The Glossy Beauty Podcast

The Glossy Beauty Podcast

By: Glossy

Language: en

Categories: Arts, Fashion, Beauty, Business, Health, Fitness

The Glossy Beauty Podcast is the newest podcast from Glossy. Each episode features candid conversations about how today’s trends, such as CBD and self-care, are shaping the future of the beauty and wellness industries. With a unique assortment of guests, The Glossy Beauty Podcast provides its listeners with a variety of insights and approaches to these categories, which are experiencing explosive growth. From new retail strategies on beauty floors to the importance of filtering skincare products through crystals, this show sets out to help listeners understand everything that is going on today, and prepare for what will show up in...

Episodes

Dr. Marnie's founder and CEO on the rise and longevity of derm-led beauty brands
Jan 08, 2026

The latest Glossy Beauty Podcast episode features board-certified dermatologist Dr. Marnie Nussbaum and beauty industry veteran Jodi Kaplan — the founder and CEO, respectively, of the Dr. Marnie skin-care brand. Dr. Nussbaum gained popularity while catering to dermatology clients in New York City’s Upper East Side before launching the brand, which was called Lines before rebranding in November. For her part, Kaplan built her industry prowess through roles at brands including Droplette, Dr. Barbara Sturm and Augustinus Bader. 

Dermatologist-founded brands continue to resonate with beauty consumers, who are seeking credibility, education and expertise in an oversaturated market. On the...

Duration: 00:33:53
The Glossy Beauty Podcast’s 2026 predictions
Jan 01, 2026

What will 2026 mean for the beauty and wellness industries? 

In today’s special episode, hosts Lexy Lebsack, Emily Jensen and Sara Spruch-Feiner share their 2026 industry predictions. 

This includes a slowdown of the "no-makeup makeup" aesthetic in favor of bolder color cosmetics trends, the rise of experimental peptide therapy among wellness consumers and an uptick in budget-conscious beauty shoppers. The hosts also made specific predictions, such as an increase in savory scents in fragrance and more clean, value-priced body care in big-box stores. The trio also muses about the bubbles that could burst in 2026, and so much...

Duration: 00:46:15
The Glossy Beauty Podcast looks back at beauty in 2025
Dec 18, 2025

As 2025 comes to a close, the Glossy Beauty team — Sara Spruch-Feiner, Lexy Lebsack and Emily Jensen — came together on the Glossy Beauty Podcast to reflect on some of the defining themes that shaped the beauty industry this year, and their own reporting.

Spruch-Feiner unpacks the continued rise of Gen Alpha as a beauty consumer, the brands emerging to meet that demand and the retailers adapting to deliver for this younger demographic. Jensen examines a challenging year for color cosmetics, where lip care and lip liner emerged as bright spots. And Lebsack points to longevity as a key grow...

Duration: 00:39:40
Ulta Beauty CEO Kecia Steelman unpacks her first year in charge and 2026 goals, plus news
Dec 11, 2025

In January, Kecia Steelman became one of the most powerful executives in beauty. 

After more than a decade at Ulta Beauty in positions like COO and head of international, she stepped into the president and CEO role with an uphill battle ahead of her. 

That’s because sales at Ulta tumbled during the 2020 pandemic, and despite an uptick in 2021, year-over-year sales had been steadily falling for nearly three years. She took over as CEO in January, and by March, she unveiled her Ulta Beauty Unleashed comeback plan — and in just 11 months, her strategy has paid off. <...

Duration: 00:53:03
What beauty products do teens want for the holidays?
Dec 04, 2025

On this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, we're exploring what teens are hoping to receive for the holidays. To do so, Sara Spruch-Feiner speaks to 13-year-old Indy (whose last name is omitted for privacy), based in Los Angeles, who shares her full wishlist with us, as well as the picks of members of her volleyball team.

But to get a broader look at the gifting landscape in 2025, Spruch-Feiner also interviewed Anna Andreeva, managing director of footwear, beauty and brands at Piper Sandler. Piper Sandler, a financial services company, is well-known for its biannual teen survey...

Duration: 00:45:34
Special Crossover Episode: The Shopper’s Black Friday Playbook
Nov 27, 2025

How can shoppers, brands and retailers win Black Friday? 

In this week’s special holiday crossover episode, Glossy Beauty Podcast host Lexy Lebsack is joined by Danny Parisi, host of the Glossy Podcast, and Gabi Barkho, host of the Modern Retail podcast, to unpack all things Black Friday. 

The three reporters start by sharing their own experiences and plans for navigating Black Friday as a shopper, then unpack some of the buzziest activations and sales strategies today. This includes both discounting and non-discounting strategies, value-focused sales, bundles and collaborations, among other tactics. The trio also walk...

Duration: 00:45:57
T3 founders Dr. Julie Chung and Kent Yu on creating the luxury hair tool category, plus news
Nov 20, 2025

Few beauty executives currently compete in a category they created, but that’s the case for Dr. Julie Chung and Kent Yu, the married co-founders behind T3 hair tools (19:00). 

The duo created the luxury hair tool category back in 2004 when they launched T3 with the first lightweight, sleek and quiet blowdryer that delivered smoother, faster results. T3’s Featherweight model was the first luxury dryer on the market and the most expensive at the time, priced at $200. Dr. Chung and Yu quickly found a consumer, and before long, T3 was the first hair tool sold in stores like...

Duration: 01:03:59
Bansk Beauty’s Reuben Carranza on building a distinct brand that lasts
Nov 06, 2025

Reuben Carranza knows a good brand when he sees it. 

Bansk Beauty, where he serves as executive chairman, made headlines in September after acquiring the buzzy, clinical skin-care brand Byoma. It’s part of the late-stage private investment firm’s growing beauty roster, which includes Amika, Eva NYC and Ethique. 

“No. 1, they're on a tear, right? They're growing rapidly. But I think what we loved about them was the story,” he told Glossy on stage at this week’s annual Glossy Beauty and Wellness Summit about its Byoma acquisition. “It's the story: they've de-complicated complicated skin-care rout...

Duration: 00:40:20
Beauty packaging hall of fame and shame with Allison Kent-Gunn, plus news
Oct 30, 2025

Allison Kent-Gunn knows good beauty packaging when she sees it. 

The Los Angeles-based aesthetician-turned-packaging consultant has become one of the leading voices in beauty packaging on social media thanks to her "hot takes" on packaging wins and misses. She’s a former cosmetic packaging instructor at the Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising, and outside of her social media, where she goes by @AllisonTurquoise, her insights can be seen in an upcoming Cosmetic Science Textbook used in packaging courses. 

Today’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast —  a special episode dedicated to the best, and worst, be...

Duration: 01:06:00
Helen Steed gives an inside look at packaging for Glossier, Merit and Rhode
Oct 23, 2025

The Glossy Beauty Podcast is back with its second of three deep dives into beauty packaging. Today, our guest is Helen Steed, a veteran in the field, whose resume includes a 10-year stint leading creative at Bumble & Bumble, and a gig as Glossier's founding creative director before striking out on her own. Now, she helms Steed & Friends, which has worked with brands including Rhode, Lore, Sakara and Ursa Major. On today's episode, she takes listeners through mini case studies, examining her work on products like Rhode's iconic phone case, Glossier's first foray into body care and Merit's logo.

<...

Duration: 00:55:24
Inside the world of beauty packaging
Oct 16, 2025

This week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast introduces a three-week series dedicated to beauty packaging. Despite daily interacting with beauty products — including face wash, body wash, lipstick or shampoo — consumers rarely spend time thinking about the countless decisions that go into a brand’s packaging. From sustainability (Are refills offered? Is the plastic PCR?) to color (think: the pull of millennial pink) to font, every packaging element is carefully considered. As our first guest in the series, FIT Professor Sebba Alqetrani, said, “The first thing the consumer sees, touches and interacts with is the package. [It] is your first...

Duration: 00:46:46
Sephora welcomes Gen Alpha shoppers with brands designed for them
Oct 09, 2025

On this week’s episode of “The Glossy Beauty Podcast,” co-hosts Sara Spruch-Feiner and Lexy Lebsack dive into one of beauty’s buzziest topics: Gen Alpha’s rapid emergence as consumers in their own right. 

They discuss Spruch-Feiner’s reporting on Sephora tweens and teens, as well as Sephora’s first two brands geared directly at Gen Alpha: Sincerely Yours, brought to market by father-daughter mega-influencer duo Jordan and Salish Matter, and Evereden, which will hit Sephora.com on October 14.

