The Glossy Beauty Podcast

When Idris and Sabrina Elba, husband and wife, launched their gender-neutral skin-care brand, S’able Labs, in July 2022, it was just ahead of the boom in celebrity beauty launches. The brand had been in development for over a year, born during the height of the Covid-19 era. The impetus was an Instagram Live series the couple started together called "Together Tuesdays," in which they talked about couples. The idea of S’able Labs is that skin care is genderless and something that couples can share. Growing up in Vancouver, Canada and experiencing acne as a teenager, Sabrina Elba became a beauty aficionado from an early period. But the co-founder of S’able Labs said she also struggled as the only Black person in high school and felt the lack of representation in beauty, too. “My relationship with beauty early on felt a lot like an investment on my part into brands that weren't investing in me,” she said. “I had a complete misunderstanding about how to care for melanated skin. But it wasn't only because I wasn't surrounded by people who looked like me, but it was also because the beauty industry didn't cater to people who looked like me.” As her relationship and eventual marriage to Idris Elba blossomed, Sabrina was exposed to a more entrepreneurial culture and mindset, which eventually translated into S’able Labs. Today, the brand is just over 1 year old and sells five products ranging from $28-$50 through its e-commerce site and SpaceNK. Zooming in from Camden, London, joined the Glossy Beauty Podcast to discuss how the Instagram Live series inspired the brand, what it’s like operating a celebrity brand and what it means to be a melanin-inclusive brand.

Sravya Adusumilli, the founder of Mango People, never thought she would become a makeup brand founder. But, after spending her academic career in a chemistry lab, she found she preferred being an entrepreneur. Mango People is Sephora’s first Ayurvedic-inspired makeup brand, selling via Sephora.com. Mango People products include a bronzer stick, a highlighter stick and a multi-stick for cheek, lip and eye application. After becoming unsatisfied with the lipsticks she used, Adusumilli developed the brand around 2017 while she was a college student studying chemical engineering. After a series of experimentations, which included accidentally dying her mother’s kitchen pink, Adusumilli finally created the Multi-Stick, which sells for $27. “Being a broke college student, I could barely afford to like get one makeup product, let alone several,” said Adusumilli. “That's how the idea of the Multi-Stick came to be; I focused on having safe ingredients on your eyes, cheeks and lips. And all you need is five minutes to look put together, which is all I had at the time.” The hero ingredient, mango butter, helped inspire the name, as did the popularity of South Asian countries, many of which practice Ayurveda. Ayurveda is an alternative medicine system with historical roots in the Indian subcontinent. Popular therapies include yoga and therapeutic oils and ingredients like ashwagandha, ginger and turmeric. Adusumilli joined the Glossy Beauty podcast to discuss how she created the brand, how her chemical engineering background is a boon to entrepreneurship and what it means to be the first Ayurvedic makeup brand at Sephora.

When Jerrod Blandino and Jeremy Johnson first launched Too Faced back in 1998, the beauty startup world was a whole different game. Over the decades, the co-founders powered through all the big changes in the beauty industry, from the rise of Sephora to the onset of the influencer era. After Estée Lauder Companies acquired Too Faced in 2016, Blandino and Johnson are at it again with a new company and two brand launches. Their new makeup brand, Polite Society, was unveiled on August 27 with Ulta Beauty as its retail partner. It joins the roster of Blandino and Johnson's new parent company, Toy Box Brands, which also recently unveiled jewelry-cleaner brand Diamond Drunk. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, the business partners share the history of their careers with Too Faced, as well as all the details on the new beauty brand, including the new products, the clean ingredients focus and the brand positioning. Related reads: Sephora accelerates clean makeup push ‘More creative’: Why Too Faced is letting influencers produce its campaigns

It's no secret that natural deodorant gets a bad rap. Clean beauty consumers looking for brands that leave out ingredients such as aluminum have long complained of having trouble finding something that works. These frustrations were what inspired Sarah Moret to found body-care brand Curie in 2018. Aluminum-free deodorant has come a long way since then, as Curie’s latest news shows: The brand launched into 4,300 Walmart locations nationwide on August 22. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Moret tells the story of the early days of the brand and the pivots she made along the way, including the introduction of hand sanitizer when deodorant buying fell off a cliff during the pandemic lockdowns. She also talked about her experience on the hit show "Shark Tank," and why it was as good for exposure as it was for fundraising.

Patrick Ta has come a long way from the MAC counter, where he started working over 12 years ago in Scottsdale, Arizona. Today, the brand founder and full-time makeup artist travels the country creating looks for Gigi Hadid, Sydney Sweeney, Camila Cabello and Alix Earle, among other well-known names. He often documents the process or the finished looks for his following of 3.4 million on Instagram and 1.2 million on TikTok. In 2019, Ta launched his namesake brand with a small array of products including a body oil, a lip gloss, a face mist and a fan to set the makeup in place. Since then, the brand has expanded to foundation, blush, contour, lipliner, lipsticks and a brow collection. In the past few months, Ta has been active on TikTok, documenting a TikTok tour of sorts that took him from Alix Earle's Miami dorm room to Bretman Rock's Paris Fashion Week suite to his own hometown of L.A. for stops with Glamzilla, Kensington Tillo (aka @kensnation) and Patrick Starrr. In this month's Glossy Pop edition of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, Ta speaks about how he made it as a celebrity makeup artist, what celebrity makeup artists owe to the Kardashians and how Earle changed his perspective on TikTok. Related stories: Patrick Ta, Ashley Tisdale, Susan Yara and Glamzilla on leveraging a viral moment ‘It was easier for Kylie Jenner’: Makeup artist Patrick Ta on the launch of his brand and plans for expansion

