieu of a pricy marketing campaigns or influencers, the company distributed samples through a personal connection in Los Angeles in its early days.Since then, Augustinus Bader has slowly added new products to its line-up to complement its cult status "The Cream" and "The Rich Cream," which retail for $265. The company expects to earn $70 million in 2020, up from an estimated $24 million in 2019 -- but Rosier doesn't see the company putting dozens of products on store shelves (or online, where it makes most of its sales), despite the demand."We can't lie about it. That product is efficient on its own and it nourishes the skin cells' environment so your skin cells make the right decision," Rosier said.

Credo is betting that customers stuck at home are as beauty-minded as always, but that more than ever, they now have the time to do their research about clean beauty."Health is what anyone is thinking about right now," Credo co-founder Annie Jackson said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "I think if we didn't have a customer before this and we do now, it's because she's really understanding that investment in health -- really educating herself on certain chemicals and how they could impact health or the environment."Credo carries items from about 135 brands, according to Jackson, and incentivizes them with "more kudos and marketing" to create transparent packaging -- and to stay away from what Credo considers less-than-clean substances.Still Jackson doesn't think of clean beauty as an exclusive part of the market anymore. Case in point: the retailer's latest collaboration with Ulta. She talked about the benefits of partnering with Ulta , consumer trends during the pandemic and just how many product submissions Credo entertains on a monthly basis.

Millions of Americans are still out of work as the coronavirus pandemic's ripples through the economy, and many are unlikely to return to the jobs they held a few months ago.A few companies -- including Stella & Dot, Ever and Keep -- have stepped into that vacuum, offering gig economy work for people willing and able to sell cosmetics, clothes and fashion accessories."We really started growing when unemployment was at 8 and 9%. And in some ways you could say the growth of our business was somewhat counter-cyclical, because when people had a greater financial need, not only did you see more people join, but you saw the people that did join work more and earn more," Stella & Dot founder and CEO Jessica Herrin said on the Glossy Podcast of the 2008 final crisis.The company counts about 30,000 "ambassadors," though the number of people actively selling on a monthly basis is between 8,000 and 10,000, according to Herrin.Prior to Covid-19, Stella & Dot, Ever and Keep went through a $50 million tech revamp to connect sellers with a digital platform (inspired by Shopify, Pinterest and Polyvore) allowing them to set up a curated selection of products -- a storefront, essentially -- which they can then email or text to customers.That foresight has been key to surviving as a business during coronavirus."Browse commerce is just done," Herrin said. "Who wants to go to a website and search and come up with a thousand options and look for reviews that may or not be real, rather than get a curated assortment texted to you with personalized recommendations?"