They examine what will happen, on Sephora's shelves and beyond, as Gen Alpha grows into its purchasing p...

Duration: 00:40:46
Amazon bets on K-Beauty, Ulta Beauty embraces Squishmallows, and 3 Glossy Pop Award winners share their campaign success secrets
Oct 02, 2025

What does it take for a beauty campaign or brand to cut through the noise in 2025? 

Our second-annual Glossy Pop Awards is one place where our team recognizes the best and most culturally relevant beauty and fashion campaigns, people, products, and brands. 

In today’s episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, we welcome three esteemed beauty executives to discuss the secret sauce behind their Glossy Pop Award-winning campaigns. 

These winning campaigns drove audience engagement, generated buzz and successfully met their set business goals. 

To start, host Lexy Lebsack welcomes Leslie Ann Hall...

Duration: 00:51:09
Executive coach Angela Bennet shares her top 3 tips for execs, plus industry news
Sep 25, 2025

Executive coach Angela Bennett knows a thing or two about the unique needs of beauty and wellness industry leaders. She spent more than two decades working across L’Oréal and Estee Lauder brands like La Roche-Posay, Maybelline and Clinique in roles like vice president, general manager and svp of talent acquisition.

"The subjective nature of [the beauty industry] requires an art of balancing data points, intuition and conviction [while] becoming your own leader to navigate the decisions that need to be made on a daily basis," Bennett said.

But today, Bennett is part of a g...

Duration: 00:52:42
Olive & June's Sarah Gibson Tuttle on life after acquisition: You have to 'focus on the consumer obsessively'
Sep 18, 2025

After starting as a brick-and-mortar nail salon in Los Angeles in 2013, Olive & June closed up shop in 2020, with founder and CEO Sarah Gibson Tuttle pivoting her focus to DIY manis. By November 2024, Helen of Troy had acquired the brand for $225 million in cash and a $15 million earnout subject to performance over three years. Helen of Troy's beauty portfolio also includes Drybar, Curlsmith and Hot Tools, among others. But Gibson Tuttle was intent on remaining involved in her brand's operations — operating essentially as it did prior to the acquisition, but with greater support.

Now, nearly a year post-acquisition, Gib...

Duration: 00:52:39
L’Oréal tech leader Guive Balooch on what’s driving beauty innovation today, plus industry news
Sep 11, 2025

When it comes to innovation in the beauty industry, few wield more power and influence than Guive Balooch, L’Oréal Group’s longtime tech leader. 

“In the last three or four years, [we’ve seen] this incredible shift in the speed of innovation,” Balooch told Glossy. “It feels great to work on things that are shaping the future of our industry.” 

Since Balooch last joined the Glossy Beauty Podcast in 2021, his team has released a light-powered blowdryer called the AirLight Pro; an in-store skin diagnostic device called Cell BioPrint; Water Saver, an in-salon water reduction tool; a hom...

Duration: 00:47:01
Reinventing a heritage beauty brand with Borghese COO Dawn Hilarczyk — plus, industry news
Sep 04, 2025

What does it take to successfully reinvent a heritage beauty brand?

Industry veteran Dawn Hilarczyk is on a mission to completely transform Borghese, the 68-year-old heritage brand famous for its Italian skin care and Fango mud masks — and it’s working. 

In today’s episode, Hilarczyk dives into the nitty-gritty of her brand turnaround efforts. She breaks down her strategy in great detail, from cleaning up the brand’s Amazon presence and expanding into Ulta Beauty, to reestablishing a social presence and reducing the brand's SKU count from 87 to 27. 

But first, host Lexy Lebsack is...

Duration: 00:51:50
Summer recap: The investments, strategies and revenue tumbles that defined the beauty industry
Aug 28, 2025

The beauty industry had an eventful summer marked by changing retailer strategies, stark revenue tumbles and a flurry of pricey acquisitions. 

In this special episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, reporters Lexy Lebsack, Emily Jensen and Sara Spruch-Feiner walk through the stories that defined the season. 

This includes strategy shifts within retailers like Sephora, Ulta Beauty and Target, plus a look at disappointing revenue at conglomerates Shiseido and Estée Lauder Companies. The team also discusses the biggest acquisitions of the season — including Rhode, Dr. Squatch, Space NK and Touchland — and the tariff-related topics we’re watchin...

Duration: 00:45:17
Target and Ultra break up, foam sunscreen is recalled —  plus, what makes a successful pop-up?
Aug 21, 2025

Host Lexy Lebsack is joined by reporter Melissa Daniels from Glossy’s sister publication Modern Retail and co-host of the Modern Retail Podcast, to walk through this week’s biggest beauty news stories. 

This includes a brief analysis of E.l.f. Beauty’s response to consumer outcry over casting controversial comedian Matt Rife in its latest campaign, a topic Lebsack and Glossy reporter Emily Jensen discussed in last week’s episode. 

Next, Lebsack and Daniels discuss the likely voluntary recall of mousse sunscreens, which includes offerings from Vacation and Supergoop sold through Sephora, Target, Nordstrom...

Duration: 01:09:09
New beauty brick-and-mortar, E.l.f. backlash — and Dr. Thomas Sterry talks plastic surgery trends
Aug 14, 2025

co-hosts Lexy Lebsack and Emily Jensen discuss industry news of the week, including changes to beauty brick-and-mortar retail, from Nordstrom's NYC flagship's approach to Mecca's new 40,000-square-foot flagship in Melbourne. They also discuss the controversy immediately surrounding E.l.f. Cosmetics' new ad featuring drag queen Heidi N Closet and comedian Matt Rife, who, in 2023, sparked outrage after he made jokes about domestic violence in his Netflix special. Commenters have flooded the brand's TikTok and Instagram pages, and have also created their own content condemning Rife's casting.

Later, co-host Sara Spruch-Feiner sits down with New York City-based p...

Duration: 00:47:06
An insider’s guide to K-beauty’s US renaissance, plus industry news
Aug 07, 2025

On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, co-host Lexy Lebsack interviews co-host Sara Spruch-Feiner about her recent reporting on the topic, diving into what’s fueling K-beauty’s renewed popularity, what trending ingredients are capturing attention and how affordability continues to play a key role in the category’s appeal.


But first, Lebsack and co-host Emily Jensen discuss Martha Stewart’s incoming new beauty brand, Elm Biosciences, which was developed with past Glossy Beauty Podcast guest Dr. Dhaval Bhanusali. They also talk about Bath & Body Works’s push into college bookstores and Dyson’s...

Duration: 00:44:19
Rare Beauty's fragrance, C-suite hires, L'Oréal earnings — and K-beauty brand Krave Beauty’s Liah Yoo
Jul 31, 2025

Krave Beauty isn’t your average K-Beauty brand.

“[Our mission] resonates with a lot of people who are really tired of the beauty industry's narrative of ‘more is more,’” CEO and co-founder Liah Yoo told Glossy. 

After getting her start working for Amorepacific in Seoul, South Korea, Yoo joined YouTube to share her own skin challenges. “I was documenting my acne skin struggles in my mid 20s, and I literally tried everything,” she said. “Nothing worked until I pressed reset and simplified my routine, going from a 14-step skin-care routine to a super minimal three-step skin-care routine...

Duration: 00:55:21
TSG Group's Phlur acquisition, Shiseido's layoffs — and everything you should know about sunscreen in the US
Jul 24, 2025

In this episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, board-certified dermatologist and Mohs surgeon Dr. Jane Yoo, and the Melanoma Research Foundation's director of advocacy, Kim Wezik, MPH, chat with Glossy podcast co-host Sara Spruch-Feiner about how the U.S. wound up so far behind the rest of the world when it comes to sunscreen, how the Melanoma Research Foundation is working with congress to try to make progress in the field, and what's at stake (20:00).

But first, co-hosts Lexy Lebsack and Emily Jensen discuss some of the week’s biggest beauty news, including TSG Group's acquisition of Ch...

Duration: 01:00:47
Prime Day's results, Beauty's wrestling opportunity — and a lawyer's take on beauty’s dupe lawsuits
Jul 17, 2025

Beauty dupes have never been more popular. But is mimicking a competitor a sound business decision?  

“This might surprise people, [but] dupes may not be illegal on their own," brand protection attorney Elizabeth Milian told Glossy. The word “dupe” is shorthand for “duplicate” and often denotes a product that is inspired by a higher-priced luxury offering. A dupe is different from a counterfeit product that presents itself as the original. 