Back in the day, the men’s grooming category was synonymous with shaving products. But not anymore. The rising acceptance of facial hair has led to a boom in beard-care products. Take Scotch Porter, for example. On top of the fact that it's the top-selling beard-care brand at Target, its beard conditioning balm is the No. 2 best-selling product in the retailer's entire men’s care category. “Beards have the staying power,” said Scotch Porter founder Calvin Quallis on this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. Investors agree that beard care is big business, as well. The brand’s $11 million dollar Series B round was led by Pendulum, a firm founded by the Obamas' financial advisor. The brand is now expanding into body care, skin care and fragrance. In the episode, Quallis shares the founding story of the brand, which emerged from the popular barbershop he founded to serve as a hub for both hair care and events ranging from performances to political debates. He also talks about men’s care trends and the brand’s bet on new categories such as fragrance and skin care. Related reads: Men’s grooming sales pick up momentum Men’s brands remain ‘bullish on beards’ The mustache makes its comeback: How brands are getting on board

We all know that there are diehard skin-care enthusiasts out there who spend hours researching the ingredients. In 2021, Emily DiDonato and Christina Uribe launched skin-care brand Covey to target the opposite of that type of customer. Instead of "skintellectuals," they’re focused on the busy millennial who doesn’t have time to go down what they call the “skin-care rabbit hole.” Both founders are bringing unique expertise to the brand. As a fashion model who has worked with countless brands including Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Givenchy, DiDonato has had firsthand experience with time-consuming skin-care routines. Uribe, meanwhile, is still working full-time at Google, which offers her firsthand knowledge of the process of researching search trends to find what beauty shoppers want. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, DiDonato and Uribe discuss the founding story of the brand, the Covey lip balm that went viral on TikTok, and the state of mainstream consumer awareness about popular skin-care trends like vitamin C and SPF.

In the past, most of the celebrity hairstylists that launched their own salons and hair-care lines were men. That’s been changing, as more female celebrity stylists are becoming founders. Mara Roszak is a member of this new generation shaking up the hair-care market. You’ve probably seen her styling work on Natalie Portman, Emma Stone, Michelle Yeoh, Olivia Wilde or Zoe Saldana on the red carpet. When she’s not doing celebrity looks, she runs her salon, Mare, and her new hair-care line, Rōz, which launched in 2021. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Roszak shares the story of how she got started working with celebrities and how that led her to found her own brand. She also discusses the processes of coming up with silicone-free formulations and ensuring the efficacy needed for celebrity public appearances. And finally, she talks about how she's approaching sustainable packaging, and where she’s putting her focus during the ongoing WGA and SAG strikes.

In 2022, Chriselle Lim and Ben Bennett, re-launched Phlur, a dormant "clean" fragrance brand at the time, with Ben Bennett. Bennett is the founder of the brand incubator The Center, which is behind Saltair, Naturium and Make Beauty. The brand was a near-instant success, with its first fragrance, Missing Person, going viral on TikTok. That year, Lim was named to the annual Glossy 50, a list of people who made a mark on the fashion or beauty industry. Last week, Lim launched the brand's ninth new fragrance, Father Figure. It launched with a splashy campaign featuring some of Lim's notable, powerful female friends, including influencer Aimee Song; founder of Make, Carrie Barber; founder of Arrae, Siffat Haider; co-CEO of Baby2Baby, Kelly Sawyer; and stylist Monica Rose. Lim is also heavily featured in the campaign imagery, alongside phrases like, "I'll be your Daddy," and "One week they love me. Next week they hate me. Both weeks I got paid." In this monthly Glossy Pop edition of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, Lim speaks about Phlur's boom of a relaunch and newest perfume, and her journey from college vlogger to mega-influencer.

In a timely Glossy Beauty Podcast episode for the height of summer, this week features a category that has blown up in beauty: sunscreen. Long gone are the days when options were limited to a handful of brands like Coppertone and Hawaiian Tropic. In recent years, a wide range of chic new sunscreen labels have been hitting the market, while skin-care brands are churning out new SPF product launches. One of these hip new brands is one-year-old Dune Suncare, which uses a colorful, nostalgic aesthetic to appeal to both men and women across all age groups. This week’s episode features the brand’s co-founders, Emily Doyle, an event production and marketing pro, and Mei Kwok, who also produces events and performs as a highly sought-after DJ. The founders have created a cool factor for the brand by working with luxury hotels, including QR codes to Kwok’s playlists in its packaging, and shooting campaigns with top fashion photographers. But its distribution plan is all about accessibility as they focus on scaling through wholesale partners including Amazon and Ulta Beauty.

When Snapchat first tapped into the power of augmented reality circa 2015, no one understood how impactful it would be to the social media platform and the beauty industry. Snapchat's “Lens” feature was introduced in 2015. This feature, powered by augmented reality technology, allows users to change how they and the world around them look. But it wasn’t until at least 2017 that the beauty industry started to catch up through independent providers like Modiface, which was later acquired by L'Oréal Group in 2018. To help further Snapchat’s relationship with the beauty and fashion industries and promote its AR strategy, Snapchat hired Rajni Jacques, head of fashion and beauty partnerships at Snapchat, to lead the charge. Jacques joined the social media platform in April 2021 from her previous role as fashion director at Teen Vogue and Allure. Jacques has been in the editorial world for the last two decades, holding positions at InStyle, Glamour, Nylon, The Fader, Vibe and Honey. Jacques sat down with Liz Flora, Glossy’s West Coast correspondent and host of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, to chat about all things augmented reality, Gen Z and the ways both play into beauty.

