(0:00:00) Rochelle: So I think, you know, you have to have right retail partners. And we started off with Sephora and we’re on sephora.com and they were really in the kitchen helping us make sure we were coming out like that. Everything we were doing was on the right track, making changes where we might have been off. And, you know, they continue to be, wonderful partner in that aspect.
(0:00:21) Rochelle: And I think having someone with their expertise, experience and kind of credibility, really, it’s almost like a seal of approval when you when, you know, you know what? It’s I think most humans, who shop. And so I know what it takes to get in. Hi.
(0:00:37) Courtney: My name is Courtney. And welcome to how they scaled it, where scaling is done with both sides of the brain. Today I’m excited to welcome Rochelle Jacobs, co-founder of Naturally Serious Rochelle’s, to career journey is a unique one. She started out in Wall Street before moving into corporate finance, and then finally transitioned into the world of beauty and wellness, where she spent years building and scaling brands.
(0:01:01) Courtney: With naturally curious, Rochelle can find her passion for scaling businesses with a mission to offer clean, effective skincare. Since its launch in 2018, Naturally Curious has carved out a place in the clean beauty movement with a tight product line that appeals to everyone from first time skincare users to seasoned beauty enthusiasts. Rochelle, it is such an honor to have you here today.
(0:01:22) Courtney: Welcome to how they scaled it.
(0:01:24) Rochelle: Thank you so much for having me, Courtney. That was great. I, I feel like I don’t even have to say that. You just said everything.
(0:01:30) Courtney: I ended up.
(0:01:32) Rochelle: Doing is.
(0:01:33) Courtney: Like, do you want to dig into kind of your career journey because you did start on Wall Street, moved into corporate finance? But how did you get from kind of that we attract into beauty what inspired that pivot?
(0:01:47) Rochelle: So I was a die hard finance everything. My that was like my whole entire life. And, but truth be told, I was born into beauty. Not just because I’m a woman who loves skincare, but because my grandmother and her, you know, six, sisters and her 12 sister in laws, all made all of their own skincare products.
(0:02:11) Rochelle: So I was raised watching them do that. I’m older. So before there was Sephora or Ulta to buy products that, barely department stores at that, you know, doing some of that stuff. It was mostly makeup back then. And, my mother was born into this also. So she really was the pioneer in this. And I’m kind of riding on her coattails to a certain extent, because she really came up with some of these great ideas.
(0:02:37) Rochelle: And, that’s how I got into beauty.
(0:02:39) Courtney: Yeah. So really, the Wall Street and corporate finance was a distraction from your truth.
(0:02:45) Rochelle: It was really like, those were, like, more of a job than it.
(0:02:47) Courtney: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Interesting. And so, What I guess what drove you to want to get into Wall Street and corporate finance? Were you just, like, interested in the business side of things more than the skincare part of things to start?
(0:02:59) Rochelle: Well, at that time, I didn’t think you could have a career in making skincare products. That wasn’t really something I thought of that I, you know, I just knew I’ve always wanted to be in finance. I my mother made sure I had subscriptions to the Wall Street Journal in the New York Times. Yeah. Starting in junior high school, I was very well read and very interested in everything.
(0:03:19) Rochelle: I kind it fascinating, and very fast. And so I never thought I would leave that until, 1999, when, I kind of saw my mother had started Peter Thomas Roth, with Peter. They’ve been business partners since, the early 90s. And this little tiny business started getting some real traction, and I thought I could go in and help them create a finance department.
(0:03:43) Rochelle: Yeah. So, it kind of went from that to, you know, there’s only a few employees at the time. So it was my hand in everything. And I just became obsessed.
(0:03:55) Courtney: Yeah. Well, I think that, you probably brought such a interesting perspective to the business, seeing so much of like that corporate finance side. But one thing that I really appreciate about your story is that you started working in manufacturing. And to build that brand, when you, when you entered into the company. So how that was an accident.
(0:04:16) Courtney: Yeah. How did that happen?
(0:04:18) Rochelle: And then happened on my first day, after I you know, I when we decided I was going to join in September of 99 and, the first day my mother said, we’re opening up our manufacturing facility. So new Jersey, figure it out. You know, that was a little bit to me. Wasn’t quite that yet, but it was, basically like, okay, sure, if we’ll go do that, why not?
(0:04:42) Courtney: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I guess like at that time when you’re especially when you’re with a younger brand, you’re just kind of figuring stuff out these gifts to say yes to things and take bigger risks.