It's very common for duped brands to regularly bring lawsuits against the companies allegedly infringing on their trade dress, or IP, such as packaging, branding, logos or any...

Duration: 00:42:37
Debut Biotech’s Joshua Britton on the breakthrough beetle pigment set to disrupt beauty, plus Amazon Prime sale news
Jul 10, 2025

The female cochineal beetle may not be aware of it, but it owes a debt of gratitude to Joshua Britton.


In February, Britton’s Debut Biotech unveiled a breakthrough set to disrupt how beauty products are formulated. Using biotechnology, the San Diego-based company created a vegan, bio-identical alternative to a common red cosmetics colorant traditionally harvested from the cochineal beetle.


This beetle pigment can be found on ingredient labels as “carmine,” “cochineal extract,” “crimson lake,” “natural red 4” or “C.I. 75470.” A quick online search reveals carmine in products from Stila, Fenty Beauty, M...

Duration: 00:38:49
Unilever's acquisition, Glossier's CEO shakeup and Arrae's Siff Haider on predicting wellness trends
Jun 26, 2025

In the big wide world of health and wellness, there is always a buzzword du jour. In the past couple months, you've likely heard buzz about gut health and GLP-1s, ingredients like creatine and colostrum, and, of course, protein. For many of these trends, Arrae, the supplement brand co-founded by Siffat "Siff" Haider and her husband, Nishant Samantray, has been right there, answering consumer demand with a product featuring that of-the-moment ingredient or speaking to a top-of-mind concern.

Wellness is Haider's passion and something she enjoys thinking about constantly, she said, both to live her best l...

Duration: 00:43:15
Beauty news from L’Oréal, Coty and Byredo — plus, Sahajan Skincare’s Lisa Mattam on clinical testing
Jun 19, 2025

Earlier this year, Sahajan founder Lisa Mattam shared insights into her clinical testing strategy with Glossy, including the difference between clinical testing and consumer perception testing; the cost, challenges and complications that can arise with this sort of investment; and how she uses the results to market her line. 

In today’s podcast episode, she breaks down all of this in more detail, including the challenges, cost and unseen hurdles. 

But first, Glossy Beauty Podcast host Lexy Lebsack is joined by senior reporter Emily Jensen to discuss the news of the week. This includes the late...

Duration: 00:49:56
Glow Recipe’s lawsuit, L'Oréal Group’s acquisition — and Drybar's Alli Webb on her new hair brand
Jun 12, 2025

West Coast correspondent Lexy Lebsack is joined by senior reporter Emily Jensen to discuss this week’s news, starting with a buzzy new lawsuit that could impact the future of beauty dupes. They discuss Glow Recipe’s new lawsuit against MCo Beauty for allegedly copying one of its hero products, $36 Watermelon Glow Dew Drops, with MCo’s $11.99 Hydrate & Glow Ultra-Dew Serum.

Jensen and Lebsack also discuss L'Oréal Group’s latest acquisition of the British skin-care brand Medik8. Announced this week, the conglomerate acquired a majority stake in the brand, which launched stateside in 2023, to bolster its luxury an...

Duration: 00:52:35
BeautyTok's latest and Huda Kattan's buy-back — plus, inside Rhode's big E.l.f. Beauty deal
Jun 05, 2025

On this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty podcast, Sara Spruch-Feiner, senior reporter at Glossy Pop, and Emily Jensen, Glossy senior beauty reporter, are joined by Gabi Barko, senior reporter at Glossy's sister publication Modern Retail, and Brit Starr, CMO at influencer marketing platform Creator IQ.

Kicking off the episode, Jensen and Spruch-Feiner chat what's happening on TikTok in beauty this week, why Pride Month will look a little different this year, and why Huda Kattan is taking back full ownership of Huda Beauty.

Later (16:18), Spruch-Feiner, Barkho and Starr discuss the biggest beauty news of...

Duration: 00:47:11
Maison Louis Marie's founders on the changing pace of fragrance — plus, the new ways shoppers are finding beauty products
May 29, 2025

Maison Louis Marie (20:00) was founded in 2012 and has never taken on investment, which, according to the married couple behind the brand, Marie du Petit Thouars and Matthew Berkson, has allowed it to focus on slow and steady growth. It is profitable and does not spend excessively on influencer marketing.

"We want to be careful with the brand. We really want to create a legacy brand," Berkson said.

In 13 years, Maison Louis Marie has grown to sell eau de parfums, perfume oils, candles, diffusers, body wash, lotion and deodorant, among other products. It entered Sephora in 2017...

Duration: 00:59:32
Sports agent Jacki Gemelos on beauty’s WNBA sponsorship opportunity, plus industry news
May 22, 2025

The WNBA kicked off its new season last week with beauty brands lining up to gain access to the league’s growing cohort of fans. 

In a gold rush that started around 2020, some of the industry’s top brands have entered into multi-year sponsorships with the league or its top players. The most recent, Fenty’s sponsorship of the New York Liberty, was announced earlier this month and kicked off on Saturday’s home game opener with several activations including a "Gloss Bomb glam cam" where fans show off their beauty look. 

The NY Liberty, a top team...

Duration: 00:51:29
Multi-shoring your supply chain with Modern Retail’s Melissa Daniels — plus Drunk Elephant’s sales slump and Touchland’s big acquisition
May 15, 2025

Despite a new, 90-day pause on President Trump’s sky-high tariffs on goods imported from China, near-shoring and multi-shoring are leading topics on the minds of business insiders now. 

But the idea of near-shoring, or moving a supply chain closer to the brand’s home country, as well as multi-shoring, or diversifying your supply chain to additional regions, comes with many pros and cons. 

On today’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, host Lexy Lebsack is joined by Melissa Daniels, senior reporter at Glossy’s sister publication Modern Retail and co-host of the Modern Retail Pod...

Duration: 00:50:53
ColourPop’s Vivian Weng talks omnichannel evolution — plus, Walmart tests beauty bars and clinical testing gains steam
May 08, 2025

Few beauty brands have had an evolution quite like Southern California-based ColourPop cosmetics (20:50). 

Launched in 2014 at the height of the DTC era, the brand once released around 40 collections per year. “That's how consumers were shopping,” Vivian Weng, ColourPop brand president, told Glossy. “For a number of years, consumers were looking for the latest launch … and looking to get their hands on limited quantities of something that was very, very specific and timely.” 

Flash forward to its eleventh birthday this month and things look very different. “[Beauty shoppers] are looking for newness, but in a different way,” Weng sai...

Duration: 00:56:57
TikTok derm Dr. Muneeb Shah on building content and his own brand — plus, Ulta's big weekend and layoffs at Coty and UPS
May 01, 2025

About four years ago, Glossy profiled Muneeb Shah. At the time, he was a resident who had accumulated an impressive 6 million TikTok followers. He had started posting during quarantine. Now, that number has skyrocketed to 17.9 million — plus an additional 1.1 million followers on Instagram. Recent content reveals partnerships with brands including Timeless Skin Care, No. 7 Skin Care and TirTir, to name a few.

Last March, Dr. Shah debuted Remedy, his own brand, which currently offers three serums, a lip balm, a moisturizer, a dandruff shampoo, a body cream for keratosis pilaris and pimple patches. In addition, Dr. Shah se...

Duration: 00:55:58
Coachella activations, the state of 'clean' beauty, and Zoe Weiner and Gabby Shacknai on Beautyfor's mission to find a home for beauty products
Apr 24, 2025

Gabby Shacknai and Zoe Weiner were already veteran beauty editors when they debuted their nonprofit, Beautyfor, in June 2024. Like many people who work in the beauty industry, they'd long been surrounded by a surplus of products and felt there had to be a way to do some good with the excess.


Initially, they planned a sale with excess from their friends in the industry. But then, brands got wind and asked to donate products. "All of a sudden, Gabby's apartment was filled with hundreds and hundreds of serums and moisturizers and things, and we...

Duration: 01:02:26
Boy Smells’ rebrand fail, Amorepacific's manufacturing pivot, LVMH earnings, and Pact Collective’s Carly Snider on becoming beauty’s biggest recycler
Apr 17, 2025

Pact Collective isn’t the first company to try to solve the beauty industry’s waste problem. But in four short years, it’s already become the most successful. 


“It feels like a really exciting time for the industry, but we've still got a lot of work to do,” Carly Snider, executive director of Pact Collective, told Glossy. “We [as an industry] are creating 120 billion units of beauty packaging globally and only a fraction of those are recycled or reused.” 