The star of Netflix’s "Queer Eye," Jonathan Van Ness has captivated a massive fan base as a comedian, best-selling author and podcast host with a prolific social media presence. But he definitely hasn’t forgotten about hair. Nearly two years ago, he added hair-care brand founder to his expanding resume with the launch of JVN Hair. For this episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Van Ness was joined by Teresa Lo, JVN Hair’s global vp and gm who has been with the brand from the start. Topics covered include Van Ness’s career journey, JVN Hair's founding story and the products’ unique formulations, which use hemisqualane and are silicone-free. Lo also addressed whether the brand is seeing any impacts from the recent changes at its parent company, Amyris, after the company announced layoffs and the departure of its CEO last week. While Van Ness is known for his humor and positivity, he’s also outspoken when it comes to more serious topics. In this interview, he reflected on the end of a Pride Month that was rife with homophobic rhetoric.

If you are one of Mikayla Nogueira’s 14.6 million TikTok followers, then you already know that one of the app’s biggest beauty influencers is getting married this weekend. But what you may not know is that she custom-created the lipstick and liner for her big day, with E.l.f. Cosmetics. The color resulting from the collaboration, which launched on Thursday, is cheekily named “Til Death Do Us Paht,” a reference to Nogueira’s famous Boston accent. Nogueira had partnered with E.l.f. before, and, as she struggled to find a lipstick she deemed perfect for her wedding day, she decided to reach out to the brand and ask if they’d like to work on one collaboratively. Nogueira has been creating content on the app since the early days of Covid. Before becoming a full-time creator, she worked at Ulta Beauty. She has done product collaborations with brands including the indie makeup brand Glamlite and skin-care brand Glow Recipe, and has partnered on sponsored posts for brands including Charlotte Tilbury, L’Oréal, Maybelline, Rael and RoC. In an April 2022 Glossy story, we reported on Nogueira’s ability to sell out a beauty product or catapult it into virality. In late January, Nogueira was at the center of a TikTok controversy around a L’Oréal mascara ad she posted: She was accused of wearing false lashes in the “after” footage demonstrating the mascara’s results. After taking a few days off, Nogueira’s next video started with, “I’m sure we all know why we’ve all gathered here today. … It’s the month of love, bitches.” She never addressed the criticism further. In the monthly Glossy Pop episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Nogueira speaks to the harsh realities of being an influencer with nearly 15 million sets of eyes on her, the pros and cons of going viral (and that ubiquitous TikTok sound of her saying Kim Kardashian’s name), and the creation of her wedding-day lipstick.

If you’re familiar with skin-care brand Dieux, you probably first came across its cult eye masks that all the cool kids have been wearing on Instagram. Now with multiple products, the brand’s celebrity fans include everyone from Hailey Bieber to Harrison Ford. This week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast features an interview with Charlotte Palermino, who co-founded the brand in 2020 with Joyce de Lemos and Marta Freedman. In addition to Dieux, Palermino is known for her prolific social media presence with a fan base of over 668,000 combined followers on TikTok and Instagram. In this conversation, she talked about how her social presence blew up on TikTok when she started sharing her strong viewpoints on everything from SPF to clean beauty. The conversation also touched on how this transfers over into running what she calls a “TMI” skincare brand that gives details on ingredients and clinical trials. On the creative side, she shared the concept behind Dieux’s “God’-like branding and the customer base it calls its “Angels.”

While economic headwinds are impacting the beauty industry these days, one area that’s still going strong is fragrance. Take InterParfums, for example. It’s the fragrance company that holds the licenses for over 20 fashion and luxury goods labels including Montblanc and Jimmy Choo. The first quarter of this year was its best in its 40-year history as it reported 24% sales growth and surpassed $1 billion in sales. On this week’s podcast, InterParfums CEO and co-founder Jean Madar shared what’s driving that growth. He talked about the surge in sales that the category has been seeing globally since the pandemic began, and why fragrance is a means for a luxury brand to bring in new customers. And at a time when a new celebrity beauty brand is hitting the market virtually every week, he made it clear that InterParfums’ licensing business is still all about fashion partners. Madar gave the details on why the company has no interest in getting in on the fickle celebrity fragrance licensing business.

When Kim Chi made the finals on season 8 of "RuPaul’s Drag Race" back in 2016, fans were captivated by her stunning makeup artistry. Not long after, she became the CEO and founder of her own makeup brand, KimChi Chic Beauty. Launched in 2019 under Bespoke Beauty Brands, the incubator founded by Nyx Professional Makeup founder Toni Ko, the brand made its national retailer debut in CVS last year. On this episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Kim Chi shares how she became what she calls an “accidental drag queen” back in 2012 and learned her elaborate makeup artistry techniques with no formal training. She also talks about the founding story of the brand and the way she's leveraging it to gain traction as one of the first beauty brands on TikTok’s shopping feature. Kim Chi also uses her platform to speak out about bias and discrimination, and is vocal about the drag queen ban attempts happening across the country. Below are some excerpts from the conversation.

Luxury fragrance brands have long relied on big celebrity brand ambassadors and traditional ad formats. Niche fragrance brands, however, are moving away from traditional strategies and finding major success on their own terms. For fragrance house Maison Francis Kurkdjian, the Baccarat Rouge 540 has earned cult status without a single official celebrity ad campaign. And despite not having partnerships, the brand has earned celebrity approval — Olivia Rodrigo wears it, and Drake has been rumored to wear it. On TikTok, the hashtag for the fragrance #baccaratrouge540 has received over 432 million views to date, and it was listed among the fragrance success highlights in parent company LVMH’s annual financial report for fiscal year 2022. On this week’s Glossy Beauty Podcast episode, the brand’s CEO, Marc Chaya, joins Glossy West Coast correspondent Liz Flora to share the story of the brand’s growth. He talks about how he co-founded the brand with perfumer Francis Kurkdjian and the ways in which the brand is disrupting traditional gender norms in fragrance. He also goes into the details of how Baccarat Rouge 540 became such a massive hit, and why the brand doesn’t work with traditional celebrity ambassadors.