(0:04:53) Rochelle: And I had no idea what I was signing up for. I just I just figured that, you know, you jump in and you start swimming, you figure it out.
(0:05:01) Courtney: So how how did that. Because I you worked there for, for, you know, pretty long time. How did that kind of help you shape the way that you approach naturally serious because that, actually series been around since 2018. So.
(0:05:16) Rochelle: You know, right. Well, it was a soft launch the last month of 2018. So we really, only had, a year before Covid hit us. But yeah, just to go back to my experience, it’s it’s understanding the complexities of manufacturing, of sourcing, of scaling, of innovation, of quality. By accident, I mean, I really learned how to do that early on.
(0:05:47) Rochelle: Watching how the professionals that were actually doing it, I, you know, just learning how the business worked and seeing the, the, the level, the level of quality that control, for example, that goes into every product, the level of innovation, the meetings with raw ingredient vendors that are sourcing, you know, making products, differentiating them so that you’re not getting the same product that everybody else has.
(0:06:13) Rochelle: Like how all of that, all that innovation comes to life behind the scenes and ordering the tubes and the bottles and the jars and understanding how the machines actually filled them all. I mean, every aspect of that all of a sudden became like, oh my gosh, some of these classes I actually took in college made sense for the first time in real life.
(0:06:35) Courtney: Yeah, yeah, probably felt like you were taking like, almost like retaking the class again.
(0:06:42) Rochelle: Yeah. It was, it was like I was teaching the classes because it was. It was such a it was so easy to say, wow, had they done that? You know, I think today in college and I’m sure a lot of your listeners are, you know, recently Acog, I think there’s a lot more case study approaches. Because when I went back to school, I did case study approaches.
(0:07:02) Rochelle: And there’s, the element of learning in a case study approach versus just reading a textbook is really kind of fascinating. So, I would say from that level I had I learned this in a case study approach, you would have been a much easier. But now I could be the case study. Yeah.
(0:07:20) Courtney: Yeah. No, I totally agree. Say, when I started marketing you ten years ago, I got this internship and I was really lucky in that I was an intern for a company that didn’t want to hire real marketers. So they basically were like, just do whatever you want to do. And so there’s a lot of just like trial and error.
(0:07:37) Courtney: And a lot of times I wasn’t doing a great job, but I was learning so much more than I have ever learned in, in school. And it is that like case study approach and just kind of throwing yourself at it and trusting yourself that like, you have high quality standards and like you do things correctly and that you want to pursue things, you want to pursue this greatness.
(0:07:57) Courtney: So when your mom said, oh, you just started manufacturing plant.
(0:08:02) Rochelle: You. Right? I mean, you’d already had the site and the chemist. Yeah. You know, and the equipment going. So it was kind of just figure out the computers and, and from there learn everything. And it was it was quite interesting.
(0:08:13) Courtney: Yeah. So then you, so you worked within these incredible skincare companies for, for a long time. Then what was the spark for naturally curious how did how did you make that transition?
(0:08:27) Rochelle: The June Jacobs collection, which we launched in the early 2000, really took a lot of my mother’s family recipes and kind of brought them to life. And back then in the early 2000, you didn’t call it clean beauty. It was called natural. So she was one of the first natural brands to, enter the market. And it has, to this day, you know, here we are, a very long time later, over 20 years later.
(0:08:57) Rochelle: And it’s it has, I guess we’ve grown with our customer base, but it was found in luxury spa throughout, you know, the country, in the world. And at the time, there weren’t that many, like, today, there’s so many. But back then, it was more of like, if you went to a resort in Hawaii or, you know, somewhere in California, they had a fancy spa and you get a facial.
(0:09:21) Rochelle: It was kind of it was it was more along those lines of how things worked. But for the most part, from there, we, you know, really were able to penetrate all the different spots and create these beautiful facials and treatments. And what I was looking to do was bring together the beauty and the simplicity of the, now clean, but then natural products with more of the clinical, background.
(0:09:53) Rochelle: And that’s what, you know, and that’s kind of what I, I actually approached my mother with Sarah, and we had this idea and we wanted something simple. We wanted something that, you know, if you are new to the market or if you’ve been using products that you could, add in a product that appealed to you that you maybe didn’t know you needed.
(0:10:13) Rochelle: But we really wanted to keep it simple and not overcomplicate it. So it has a very clean lineup and, very Sarah, my partner and in crime and co-founder is very, she gave up some really great name. She’s like an incredible marketer. So my favorite product, for example, it’s a vitamin C, actually. I keep it by my desk.