This widely-shared statistic was one catalyst for Pact’s launch in 2021 as...

Duration: 01:06:41
Longtime beauty CMO Michelle Miller joins Glossy reporters to discuss the future of TikTok, plus industry news
Apr 10, 2025

Esteemed beauty marketer Michelle Miller knows a thing or two about a successful TikTok strategy.


Miller served as CMO of K-18 during its gangbuster rise and 2023 strategic acquisition by Unilever. Her CV also includes Kosas, Too Faced and, as of January, CMO of Vegamour hair care. 


“[TikTok has] an algorithm that is able to democratize beauty in a way that makes it a lot more accessible [to the average consumer],” Miller said. “With the platform being so uncertain, it's emotionally hard for brands that have invested so much time into cr...

Duration: 01:04:26
With Sephora launch, Ultra Violette readies to take the US market by storm
Apr 03, 2025

Sephora has launched numerous new brands in recent months, many of them buzzy and beloved — but perhaps none has been as hotly anticipated as Ultra Violette (that's pronounced "violet"), the Aussie sunscreen brand first launched in 2018.


Sephora marks the brand's official debut into the U.S. market — a landmark occasion, because, as co-founder Bec Jefferd said on this week's episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, "You can't be a serious global beauty brand if you aren't in the U.S."


That's in spite of the fact that the brand has al...

Duration: 01:03:19
Act+Acre founders on the rise of scalp-care: ‘Education is the forefront of the brand’
Mar 27, 2025

Act+Acre’s husband-and-wife founders were early to the growth of the scalp-care market when they launched their brand in 2019 with one product: a $48 prewash treatment called Scalp Detox Oil. 


“[Scalp care] was definitely an afterthought for people [a few years ago],” brand founder and hairstylist Helen Reavey told Glossy. “Launching it in 2019, we were one of the first to solely think about scalp care the way skin care had come up and was so personalized, and we took that approach. It's not a one-size-fits-all for the scalp.”


Reavey has seen th...

Duration: 00:38:23
Hair-care tycoon Carolyn Aronson enters mass with Cloud: ‘It has the callouts Gen Z is looking for’
Mar 20, 2025

Very few beauty entrepreneurs have had more success than Carolyn Aronson.


In 2006, the longtime hairstylist and salon owner launched professional hair-care brand It’s a 10 with one hero product: Miracle Leave-In spray. The $21 formula was an immediate success for its ability to hydrate, smooth, condition, defrizz and protect hair with one formula. The brand had immediate success by seeding the product to professional hairstylists before entering Ulta Beauty, Target, Sally’s Beauty, Cosmoprof, SalonCentric and Amazon, and selling DTC. 


Using Miracle Leave-In as the anchor for expansion, the company added...

Duration: 00:42:25
Hally Hair's Kathryn Winokur: 'Gen Z is not static — she's growing up'
Mar 13, 2025

Kathryn Winokur launched Hally Hair in 2021 after working for companies including PepsiCo and Dove. From engineering college partnerships to hosting a trip for Alabama sorority girls, the brand has succeeded by keeping its finger on the pulse and remaining deeply entrenched in youth culture. Its latest move is a timely one, too: On March 6, it introduced Lady H, a $39 alcohol-free hair perfume that also adds shine to hair. The scent launched DTC and on TikTok Shop and will hit Ulta Beauty — in all doors and online — on April 20.


"We see hair and fragrance as some...

Duration: 00:43:16
C.O. Bigelow president Ian Ginsberg on unlocking profitable pharmacy retail: 'You have to create a want, not a need’
Mar 06, 2025

For New Yorkers, C.O. Bigelow is an institution. 

“There's something about the [Bigelow] apothecary that emotionally appeals to people,” Ian Ginsberg, president, pharmacist and third generation owner of C.O. Bigelow, told Glossy. “Everybody, no matter how young or old you are, has some memory about going to the apothecary and the pharmacist telling you what to do. That's where I started [when I joined the family business four decades ago]. I started focusing on what happens when you walk in the door.”

Opened in 1838, C.O. Bigelow is a mainstay in the Greenwich Village n...

Duration: 00:42:55
Kelli Anne Sewell is building a different kind of makeup artist-founded business
Feb 27, 2025

There is a traditional path for successful makeup artists nowadays: Build up a roster of influential clients, accrue a following on social media, and start a brand of your own. After all, makeup artist-led brands — think: Makeup by Mario, Patrick Ta, Violette Fr and Fara Homidi — have never been hotter.

But makeup artist Kelli Anne Sewell is taking a different approach.

Sewell started her career in tech and would slide into the DMs of influential people, offering free services during her time off from work and posting the results on social media — even when she had 10...

Duration: 00:43:23
MCoBeauty CMO Meridith Rojas: 'Dupes democratize beauty'
Feb 20, 2025

For MCoBeauty CMO Meridith Rojas, the ability to democratize the beauty industry lies in the power of dupes. 

“We're in this moment, in this cultural zeitgeist, where people don't want to have to spend $1,000 on a face of beauty and don't want to be left out of the trends,” said Rojas. “We really want to create luxury for everyone. And of course, we have amazing dupes, but we also have some homegrown innovation. The combination has been really magnetic, and our community is growing in the U.S. so fast. We have a very exciting year ahead of us.”...

Duration: 00:56:27
Parlux president Lori Singer on launching Billie Eilish’s 4th fragrance: ‘Her fans are anxiously waiting’
Feb 13, 2025

Longtime beauty executive Lori Singer has been instrumental in some of the biggest fragrance license deals of the past 20 years.

Singer spent more than a decade at Coty, where she worked on bestselling fragrances by Calvin Klein, Vera Wang, Balenciaga and Nautica. She also tripled global net revenues for Marc Jacobs with its iconic Daisy franchise launched in 2007. Singer got her start at Revlon, and her CV also includes Calvin Klein Cosmetics, Unilever and Benetton Group. 

“I've spent my entire career in beauty. I’m sort of a beauty lifer,” she told Glossy. “I fell in love o...

Duration: 00:52:08
Founder Jordan Samuel on launching less products
Feb 06, 2025

Jordan Samuel, a former ballet dancer, launched his eponymous skin care brand in 2013, with just two products: The After Show Treatment Cleanser and the Hydrate Facial Serum.


He has grown, since then, but remained small, which he calls, a “badge of honor.” The brand is beloved by leading skin care influencers like Caroline Hirons (776,000 Instagram followers). It is primarily DTC but is carried at the fast facial bar, Formula Fig, as well as C.O. Bigelow, and available to international customers via Cult Beauty.


In this episode of the Glos...

Duration: 00:44:01
Amanda Kloots on Proper, her new brand of supplements in partnership with The Center
Jan 30, 2025

To her 769,000 Instagram followers, fitness entrepreneur-turned-brand founder Amanda Kloots feels like a friend who just happens to sometimes star in movies or host TV shows — she wrapped her gig on CBS's "The Talk" when the show ended last year and hosts "Live From The Other Side" on Netflix. Some of her fans have been following her journey since she started teaching fitness classes nearly a decade ago, in 2016. That was when she first transitioned out of her previous career as a Radio City Rockette and Broadway dancer and started building her fitness business, Amanda Kloots Fitness.

Earlier thi...

Duration: 00:45:55
Remedy Place’s Dr. Jonathan Leary: 'Social self-care' is the future of wellness
Jan 23, 2025

Dr. Jonathan Leary is on a mission to change how and where consumers socialize. 

“We're the world's first social wellness club. What I mean by that is we're not a gym, we're not a spa, we don't do beauty, and we don't do aesthetics. All we do is self-care, but made social,” said Remedy Place founder and CEO Dr. Leary. “I'm really trying to change the narrative of how people socialize, but in a healthy way.”

That means he encourages his clients to substitute happy hour for a group cryotherapy appointment or a work meeting for a grou...

Duration: 00:48:15
Dr. David Shafer on GLP-1s, NAD and metabolic optimization
Jan 16, 2025

Dr. David Shafer has been a practicing plastic surgeon for 15 years, but since 2020, the Shafer Clinic, where he practices, has also operated Advitam, a metabolic aesthetics clinic. Through Dr. Shafer's work with both, he sees patients who are striving to lose weight or gain energy, and he's also had a front-row seat to the rise of GLP-1s. In the plastic surgery clinic, patients may come in for skin removal surgery, having lost a lot of weight taking a GLP-1. At Advitam, they may be supervised while taking one. If you've seen headlines in the past year about Ozempic...