Mike Einziger, the lead guitarist of the ’90s rock band Incubus, and his wife, science teacher-turned-rock violinist Ann Marie Simpson-Einziger, did not intend to start a beauty brand. Ann Marie Simpson-Einziger organically came upon her hero ingredient, a yeast-derived compound called malassezin, after being diagnosed with a harmless skin condition. The diagnosis led her to question whether something that "most people would view as a negative" could be harnessed to address common skin concerns — namely, hyperpigmentation and the common desire people have to lighten darkened patches of skin. That was over six years ago — that's how long it's taken the couple to build a team, complete extensive testing, develop a formula and bring it to testing. Plus, they fundraised to the tune of $6.2 million dollars, with key investors including The Female Founders Fund, Nyx founder Toni Ko and Paul Mitchell co-founder John Paul DeJoria. On May 9, the brand finally launched, with one product — Molecular Hero Serum — offered for sale on its e-commerce site.

Influencer brands might be common now, but that wasn’t the case half a decade ago. One of the original Instagram influencers, Marianna Hewitt launched Summer Fridays with her co-founder Lauren Ireland in 2018. As the first influencer brand at Sephora, Summer Fridays quickly became a top seller with its cult Jet Lag Mask. Funded by Prelude Growth Partners, the brand now has a full lineup of skincare and makeup products. On this week’s Glossy Beauty Podcast episode, Hewitt joined to talk about her career and how she discovered the power of Instagram early after starting out her influencer career on YouTube. She also shared strategies for going viral on social media with collabs like her Erewhon smoothie, as well as her thoughts on the most effective social platforms and formats for driving sales. While she may have gotten in on Instagram in its photo days, she discussed why the video format is the most effective sales driver on both Instagram and TikTok.

If you’ve been into a CVS lately, you’ve probably noticed that the term “drugstore beauty” doesn’t mean what it used to. Amid the conglomerate-owned giants like Maybelline and Covergirl, you can now find hip indie startups on the shelves. Behind that strategy is Andrea Harrison, the retailer's vp of merchandising for beauty and personal care. For this episode of the podcast, Harrison talked about how CVS has been experimenting with its new "Beauty IRL" store format, what beauty trends are on her radar and what CVS looks for in startup brands ready to enter a major national retailer. She also talked about what happens when a product sold at CVS goes viral on TikTok.

If you’ve noticed hair has been getting a lot more colorful in the past few years, you’re not alone. Pink, purple, blue or orange hair is no longer just for rebellious teens and rock stars. Hair dye brand Good Dye Young has been riding this wave of popularity—and helping drive it. Launched by Paramore lead singer Hayley Williams and her longtime hairstylist Brian O’Connor in 2016, the brand has been making its way into the biggest national retailers as it experiences double-digit growth. In addition to being stocked at Target and Walmart, it’s going to be launching in-store at Ulta Beauty on May 8. Hayley and Brian join this week’s Glossy Beauty Podcast to talk about the new launch and all things hair dye. They share the history of the brand and Hayley’s iconic Riot orange color, how they’re working to break down stigmas about colorful hair as it becomes more mainstream, their creative hair inspirations, their salon in Nashville that they opened last year, and more.

There are countless ways to launch a celebrity-founded skin-care brand nowadays. One can partner with an incubator (à la Peyton List and Pley Beauty), build a company within the framework of a larger conglomerate (i.e., Fenty Beauty and Rihanna with Kendo, or JVN and Jonathan Van Ness with Amyris) — or, you can build from the ground up. Some of the most successful celebrity-founded brands were birthed from the final option. They include Rare Beauty by Selena Gomez and Rhode by Hailey Bieber. Molly Sims has taken a somewhat hybrid approach to create her new skin-care line, YSE Beauty. She built her own team, tapping veterans from brands like Dr. Barbara Sturm and Poosh. However, she brought in a partner in the business, too —formulation expert and founder of SOS Beauty Charlene Valledor, who has created products for brands including Shani Darden and Patrick Ta. YSE Beauty is launching with six products, all focused on addressing hyperpigmentation, which became a major concern for Sims in her 40s — Sims will turn 50 in May. Sims has been working on the brand and its product development for the past three years, but she's been enmeshed in the beauty space for much longer. She has a weekly beauty podcast — "Lipstick On The Rim," which launched in 2021 — plus she's published beauty content on her shoppable blog, Mollysims.com, for the past seven years. Of course, she's also gained valuable beauty experience through her modeling and acting careers. The latest Pop Edition of the Glossy Beauty Podcast features Sims discussing the development of YSE.

When Wende Zomnir co-founded Urban Decay in 1996, there was no Instagram or TikTok, and Sephora was still two years out from entering the U.S. Fast forward to today, she wrapped up her tenure at Urban Decay in December and has re-entered the beauty startup game with a new brand, Caliray. Since Zomnir launched Caliray in 2021, it entered Sephora in 2022 and just secured a Series A round of funding in February this year. In the episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Zomnir discusses what’s different about launching a beauty startup in 2022, compared to the ’90s. And with Earth Day this Saturday, she goes into detail about the brand’s sustainable packaging innovations, including its new compostable bamboo eyeshadow palette.