Duration: 00:35:38
Your Reformer’s Emma Stallworthy on scaling subscription pilates in the US
Jan 09, 2025

Despite being around for nearly 100 years, pilates has never been so popular. 

As previously reported by Glossy, search volume for “pilates” was at an all-time high in January 2004, with small yearly spikes each January since. It wasn’t until 2022 that search numbers topped those 2004 numbers before hitting an all-time in January 2023 and then again in January of 2024. 

However, searches have already topped 2024 numbers during the first week of the new year, according to Google Trends. The highest search numbers are coming from Australia, Singapore, New Zealand and the U.K. The U.S. ranks ninth for sear...

Duration: 00:45:35
The Glossy Beauty Podcast's 2025 industry predictions
Jan 02, 2025

For this week's special episode, Glossy Beauty Podcast co-hosts Sara Spruch-Feiner and Lexy Lebsack brought on colleague Emily Jensen to discuss six topics — all 2024 trends they expect will continue to dominate in the year to come or emerging trends they believe will be big topics of conversation. These included the pending TikTok ban and how it will affect beauty brands, the shifts in influencer marketing including the question of "authenticity," the rise-and-rise of the fragrance category, the boom in sports and beauty partnerships, the impact of GLP-1 drugs on skin care, and the nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fo...

Duration: 01:09:22
The Glossy Beauty Podcast’s 2024 can’t-miss moments
Dec 26, 2024

Glossy reporters Lexy Lebsack, Sara Spruch-Feiner and Emma Sandler welcomed dozens of guests onto the Glossy Beauty Podcast in 2024. This included top executives at L’Oréal Group and Kendo Brands; longtime industry leaders from Retrouvé and Versed; and breakout indie brand founders from Flamingo Estate and Fazit.

But it was the six interviews highlighted below that best capture the ways in which the beauty industry changed in 2024. In today’s special end-of-year podcast episode, Lebsack and Spruch-Feiner walk through six can’t-miss clips.

In the clips ahead, Estée Lauder VP Chloe Green-Vamos discusses how the c...

Duration: 00:36:59
Versed's Katherine Power and Lola Gonzalez Marra: ‘Every great brand should evolve its look and feel every five years’
Dec 19, 2024

“I believe that every great brand should evolve its look and feel about every five years,” said Katherine Power, serial entrepreneur and the founder of Versed skin care. “Since our launch in 2019, we've seen that our core customer, who is primarily an older millennial or young Gen X — I call them Xennials — has really grown along with us, and we wanted to continue to grow with them and to create something fresh and modern.”

This included a refresh of packaging, visuals and language overseen by Lola Gonzalez Marra, Versed’s longtime creative lead. Power and Marra have worked togethe...

Duration: 00:35:57
Fazit's founders on how Taylor Swift and her glitter freckles changed their business
Dec 12, 2024

Aliett Buttelman and Nina LaBruna launched Fazit Beauty in January 2022. When it first debuted, the brand focused on various skin-care patches. In the years since, it has built a following on TikTok (76,000 followers) with products like oversized acne patches, silicone scar patches and patches that help treat ingrown hairs. According to Buttelman, by October 2024, the brand had amassed around 200 million views on the app when its trajectory changed overnight.

That's because, in October, Taylor Swift wore Fazit's Faux Freckle Makeup Patches to a Kansas City Chiefs game. The patches, which come in a variety of metallic hues...

Duration: 00:52:26
Sumin Lee on why Beauty of Joseon is blowing up in the US before its native Korea
Dec 05, 2024

If you've scrolled TikTok lately, perhaps you've come across a sunscreen from K-beauty brand Beauty of Joseon. On the app, it's somewhat ubiquitous. Sumin Lee is part of a team that acquired the brand and totally reinvented it, introducing the version today's U.S. consumers know in 2019. In the five years since, it's become a hit, particularly for its sunscreens, including the Relief Sun Aqua-Fresh: Rice + B5 (SPF50+ PA++++). It not only uses advanced SPF filters that were previously unavailable in the U.S., but it's also relatively affordable, at $18.

The brand has taken off not only...

Duration: 00:46:10
Special Episode: The year's Black Friday-Cyber Monday retail trends
Nov 28, 2024

According to market research analytics companies and retail industry trade groups, American consumers are forecasted to spend nearly a trillion dollars on holiday shopping this year. 

Specifically, shoppers could spend around $1,778 each, up 8% from 2023, according to new data released by Deloitte. Meanwhile, holiday sales could grow an estimated 2.5-3.5% to reach $990 billion in sales from November 1 to December 31, up from $964.4 billion in 2023, according to the National Retail Federation. 

However, how consumers will spend this money — and on what — has yet to be seen.

In this special Thanksgiving crossover episode with sister publication Modern Retail...

Duration: 00:42:51
Fundraising lessons with Flamingo Estate founder Richard Christiansen: 'No one cares about the story'
Nov 21, 2024

Richard Christiansen has learned many priceless lessons since he began fundraising for his brand, Flamingo Estate, around two years ago. 

This includes his surprising realization that many investors care little about the brand or the founder’s story. Instead, he said, there's a near-universal desire among the VC set for 90% margins across personal care products. 

“Know your audience; they're there to look at the numbers. … No one cares about the [brand or founder] story,” he told Glossy. "I, too, spent so much time on the storytelling, but at that moment, in those meetings, it's only about the...

Duration: 00:52:52
JB Skrub's Jill Biren on marketing to tween boys
Nov 14, 2024

Before the "aha" moment that led to the creation of JB Skrub, the brand she co-founded with "Modern Family" star Julie Bowen, Jill Biren worked in magazine publishing at Condé Nast for 16 years. But then, one day, she was packing her 9-year-old son up for camp and realized there wasn't a personal care brand made for him. He was too old to bring baby soap to camp, and she didn't want to send him with a synthetically fragranced men's product. And so, an idea was born.

Bowen, also a boy mom, related to this struggle, and the tw...

Duration: 00:53:50
Skin-care founder Angela Caglia on the stem cell technology that created 437% sales growth: 'It's transformed the business'
Nov 07, 2024

After more than seven years in business, Angela Caglia Skincare is having its hockey stick moment. 

“Our sales are up 437% in the past year,” founder Angela Caglia told Glossy. “We'll finish this year at close to $4 million [in sales] and around 90% of that will be the Cell Forté Serum; it’s all we're promoting.”

Since launching the hero product in October 2023, the brand’s Cell Forté Serum has garnered several beauty industry awards from publications like Elle, Byrdie, TZR and Essence, and sold out three times on Violet Grey. And it was the catalyst for the brand’s exp...

Duration: 00:46:25
By Rosie Jane's Rosie Jane Johnston on entering mass retail via Target: 'Prestige consumers shop everywhere today'
Oct 31, 2024

Years ago, a strong retail strategy often included brands staying in one pricing category, such as mass, prestige or luxury. Today, those best practices have come into question. 

“It’s strategic, … and it's also nerve-racking at the same time,” Rosie Jane Johnston, founder of fine fragrance and body-care line By Rosie Jane, told Glossy about her company’s expansion into the mass market this month through Target. “It’s always been in the back of my mind to make By Rosie Jane, particularly the body-care side of the brand, accessible in a real way.” 

As of this week, John...

Duration: 00:43:21
Matt Newman (@Mattloveshair) on using educational content to build a large and loyal following
Oct 24, 2024

When the pandemic hit, Matt Newman, like many hairstylists, found himself at home unoccupied. Eventually, though, he took his expertise to TikTok — and today, he has 2.4 million followers on the platform and another 1.2 million on Instagram.

Regularly working with brands like Tresemmé, he's known for both his tutorials and his takes on viral trends and hacks. But what he is most proud of in his four years of content creation is simply teaching people how to do their hair, he said. "The thing people tell me when I meet my internet friends in real life, is, 'You taug...

Duration: 00:46:50
Beachwaver’s Sarah Potempa on live-selling and reaching 1 million units sold on TikTok Shop
Oct 17, 2024

Sarah Potempa, celebrity hairstylist and co-founder of The Beachwaver, is a live-selling expert.

It all started in 2012 when she launched her first product, the original Beachwaver rotating curling iron, live on QVC. “It was wild because they said, ‘Don't get too excited — you might get four or five shows in your first year.’ … And then I was on QVC over 50 times my first year,” she told Glossy. 

She thrived in the medium and was able to reach a growing number of consumers looking for an easier way to create beachy waves at home. She sold out frequentl...

Duration: 01:04:49
Claudia Sulewski on Cyklar's rebrand 1 year after launch
Oct 10, 2024

Claudia Sulewski's career started at age 11, when she launched her YouTube channel with a video about applying her mom's blue eyeshadow. Today, the channel has 2.46 million followers. On Instagram, Sulewski also has 2 million followers, and she has yet another 1.1 million on TikTok. Last year, she translated her success as a creator into the launch of her brand, Cyklar, which she bootstrapped and debuted with one product, a body cream.

In March of this year, Cyklar received investment from The Center, the brand incubator and investment firm that runs Phlur, Make, Prequel and Saltair — it sold Naturium to E.l...

Duration: 00:40:42
Luminaire’s Sukeena Rao: 'VICs are the driving force of the luxury business'
Oct 03, 2024

“VICs are the driving force of the luxury business,” Sukeena Rao, co-founder of London-based personal shopping firm Luminaire, told Glossy. “They count for a large percentage of global sales with pretty much every brand.”

VICs, or "very important customers," is shorthand in the luxury market for a growing subset of high-end, wealthy shoppers that are “very low key, very off the radar [and] not known to the public,” Rao told Glossy. It’s part of what she calls a shifting market where, 15-20 years ago, the luxury shopper was mostly well-known celebrities or very wealthy public figures. Whereas now, l...

Duration: 00:47:26
DedCool's Carina Chaz on 'reshaping the way fragrance is defined and experienced'
Sep 26, 2024

With the fragrance industry expected to generate $59.9 billion in 2024, both new and heritage brands are strategizing to differentiate in the growing market. For some, the result is offering niche scents, and for others, it's leveraging communities. For 8-year-old DedCool, a genderless, planet-first and functional approach is what sets it apart, said founder Carina Chaz.

Since launching DedCool in 2016 with a self-investment of $10,000, Chaz has made her brand one to watch. In August 2022, Dedcool expanded to Sephora stores and its e-commerce channels and introduced three new product categories, including air fresheners, candles and laundry detergent. The latter, Chaz...

Duration: 00:35:50
Black Girl Sunscreen founder Shontay Lundy: ‘The retail landscape is not what it used to be’
Sep 19, 2024

Shontay Lundy is on a mission to disrupt the sun-care space. 

She is the founder of Black Girl Sunscreen, a sunscreen brand she launched in 2016 as an alternative to the many sunscreen formulas that leave a white cast on skin, a problem that’s particularly noticeable on medium and dark complexions. The line was an instant hit and she quickly gained wide distribution at Target, CVS, Ulta Beauty, Walgreens, and Walmart, among other retailers. The brand also sells direct-to-consumer and on Amazon.

In 2019, Lundy launched a children’s line called BGS Kids, which features its own b...

Duration: 00:57:03
Experiment's Lisa Guerrera and Emmy Ketcham on creating a brand for the 'nerdy, smart girl who ends up being cool in adulthood'
Sep 12, 2024

Lisa Guerrera and Emmy Ketcham, co-founders of Experiment, met in 2019 at an event for the Sephora Accelerate program, which Guerrera participated in with her first business.

Together, they soft-launched their skin-care brand in 2020 with a lime-green silicone sheet mask. Since then, the brand has grown to include products including a glycerin-based hydrating serum, a “micro-slugging” oil gel and a lip balm. Its first cleanser will launch in a few weeks.

In April, Experiment announced a $3.3 million seed round, led by Greycroft.

On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, the duo discus...

Duration: 00:55:59
Estée Lauder VP Chloe Green-Vamos talks data, AI and reverse mentorship
Sep 05, 2024

Chloe Green-Vamos, the vp of global innovation strategy at the Estée Lauder Companies, leads the company's global research and development strategy, innovation portfolio insights and analytics, and enterprise innovation planning. She’s also the chief of staff to Estee Lauder Companies’ chief research, product and innovation officer, Carl Haney.

Green-Vamos represents a new kind of executive role at a company like Estée Lauder — one that heavily relies upon collecting and understanding all types of new and emerging digital and consumer data, as well as the newest forms of media, technology and social media.

On the l...

Duration: 00:45:55
Industry veteran Sarah Creal on creating a brand for women over 40: 'I was part of the problem'
Aug 29, 2024

Sarah Creal got her start in beauty while working at a Clinique counter. But it wasn't long before Creal was working in product development and marketing at major brands including Bobbi Brown, Tom Ford and Prada Beauty. In 2018, she co-founded Victoria Beckham Beauty with the former Spice Girl herself — she was CEO of that company until 2022.

Then, earlier this summer, she debuted Sarah Creal Beauty, designed for luxury shoppers over 40. Sold direct-to-consumer since its launch, the brand is made up of a tight edit of skin-care and color cosmetics products including a concealer, a brightening and hydrating es...

Duration: 00:45:21
Tennis star Sloane Stephens on launching Doc & Glo: ‘Entrepreneurship is not for the weak’
Aug 22, 2024

Sloane Stephens started playing tennis at 9 years old and quickly climbed the ranks, beating Serena Williams in the 2013 Australian Open at age 19. She is the founder of The Sloane Stephens Foundation, which works to introduce tennis to underserved students — and, as of August 21, she is the founder of Doc & Glo, a body-care line that debuted with two products: the $18 Game-Changing Deodorant and the $22 24/7 Hustle Deodorizing Body Mist. The brand is named after Stephens’ grandparents. Her grandfather was an OB/GYN, while her grandmother "had all these girls' groups and always gave back," Stephens said on the Glossy Beauty Podcast.

Duration: 00:41:06
Beautycounter alum and Ritual chief impact officer Lindsay Dahl on how to lead a mission-driven brand
Aug 15, 2024

Back in 2014, Lindsay Dahl’s career trajectory took an unexpected turn. She’d spent a decade working at chemical safety- and environmental-focused nonprofits in Washington D.C. before she got an offer she couldn’t refuse. 

“I never thought I would go to the corporate side,” Dahl told Glossy. “If I'm being honest, I really liked being a part of the nonprofit community where I felt like I could be both challenging companies and also challenging those in power in government.”

But then she got a call from Beautycounter. “I sat down and talked to Gregg [Renfrew...

Duration: 00:46:53
L'Oréal President Nathalie Gerschtein on intuition, trends and the mass beauty shopper: ‘There's really only one consumer’
Aug 08, 2024

Nathalie Gerschtein’s career at L’Oréal started before she even graduated college. 

“One of the reasons I joined L'Oréal, [which I met] on campus [in college], was because it would give me the opportunity to work internationally, and I knew I really wanted to discover different cultures, different go-to-market strategies,” she told Glossy. “Then when I started to work in beauty, I realized how joyful it is because beauty is about self-esteem, it's about self-confidence, it's about self-expression. And it makes people happy to interact with this category. So here I am, 22 years after starting in L...

Duration: 00:42:52
Cosmetic chemist Javon Ford on his unorthodox career path
Aug 01, 2024

When Javon Ford (@javonford16, 455,400 TikTok followers) graduated college, he knew he wanted to be a chemist and wanted to work in the cosmetics industry. What he didn’t anticipate was becoming wildly popular on TikTok with nearly half a million followers.

Ford’s background in chemistry, working on making new formulations for cosmetics companies, has given him an in-depth knowledge of what goes into beauty and skin-care products. His videos involve him busting some of the most widespread myths in beauty and skin care, pointing out which ingredients are harmful or, more commonly, useless. In a recent vide...

Duration: 00:41:06
After selling Kiehl’s to L’Oréal, the Heidegger family is ready to scale Retrouvé
Jul 25, 2024

When it comes to influential families in the beauty industry, Jami Morse Heidegger and daughter Hannah Heidegger are in a class all their own. They represent the third and fourth generations of skin-care brand owners in the U.S. dating back to the late 1800s. 

After immigrating to the U.S. as a child, Jami’s grandfather Irving Morse apprenticed for John Kiehl, the founder of Kiehl’s Apothecary in New York City. In 1921, when Kiehl retired, he allowed Morse to buy the brand and, for the next eight decades, it was Morse’s family business. For Jami, K...

Duration: 01:19:07
Tweens Talk Beauty
Jul 18, 2024

This week, the Glossy Beauty Podcast welcomed three very special guests: Ali, 10, of New York City; Riley, 11, of Merrick, New York; and Leora, 12, of Bay Shore, New York. The three girls joined us in a Flatiron, NYC recording studio, where we sat down to talk all things beauty.