Launching Cheekbone Beauty in 2016 was a bit of a serendipitous moment for founder Jenn Harper. It all started in Jan. 2015 when she dreamed about "Native little girls with their brown little skin and rosy cheeks, covered in lip gloss." The dream, paired with Harper's recent sobriety journey and deeper discovery about her lineage and Ojibwe culture, inspired her to create a beauty brand. The journey to becoming a beauty founder was no easy feat for Harper. Until 2016, Harper's professional career was rooted in the food industry, specifically seafood. Though she had no formal experience in beauty, her determination to launch a successful brand and celebrate her indigenous culture were her biggest motivators. Through thorough research and sourcing, Harper launched Cheekbone Beauty in Nov. 2016 as a DTC brand. "Going back, of course, I'd love to do things differently," Harper shared on the latest episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast. "However, I learned so much from starting things the way [I did], by being super scrappy about how we were going to build and learning how to [launch a business in real time]." In 2019, after Cheekbone Beauty's launch, Harper went on "Dragon's Den," a fundraising show similar to "Shark Tank." She did not accept an offer, but the exposure helped catapult Cheekbone Beauty's brand awareness. In addition to her experience on "Dragon's Den," Harper connected with Raven Capital, the first Indigenous investment fund in the world. The company initially offered Harper $350,000 to transition her business from being a private white label to creating its own products and packaging. Thanks to the funding, in March 2020, Cheekbone Beauty launched with its first proprietaryproduct, the Sustain Lipstick. As Harper looks to the future, she said she's excited about Cheekbone Beauty's direction. In 2021, the brand launched in Sephora Canada. And most recently, Cheekbone Beauty secured a partnership with Thirteen Lune — it will be available to shop on the marketplace's website and in 600 J.C. Penney locations. Apart from retail expansion, Cheekbone Beauty is also committed to innovation on the sustainability front through its packaging and clean ingredients.

Like many people who rerouted their career path in the last three years, Cynthia Sakai made a mid-pandemic leap from the fashion industry to personal care. "I had been in the fashion space for a really long time, and there was something missing. I felt I wasn't doing enough; I wasn't doing something that was making a difference," Sakai said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "The beauty space and the wellness space was something that, as a consumer, I always loved — but I never wanted to create a brand just to create another brand." A CFDA designer who founded the Vita Fede jewelry brand, Sakai switched gears in 2020 by introducing evolvetogether with a line of medical-grade face masks. After proving popular among celebs including Ariana Grande and Justin Bieber, the masks’ sales funded the brand’s expansion to a range of gender-neutral personal care products, each with innovative sustainable packaging. Among them: a powder face wash with dissolvable packaging, refillable hand sanitizer in glass bottles and biodegradable storage bags. Its best-sellers are a lip balm, a hand cream and a deodorant. “Consumers today want high-performing products that feature beautiful design, and are good for people and the planet,” she said. She added that sustainability alone has never been enough to clinch the sale. “You can't expect to change consumer behavior,” she said. “So we want to create a brand [where] people love the product first. They love the performance of it. And even if it wasn't sustainable, they would come back to us to purchase it." In the year ahead, evolvetogether plans to roll out new products, including candles and body care. It will also be fundraising, Sakai said.

If you’ve followed beauty dupe trends on TikTok, you’ve most likely come across a product or two from Milani Cosmetics. From its lip oil to its concealer, the mass makeup brand has seen multiple products go viral thanks to dupe-obsessed influencers like Mikayla Nogueira. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, the brand’s CMO, Jeremy Lowenstein, shares the details on the brand’s marketing strategy at a time when both TikTok and inflation are making price a big focus in beauty. Topics included how Milani responds to viral product moments on TikTok through campaigns and inventory, how it chooses its influencer collab partners, and why it’s important to have the right content for the right platforms. Also addressed: that viral TikTok video the brand made during the Depp-Heard trial last year.

Not long ago, the options for beauty consumers looking for clean hair care were limited to a handful of brands at either the luxury or the crunchy granola ends of the spectrum. Former business school classmates Lindsay Holden, Britta Chatterjee and Shannon Kearney saw an opening in the market for a mass premium brand appealing to millennials’ ingredient- and style-consciousness. Odele launched in 2020, quickly entering Target, where Holden was previously a senior buyer. Gender-neutral, minimalist, and at an accessible price point, it has since expanded to Ulta Beauty and CVS, and is in the process of launching products geared toward specific hair types. On this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Holden and Chatterjee talked about the opportunity they saw for clean hair-care at mass retail and their process for branding and design.

While she may be best known for her acting and singing, Vanessa Hudgens, is not new to entrepreneurship. The 34-year-old star, with 49 million Instagram followers, is behind Caliwater, a cactus water she said she drinks every morning. She also has a margarita line, which she co-created with Ashley Benson and Rosario Dawson for Thomas Ashbourne. She first launched Know Beauty in 2021 with singer, Madison Beer. It was a somewhat complicated concept in which users used a DNA kit, which was used to pair them with personalized products matched to their skin type and concerns. Hudgens admits it didn't land and decided to go back to the drawing board entirely. Yesterday, she re-launched Know Beauty as a completely different brand. This time, it is sold on Amazon and has just one product, the $35 Glacial Bay Clay Mask. Hudgens partnered on the formulation with Cosmos Labs founder and CEO Mary Berry. And she noted in the conversation that the brand will continue to be "mask-forward." In the first Pop Edition of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Hudgens discusses what motivated the reinvention, what makes Know's starting SKU different and why Amazon made sense as a launch retail partner.

Meg Bedford has always been attracted to startups. Bedford, CEO of Loops Beauty, dabbled in editorial at Vogue before joining Tom Ford and eventually Pat McGrath Beauty, finally landing at Loops in Aug. 2022. Loops, the 3-year-old hydrogel face mask brand, has made a name for itself as a buzzy celeb-loved brand. In Oct. 2020, Loops announced model Emily Ratajkowski as its partner and creative director. Then, in July 2022, Loops appointed “Riverdale” actress Camila Mendes as its partner and creative director. Loops is sold through Ulta Beauty and expanded to Target in February. It was founded by brand incubator Syllable, in collaboration with content production house Shots Studio. Loops offers a variety of need-based face masks, ranging in price from $25-$35 for a bundle of five. The brand also offers a subscription service. According to WWD, Loops was expected to earn between $8 million and $10 million in retail sales in its first year in business.

When Tiffany Scott got the idea for Róen Beauty in 2017, her goal was to create a glam luxury brand centered on clean beauty products. After two years of searching, she found lab partners that understood her vision and mission. And she launched Róen Beauty in 2019 with non-toxic eyeshadows and a makeup brush. Shortly after the brand's inception, Scott met Róen Beauty's current creative director, Kate Synott, and the two hit it off. Scott's passion and innovative vision have successfully complemented Synott's expertise in makeup and skin care; together, they've transformed Róen Beauty into a premiere clean beauty brand. Since its launch, the brand has expanded to product categories including skin care, mascara and blush. For 2023, Scott and Synnott said continuing to produce new and exciting clean beauty products that are accessible is top of mind. Expanding into more product categories and physical retail stores are goals, as well. "The success has been really great, and the partnerships have been really great," Scott said on the latest episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast. "But we want to expand into [more categories] this year. And we have another exciting launch coming in Q2 that's a retail partnership. [The retailer] is a really beautiful, clean, well-known beauty retailer in the U.S. and abroad."

Growing up in communities of color, Jeff Lee and Courtney Shields were both early to understanding the importance of diversity and inclusion in beauty. When they met virtually through peers during the pandemic, they instantly connected over a shared desire to create a multicultural collection of beauty products catering to all. Their mutual passions for making all women feel seen and beautiful birthed DIBS Beauty, short for Desert Island Beauty Status, in September 2021. The co-founders secured $2.6 million in an initial funding round from Tula's co-founders, as well as major stakeholders at finance company L Catterton, which also invested in Tula, and influencers. DIBS Beauty's less intimidating and more inclusive approach to beauty also made it one of the fastest-growing brands in 2022, according to research firm Spate. Thanks in part to the virality of the brand's hero product, Status Stick, average monthly searches for the brand grew to 2,470 in 2022. "The mission of DIBS Beauty is desert island beauty status. It's the makeup you would take with you to a desert island," Lee said on the latest episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast. In January, the company reported 700% year-over-year sales growth. With expansion top of mind for the co-founders, creating new, innovative products and expanding to new distribution channels are the biggest priorities this year.

When Lauren Otsuki and Vimla Black-Gupta launched skin-care brand Ourself in February 2022, their main goal was to provide beauty consumers with cosmetic enhancement options other than injections and lasers. To date, the indie brand has received $30 million in funding for its groundbreaking, at-home biotech alternatives to clinical products. Ourself's science-backed products are said to give the same effects as fillers and toxins. The company's ability to leverage science has helped it gain a large following in less than a year. Currently, the brand has 23 products, with some standouts being a two-step lip filler alternative and a five-product hyperpigmentation healer. "The idea of Ourself was about looking like yourself — because when did that actually stop being OK? The second meaning of Ourself is that you actually do it yourself," Black-Gupta said on the latest episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast. "What our technology offers for the first time ever is to be able to get visible results that are self-administered from the comfort of your home. It's easy to use, and you get visible results." Co-founders Otsuki and Black-Gupta have long careers in the beauty industry. Otsuki previously founded five biotech firms, including SkinMedica and Alastin Skincare, and is the evp of Glo Pharma, Ourself's parent company. Black-Gupta was formerly CMO of Equinox and also held marketing roles at Estée Lauder, P&G and Bobby Brown. The duo is confident Ourself will revolutionize topical skin care. And as the brand prepares to celebrate its first anniversary, Otsuki and Black-Gupta are working to strengthen its DTC channels to ensure longevity.

From Kylie Jenner to Martha Stewart, 51-year-old skin-care brand Mario Badescu has been cited as a go-to by a wide range of celebrities known for their strong thirst trap game. What started as a small facial studio in New York City has now become a brand stocked in thousands of stores at national and international retailers. Joseph Cabasso, the president of sales and co-owner of Mario Badescu, joins this week’s Glossy Beauty Podcast to talk the past, present and future of the brand. He tells the story of the brand’s history, including how his family acquired the brand and and who Mario Badescu was. During the episode, he shares accounts of its early days–including its big break with Henri Bendel and the start of its 40-plus-year relationship with Martha Stewart, who still goes into its New York salon for monthly facials to this day. He discusses the background of Mario Badescu’s best-selling hero drying lotion, as well as how the brand has evolved over the years to reach new generations, from Urban Outfitters and the VSCO girl era to TikTok today. He also gets candid about TikTok’s skin-care “cancel culture,” why his company is keeping prices low in a time of inflation, and why the brand is not big on paid influencer marketing.

One of only 17 artists to ever achieve EGOT status, singer-songwriter John Legend is also a man of many business ventures, such as wine, fashion and now skin care. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, he shares all the details of his newly launched brand, Loved01, which debuted in CVS on February 1 and enters Walmart in March. Speaking to Glossy not long after welcoming his third baby, he talked about the process of developing the brand, including how it caters to melanin-rich skin, what inspired him during the creative design process and why he chose the brand’s accessible price point. He also talked about the gender-neutral concept of the brand, as well as the state of gender in culture these days. Listen to hear him weigh in on why men are taking better care of their skin, sharing their feelings and embracing the “soft life.” He also discussed the backlash from patriarchal forces and the impact that’s having on politics.