Glossy Pop has fastidiously reported on the tween obsession with skin care for months, examining the rise of brands that cater to the demographic, younger and younger girls’ beauty obsession vis-a-vis social media, the rise of Gen Alpha influencer-queen Katie Fang, and the Sephora tween brouhaha.

On this w...

Duration: 00:29:52
213Deli founders on building a ‘text commerce’ beauty retailer: ‘Nobody wants to download an app’
Jul 11, 2024

Before business partners Nicole Collins and Corey Weiss launched the 213Deli text-commerce beauty shopping platform last year, they were behind the scenes working for digital commerce trailblazers like Ipsy and Flip. 

Weiss worked in media at Sony Pictures and Yahoo before spending a decade growing the business side of Ipsy, a beauty subscription service started by Michelle Phan in 2011, where he met Collins. Meanwhile, Collins spent four years at Ipsy growing the brand partnerships team before joining the founding team at Flip, a shopping social network. Collins was also the co-founder of Yume, a Chinese-American company responsible f...

Duration: 00:40:42
Jess Hunt on Refy Beauty's signature Brow Sculpt, recent complexion launch and success at Sephora
Jun 27, 2024

Jess Hunt, now 27, has been creating content for over a decade. She has 1.7 million followers on Instagram, where she got started, and another 184,000 on TikTok. Through her career as a content creator, she met Jenna Meek, formerly the founder of a beauty brand called Shrine, who eventually became her co-founder. Today, the duo runs Refy Beauty. Refy launched in 2020 and hit shelves at Sephora by 2021.

Hunt's bold, bushy brows provided the impetus for Refy. On set for a photoshoot, Meek watched Hunt doing her brow makeup and asked her for details. Hunt spilled that it took a...

Duration: 00:39:12
DC attorney Katlin McKelvie on forming MOCRA in the Senate and the 'black box' deadline coming next from FDA
Jun 20, 2024

In December, America’s first big move to regulate the beauty industry in more than 80 years went into effect with the Modernization of Cosmetics Regulatory Act of 2022, best known as MoCRA. But it isn’t until the end of this month that the industry will meet its first big deadline from the Food & Drug Administration. 

By July 1, brands and manufacturers must provide a list of their products and where they were made to the FDA through its online portal called Cosmetics Direct. It’s the first of many deadlines and requirements, some of which are still in flux, t...

Duration: 00:34:59
Deepica Mutyala on growing Live Tinted's complexion category
Jun 13, 2024

In May, Live Tinted turned five years old. The brand was founded by Deepica Mutyala, a veteran of both the corporate beauty space, as a one-time manager at Birchbox, and the creator space — Mutyala has 502,000 followers on Instagram. Live Tinted launched in 2018, four years after Mutyala went viral on YouTube (333,000 followers) for a video about correcting dark circles with red lipstick. That video, which has 10 million views, landed her a segment on "The Today Show," and led to her quitting her full-time job and focusing full-time on the beauty brand.

Today, Live Tinted sells the Huestick All-Over Colo...

Duration: 00:37:10
AS Beauty Group's Sara Mitzner: 'We keep women 40 and older in mind' at every stage of the brand
Jun 06, 2024

Unlike many beauty executives, Sara Mitzner, vp of brand marketing at AS Beauty Group since 2019, started her career in fashion. Her resume includes roles a Complex, Fullbeauty Brands and Swimsuits for All. AS Beauty Group is a personal care product company that owns Cover FX, Laura Geller Beauty, Julep Beauty, Mally Beauty and Bliss brands.

Mitzner has led many of AS Beauty brands' biggest marketing moves, including Laura Geller Beauty pivoting its strategy to attract and acquire more mature consumers. According to Mitzner, in April, AS Beauty Group's sales were up 140% year-over-year. "It's been fun for me...

Duration: 00:49:58
Taylor Frankel on 10 years of Nudestix
May 30, 2024

Taylor Frankel is one of three co-founders of Toronto-based Nudestix. And, as the beauty brand's main face, she has been spending the year celebrating its 10-year anniversary. She founded the brand with her sister, Ally Frankel, and her mother, industry veteran Jenny Frankel, when the two sisters were teenagers.

In today's competitive beauty market, making it to the 10-year mark deserves to be celebrated. As such, the brand has kicked off a tour, during which Frankel will participate in brand activations in her home base in Toronto, as well as in New York, Los Angeles and London...

Duration: 00:48:25
Mielle's Monique Rodríguez on prioritizing 'innovation and meeting the needs of the ever-changing consumer'
May 23, 2024

When Mielle Organics founder and CEO Monique Rodriguez started the textured hair-care brand in her kitchen 10 years ago, her goal was to create healthy organic products for her textured hair.

Now, a decade later, Mielle Organics has become a household name and staple for many consumers with varying hair types. The brand is distributed in over 87 countries and over 100,000 stores across the U.S. In January 2023, Mielle Organics was acquired by consumer goods company Procter & Gamble for an undisclosed sum.

On this week's episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, Rodriguez discusses what's next for Mielle...

Duration: 00:34:11
Prequel Skin's Dr. Sam Ellis: 'There's space for a dermatologist-founded brand that is more approachable and not prestige'
May 16, 2024

Prequel Skin is less than a year old. But the direct-to-consumer brand, founded by dermatologist Dr. Sam Ellis, in partnership with Ben Bennett's incubator, The Center, has caught on. That can be owed, at least in part, to Ellis's social following: She has 336,000 YouTube subscribers, 226,000 Instagram followers and over 129,000 followers on TikTok.

The brand's products span multitasking cleansers and moisturizers for the face and body, skin barrier-boosting ointments and a duo of serums, including one with vitamin C and one meant to address skin redness.

On this week’s episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast, Dr...

Duration: 00:37:59
Prose CMO Megan Streeter: AI is at the core of who we are
May 09, 2024

When Prose launched in 2017, custom hair care was an untapped market, allowing the brand to disrupt the space. Since then, Prose has sold over 10 million units and expanded to skin care, in May 2023.

May 2023 also marked a significant milestone for Prose: It reached profitability before bringing in about $135 million in sales for the year. In 2024, co-founder and CEO Arnaud Plas estimates the brand will do about $160 million in sales. Plas credited the brand's skin-care line as a major driving force behind its profitability. It has been reported that the category accounts for about 10% of the brand's sales.<...

Duration: 00:33:56
Westman Atelier's Gucci Westman & David Neville: An engaging, authentic founder is 'very rare in the luxury category'
May 02, 2024

Since launching in 2018, Westman Atelier has become one of the most covetable brands in luxury beauty. From the $68 foundation sticks that introduced the brand to the market to newer launches like the Lip Suede Matte Lipstick ($50) and, most recently, the Suprême C serum ($325), the brand's products are the kind that people like to show off on their vanities or pull out of their handbags. The Suprême C serum is its second skin care product — the brand will be leaning more heavily into the category in the months ahead, with plans to grow it to 10% of its business in t...

Duration: 00:50:27
Billie's Georgina Gooley on the company's post-acquisition growth
Apr 25, 2024

As more consumers indulge in self-care at home, the body-care category is continuing to grow, allowing brands to seize the moment.

For 7-year-old body-care brand Billie, which was acquired for $310 million by personal care company Edgewell in 2021, the body-care surge couldn't have come at a better time. Before the acquisition, Billie solely sold direct-to-consumer. But in 2022, it launched in Walmart before expanding to Amazon, Target, Ulta and Kroger last year. In February, Billie rolled out its biggest category expansion yet with new body wash, body lotion and deodorant products.

On this week’s episode of the G...

Duration: 00:29:57
Digiday Media Presents: The Return Season Three
Apr 21, 2024

Digiday Media's WorkLife is proud to present season three of The Return, a podcast about the modern workforce, with this season focused on middle management.

Last season, we heard what it’s like for Gen Z to enter the workforce for the first time in a post-pandemic world. We highlighted themes like why values are so important to Gen Zers, whether or not they are loyal to their employers, how they use TikTok for career advice, what it means to be a young professional who is a boss to older workers, and so much more.

Th...

Duration: 00:03:25
Tina Chen Craig on being 'the world's most reluctant beauty founder'
Apr 18, 2024

Tina Chen Craig started Bag Snob, her original claim to fame, in 2005. She hustled her way to the front row of New York Fashion Week when "blogger" was still a dirty word and before "influencer" was in anyone's vocabulary. Then, in 2019, she did something she never expected to do and launched a beauty product, marking her first step in building a full beauty brand spanning skin care, body care and color cosmetics.