Formerly the CEO of Ben & Jerry’s, Jostein Solheim took the helm of Unilever’s Health & Wellbeing division in June 2021. He’s drawing on over 30 years of experience at Unilever to guide the 4-year-old division through its acquisitions, which have so far included wellness and supplements brands including Nutrafol, Liquid I.V. and Olly. The company has high hopes for the new division with “well north of €1 billion” in net sales annually, he said. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Solheim weighs in on what’s driving “the fusion of wellness into beauty and beauty into wellness,” as he puts it; how wellness brands are breaking taboos on topics like women’s hair loss; and which wellness trends Unilever is looking at for future acquisitions.

A beauty industry veteran, Victor Casale knows a thing or two about building brands. After serving as the chief chemist at MAC Cosmetics from its inception through its acquisition, he later went on to found CoverFX. Now, he’s back in the beauty startup world in a big way as the co-founder of two brands he’s helping run simultaneously: custom skin-care brand Pure Culture Beauty and refillable makeup brand MOB Beauty. His interest in revamping the way beauty is packaged and sold comes from a long-held interest in sustainability. In fact, he spearheaded MAC’s “Back to MAC” package recycling program 35 years ago, pre-dating municipal recycling in many cities. Now, he’s the co-founder of beauty recycling program Pact Collective, which has 160 members and partnerships with retailers including Ulta Beauty and Sephora. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Casale goes into extensive detail on refillable beauty, his experience with recycling in the early days, the way Pact Collective works and how consumers can demand change.

From an early age, Richard Parker was aware of his skin. When Parker was a teenager, he was diagnosed with a skin condition caused by sun damage called ochronosis. And in his early 20s, he suffered from acne. After meeting multiple dermatologists and learning more about products and ingredients that could help his conditions, Parker was inspired to venture into health and beauty to share that knowledge with others. The knowledge Parker gained from medical experts and his own studies led him to launch Rationale in 1992. Since its creation, the skin-care brand's sole purpose has been to equip consumers with the necessary information and products to help repair damage caused by the sun and other free radical exposure. "The information [on how to maintain healthy skin] was so valuable to women [when we launched] because there weren't any of the codebreakers or websites that we all have access to today," Parker said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "Some of the vital components that we now know are important to skin health, like immune boosters and antioxidants, didn't exist in skin care at that time." Rationale's unique and medically-backed approach to skin care catapulted the brand's growth in Australia. Three decades later, Rationale is considered a cult favorite among many of Australia's biggest celebrities and skin-care enthusiasts. Parker is now grooming the brand to connect with consumers around the globe. He's currently focused on the U.S. and Southeast Asian markets.

After selling her skin-care brand Nyakio Beauty to Unilever in 2017, Nyakio Grieco set her sights on beauty retail with the launch of Thirteen Lune in 2020. As multiple beauty retailers were pledging to offer at least 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned brands, she came up with a “90/10” model for Thirteen Lune: 90% of brands are BIPOC-owned, with 10% owned by those who demonstrate allyship. With $1 million in funding from celebrities including Gwyneth Paltrow and Sean Combs and a $3 million seed round led by Fearless Fund, Thirteen Lune is in the process of taking over all of JCPenney’s former Sephora locations. It also stocks Grieco’s new skin-care venture, Relevant, which was launched in 2022. Physical retail is a big part of Grieco’s vision for Thirteen Lune, which will be launching its first standalone physical store early this year in Los Angeles. In this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Grieco shared her success story from the inspiration of her first brand launched in 2002 to her current beauty ventures.

It’s that time of year again. To wrap up 2022 on the Glossy Beauty Podcast, West Coast correspondent Liz Flora, beauty and wellness editor Emma Sandler, and senior reporter Sara Spruch-Feiner sat down from New York and Los Angeles to have a Zoom chat about the biggest beauty industry trends of the year. The power of short video for beauty was more obvious than ever this year, thanks to not only the impact of viral TikTok trends driving sales spikes for brands, but also to an influx of social platforms emphasizing the format. But challenges with social advertising due to Apple’s iOS policies, along with Gen Z’s love of shopping at retailers, have driven more beauty startups offline and into retailers. Meanwhile, the jury is still out on what role the metaverse will play in future beauty sales, with brands experimenting with a variety of campaigns in virtual worlds.

For many consumers in the market for cosmetic procedures, busy lives often mean that anything with an at-home recovery period isn’t always possible. That concept has been a big selling point for Dr. Dennis Gross’ eponymous skin-care brand, which is still going strong with its cult Alpha Beta Universal Daily Peel after over two decades. Created to offer a chemical peel with no skin redness or need to stay home, Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare’s peel is “now the number one selling peel in the world,” said Dr. Gross on this week’s Glossy Beauty Podcast. With a growing number of products added to its lineup, a minority investment from private equity firm Main Post, and plans to expand further internationally, the brand has seen “explosive” growth, he said. On the episode, he shares its founding story and plans for expansion, while weighing in on the rise of dermatologist brands and why he’s not succumbing to TikTok trends.

In 2008, Mario Dedivanovic was working the retail floor at Sephora. Now, his own eponymous brand can be found on its shelves. On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, celebrity makeup artist and brand founder Dedivanovic sat down to discuss his epic career journey and how it brought him from becoming a top celebrity makeup artist to launching his brand Makeup by Mario in 2020. The conversation, of course, includes Kim Kardashian. Fans of her reality shows have likely seen him by her side in glam session scenes throughout the years. While most closely associated with Kardashian, he’s worked on a high-caliber client list over the years that includes Jennifer Lopez, Salma Hayek, Kate Bosworth, Demi Lovato and Naomie Harris.