Called U Beauty, the brand launched on Net-a-Porter in November 2019 with Chen Craig's original product, the Resurfacing Compound. Based on units sold, it's still the...

Duration: 00:56:25
Rodial Group CEO Maria Hatzistefanis on growing a self-funded beauty brand
Apr 11, 2024

Running two beauty businesses without outside funding is no small feat, but Maria Hatzistefanis, founder and CEO of Rodial and Nip+Fab, is making it work. And her businesses are thriving.

Hatzistefanis launched the luxury skin-care and makeup brand Rodial in 1999, after being fired from her investment banking job in her early 20s. She went on to launch Nip+Fab in 2010. Now best known for its bestselling Glycolic Fix product range, Nip+Fab was originally meant to be Rodial's more accessible, mass-market little sister.

"My idea [for both brands] was to come up with products...

Duration: 00:33:05
Katie Sturino on bringing Megababe to the masses
Apr 04, 2024

Along with being the founder of 7-year-old Megababe, Katie Sturino is an influencer (803,000 followers on Instagram, 25,000 on TikTok), a body positivity advocate and the author of the book "Body Talk," published in 2021.

Megababe is best known for its first product: Thigh Rescue, an anti-chafe stick of which over 1 million units have sold. In addition to being sold at Target, Ulta, Goop, Anthropologie and Nordstrom, among other retailers, the brand launched at Walmart in early March.

"Megababe is still self-funded; we have never taken $1 of fundraising," Sturino said on this week's episode of the Glossy Beauty...

Duration: 00:34:18
CEO Oliver Zak on Mad Rabbit's Walmart expansion, Discord community and competition
Mar 28, 2024

Tattoos are now big business for the beauty industry.

Since 2021, tattooing and tattoo care products have attracted both investor and strategic acquirer attention. Brands like Mad Rabbit have raised millions in outside funding to provide tattooed customers with before, during and aftercare products. According to a 2015 Harris Poll, more Americans are getting tattoos, with 29% having at least one. Specifically, 47% of millennials have one compared to over 36% of Gen Xers. What was previously associated with only select groups of people, tattoos are now more common among people from all walks of life.

“A big agenda of Ma...

Duration: 00:31:32
Lo Bosworth on expanding Love Wellness beyond vaginal health
Mar 21, 2024

Love Wellness, the supplements brand created by "Laguna Beach" alum Lo Bosworth in 2016, is now eight years old. The brand's bestsellers include its Good Girl Probiotics and The Killer boric acid suppositories, both designed to support vaginal health, as well as its Bye Bye Bloat de-bloating supplement, of which 2 million bottles have sold. Last week, Bye Bye Bloat became a full-blown franchise with the launch of the brand's first true body-care products: a $14.99 Lymphatic Massage Roller, a $24.99 Firming Clay Body Mask and a $19.99 Detoxifying Body Oil.

On this week's episode of The Glossy Beauty Podcast, Bosworth discusses...

Duration: 00:38:39
Clinique global brand president Michelle Freyre: Brand relevancy is key to 'break through and achieve success'
Mar 14, 2024

When Clinique’s 52-year-old Black Honey lipstick went viral on TikTok in 2021, it represented a major shift for both the decades-old brand and the beauty industry.

For the industry, it introduced the notion that viral TikTok moments could be a cash windfall for brands and worthy of their always-on marketing attention. For Clinique, it jumpstarted the need for the brand to act like a nimble startup and affirm its cultural currency. Since then, Clinique has been bullish on reaching younger consumers through college campus activations, building on its Black Honey fame with new products, and further developing it...

Duration: 00:53:26
Sara Foster on Favorite Daughter's expansion to 'multiple categories'
Mar 07, 2024

Though actor, podcaster, investor and brand founder Sara Foster never intended to launch a clothing line, it turns out she's quite good at it. Four-year-old Favorite Daughter, which she and her sister Erin Foster created in partnership with Centric Brands, was profitable by year two, she said. In 2023, the brand tiptoed into beauty, launching a duo of lip oils with Saint Jane, the "clean" beauty brand founded by Casey Georgeson. Now, with Georgeson's help, Favorite Daughter is launching its first two fragrances — one for each sister. Sara Foster's signature is called "Grecian Nights," while Erin Foster's is "Italian Summers."

<...

Duration: 00:42:46
Kendo Brands' Sarah Koch: Brand relevance is 'the million-dollar question'
Feb 29, 2024

Maintaining the cultural relevancy of a 40-year-old brand is no small feat. However, Sarah Koch, svp and gm of Kendo Brands, is up to the task when it comes to OleHenriksen skin care.

“You have to be true to your core as a brand, but then you have to continue to evolve with the consumer so that you're relevant to where he or she is in their lives,” said Koch on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty podcast.

The anti-aging brand was founded in 1983 by Ole Henriksen, a Danish esthetician who developed a collection of p...

Duration: 00:36:12
CEO Kyle Leahy on what Glossier has in common with Taylor Swift and whether it's reformulated its You fragrance
Feb 22, 2024

Kyle Leahy, Glossier's first CEO after its founder Emily Weiss vacated the role in May 2022, has had a busy first year-and-a-half in the job. She brought the brand into wholesale for the first time. brokering its partnership with Sephora, which has been a great success. She's also continued the brand's WNBA partnership, launched its first college tour and increased the cadence of its launches. But perhaps most importantly, she can be credited with the revival of the brand, which, as she said in her 2023 Glossy 50 profile, is a long-haul job: “We genuinely believe we’re on year 10 of building a 100...

Duration: 00:38:58
Allergan Aesthetics' Carrie Strom on the 'aesthetics generation' and new frontiers for injectables
Feb 15, 2024

Botox has dominated the neurotoxin market since its FDA approval for cosmetic use in 2002. However, its iconic status would not be possible without the backing of global company Allergan Aesthetics.

In addition to Botox, Allergan Aesthetics itself a subsidiary of pharmaceutical company AbbVie, which houses aesthetics brands including Juvéderm, SkinVive, Kybella and Coolsculpting, among others. In its full-year 2023 earnings released in February, AbbVie reported that the global net revenue of its aesthetics portfolio was about $5.3 billion, with global Botox Cosmetic's net revenue reaching $2.7 billion and global Juvéderm's net revenue equalling $1.4 billion. Leading this portfolio of ae...

Duration: 00:33:36
Renée Rouleau on taking on retail partners after 27 years in business
Feb 08, 2024

Renée Rouleau, the celebrity esthetician and entrepreneur, opened her first spa and launched her first product in 1996. By 1999, she had become an early entrant in e-commerce.

Today, rather than giving facials, Rouleau is focused on her role of founder and CEO of her brand, which offers a robust assortment of SKUs. Still, she makes time for celebrity clients, which include Lili Reinhart and Demi Lovato. Rouleau is known for her unique approach to categorizing skin — she does so by assigning it to nine types, rather than the traditional three or four. 

On this week’s epis...

Duration: 00:36:48
Moroccanoil's Carmen Tal: 'The way the consumer is going to the salon has changed'
Feb 01, 2024

Though Moroccanoil co-founder Carmen Tal initially launched the 15-year-old hair- and body-care brand with little to no beauty experience, she has been able to grow it into a global empire.

In February 2023, Moroccanoil, which is currently distributed through thousands of salons, announced a three-day, Las Vegas-based event for professional hairstylists called The Collective. Meant to showcase the brand's network of global talent, the sold-out event eventually hosted 2,000 people in Las Vegas.

"Every [attendee] had the opportunity to either learn or demonstrate their skills. It was incredible to see the [hair-care] community, which is very close...

Duration: 00:38:02
E.l.f. Beauty's Laurie Lam on the brand's latest marketing project, a film dubbed 'Cosmetic Criminals'
Jan 25, 2024

This week, we’re doing things a little differently. Joining us on the Glossy Beauty Podcast is Laurie Lam, E.l.f. Beauty's chief brand officer, providing an up-close look at the beauty brand’s latest project: a 15-minute short film, “Cosmetic Criminals,” which is playing in select AMC theaters before the start of the movie “Mean Girls”. It is also streaming on Amazon Freevee. The film parodies the true crime genre, prompting viewers to piece together who is “E.l.f.-pinching,” which is the brand’s term for “borrowing” products without intending to return them. The concept, Lam said, was introduc...

Duration: 00:26:22