For Akash Mehta, Ayurvedic beauty is a family business. Growing up in a British-Indian household, Mehta interacted with Ayurveda, an alternative medicine system with historical roots in the Indian subcontinent, through his mother and grandparents. Meanwhile, his father worked in the beauty industry as a fragrance entrepreneur. Despite not initially planning to work in beauty, Mehta now sees the value in his exposure to the industry through his father. In early 2020, Mehta launched Fable & Mane, an Ayurvedic-inspired hair-care brand, with his sister Nikita Mehta. It debuted out of SOS Beauty, an incubator behind brands like Summer Fridays, Ouai, Patrick Ta Beauty and Shani Darden Skincare. Fable & Mane sells shampoo, conditioner, an oil mist and a scalp scrub, among other products. Products are priced $16-$49 and sold through Sephora and Fable & Mane's e-commerce site. "At the same time [of our launch], there was no representation in the industry like us. We went to Sephora, and there was no Ayurvedic hair brand," Mehta said. "With Ayurveda products, [the issue] is that they smell. But we're all busy and going out, so I wanted [to introduce] something that smells great and performs." On the latest episode of the Glossy Podcast, Mehta spoke with Priya Rao about building the brand, unexpected viral moments on TikTok, plans for 2023, and the brand potential within the buzzy and booming hair space.

When Harry Slatkin and his wife, Laura, built Slatkin & Co., they disrupted the fragrance industry by making home fragrances accessible to a wider demographic. Slatkin sold Slatkin & Co. to Limited Brands, which owns Bath & Body Works, in 2005. But he kept his role as executive chairman and president of the company, and eventually took over the entire home fragrance division. After growing the business to $1.3 billion, Slatkin stepped down from his role in 2012. Today, the company does $2.3 billion in home fragrance sales, according to Slatkin. 'When I started, I was entrepreneurial at Limited Brands. [Lex Wexner] let me set up offices in New York, and I had my own team," Slatkin said on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. "As soon as we started hitting $400 million and $500 million [in sales], I was becoming a part of these big teams, and the entrepreneur and the excitement of it starts to leave. … It was no longer what I could call hands-on, for me. I decided, after getting to a billion dollars [in revenue], that it was time for me to step down." Slatkin consulted for Bath & Body Works for three years after selling his company, but at the same time, he pivoted into fashion through a partnership with Tommy Hilfiger. The duo went on to acquire apparel brand Belstaff in 2011. Slatkin is now focused on growing the company's distribution for its current offerings, with no plans to expand to more categories in the near future.

When beauty and personal care executive Rod Little joined personal care conglomerate Edgewell as CFO in 2018, the company’s core businesses of shaving and feminine care were seeing mid-single-digit declines. Competing with giants like Procter & Gamble and DTC disruptors like Billie, the company was in need of a transformation. Rising to CEO in 2019, Little identified the areas that needed to change at the company, which owns household name brands such as Schick, Banana Boat and Playtex. “We had gotten into a rhythm of being too technology-focused, and we had been led by technology, as opposed to being led by the consumer,” he said on this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. His turnaround strategy included not only moving the focus to the consumer, but also adopting a startup mentality and embracing new acquisitions in growth categories. While the company’s attempted acquisition of Harry’s was blocked by the FTC in 2020, the company has made four acquisitions in the past five years: men’s grooming brands Bulldog, Jack Black and Cremo, and razor startup Billie. With its new brands driving double-digit growth, Edgewell’s shaving and feminine care categories have moved up to “mid-single-digit” growth this year, while its sun-care category is going strong. On this week’s episode, Little shares details on the company’s acquisition strategy, his thoughts on the FTC decision and ways brands can stay innovative while scaling.

Nearly every turn in Isamaya Ffrench’s career was unexpected. Ffrench grew up in a family of engineers and didn’t ascribe to the glamorous rituals her mother and grandmother practiced when she was a child. Her introduction to beauty came by way of discovering Kevyn Aucoin’s iconic beauty book “Making Faces.” But even after studying that book cover to cover, Ffrench still didn’t have dreams of becoming a makeup artist, content creator or founder of her namesake beauty brand — all of which she is now. In fact, Ffrench danced professionally for 15 years. But a colleague at the contemporary theatrical performance group Theo Adams Company put her up for a body painting job at i-D magazine, knowing Ffrench painted faces at children’s parties. While unplanned, that gig planted the seeds for Ffrench’s future career. “I was hired to do a very specific thing,” said Ffrench on the most recent episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast. “I was using clay and mixed media and turning these models into Demigods. It was all very creative, but there was another makeup artist on set who had been booked to do the beauty because I guess I was a wildcard. I just remember there was this moment when I was washing up my really dirty, grubby brushes in the sink with washing liquid. I had big paintbrushes and sponges and all this grimy stuff. I looked over at this makeup artist who sat there with her beautiful kit laid out looking very clean. I was like, ‘Hold on a sec, why am I not doing that job? I should be doing that job, as well.'” Ffrench continued to book editorial jobs, all while refining her subverted beauty aesthetic. Her work landed her ambassador and creative director posts at YSL Beauté, Tom Ford Beauty, Burberry and Byredo, which proved to be fortuitous primers to launching her own brand, Isamaya, in June. “I don’t ever think I planned to do my own brand, or not until very, very recently, probably because I was very happy doing it for other people. … And then I sort of thought, ‘Well, maybe there are some things I would like to do for myself that brands wouldn’t let me do because they have their own language,'” she said. Since debuting Isamaya this summer, Ffrench has leaned into the drop model, first launching the Industrial collection, a BDSM-inspired offering. Wild Star, a rhinestone cowgirl-esque drop, debuted Thursday with L.A. pop-ups supporting the collection.

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 shift Kogan: “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 uncertainty Hale: “[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.”