(0:10:36) Rochelle: The only product, but it’s, called C your glow. And and it’s a vitamin C product. So everything has, like, you know what it is based on the name. Yeah. Zero baggage for your eyes. Yeah. There. There’s a lip service. Greater lip. So she she did that part of it. I’m a very literal person. So like mine would be like, not so catchy.
(0:10:59) Courtney: That’s okay. And so you need a co-founder thing, right? Right. So you like you, you said you kind of have a very streamlined, product line. So there’s not that many SKUs really. How like what was the thinking behind keeping it so simple? And are you planning on like expanding.
(0:11:15) Rochelle: It at all? I don’t think we ever really want that. This is not going to be some huge, SKUs sort of line. Like we might try as if if some newer technologies come up, we might improve the product or replace it with a new and improved type of product. But the the products that we currently have in here, and certainly over the years they will evolve because, things change.
(0:11:35) Rochelle: But, you know, we added a second cleanser because we had one was a, kind of a creamy based, moisture cleanser. And then the other one we launched was like a cleansing butter. So, you know, but a little different than, like, the gel ones that are out there. And there’s plenty of gel ones out there. So I, you know, we tried to create different types of serums we have the ingredients are very special there.
(0:11:57) Rochelle: You know, it’s it’s the way we were able to do this. And are and my favorite term in the collection, it’s called there’s no bad ingredients. But our definition of bad is is not just bad, it’s banned, ambiguous or debatable. So it’s you know, we when we first launched this, we had a huge list. And back then the, the retailers had this much smaller list.
(0:12:19) Rochelle: So with as they continue to grow their list and expand on their list, we’re like, we’ve been saying this for years. So, you know, that that’s kind of how what our, our thing was. But I think, what’s really important to note is, you know, things change and, and, and consumer’s understanding of things changed. And back in 2019, we really launch it wasn’t, clean beauty.
(0:12:46) Rochelle: I wouldn’t say a negative connotation. I think if people wanted to love it, but they didn’t believe it would be effective. And there’s no way you could have executive clean beauty. And our that was, you know, and that was our point of difference. But what I said back then and what I’m so proud and what we’re both so proud to say today, is that that’s the new standard.
(0:13:12) Rochelle: Right. So as you can’t really launch a new brand now that’s not clean glass, why would you ever do that when you have the ability. So our goal was to really, you know, be really pioneer in making sure that this, this trend of clean beauty wasn’t just a trend. It became part of an everyday life.
(0:13:32) Courtney: Yeah, once. So the way that you kind of combated that and educated people is by saying that you’re both clinical and clinical.
(0:13:39) Rochelle: Clinical looks like an oxymoron. Doesn’t make sense.
(0:13:42) Courtney: I know. I was like, I didn’t think it was that challenging at all. When you were developing the products was kind of balancing those two things together.
(0:13:48) Rochelle: Well, I think today, you know, five years later, plus years later, it’s it’s like, yeah, duh, of course it’s both. Right. But back then it was like, yes, sure, it is proven. Right. So, you know, we had to do a lot of different testing and a lot of other things to prove it. Okay. Yeah. This really does what it says.
(0:14:07) Rochelle: It does. Wow. You know, so.
(0:14:10) Courtney: So now I mean in 2019 it was clean was really an emerging trend. But like you said it’s become a lot more like everything is clean. So how has that changed the way that you approach your brand. Like how are you continuing to different.
(0:14:25) Rochelle: So it’s no longer it’s no longer clean. It’s not something. So now it’s really so when we developed the line, there was a bunch of different things going on at the time when we first, when we first started formulating, because that takes a while before you obviously have a product that you’re putting on a shelf and some of the ideation.
(0:14:44) Rochelle: And back then, you know, we I was, quote, a young mother, maybe not that young, but I was I might have young children and I was a busy career woman, and I was on the go and I was an early pioneer to sort of the wellness world. So what does that mean to people? I mean, I’ve been doing yoga for a long time.
(0:15:05) Rochelle: I have tried not to use plastic water bottles for over a decade or more. I mean, I, I can’t stand, but like, I’ve tried to make better conscious decisions and choices for as long as I can remember. And also as my life grew and my children, you know, their baby problems became bigger problems and like, things just started shifting in life.
(0:15:31) Rochelle: My personal time, changed, right? So now not you’re not putting them to bed at 730 or 8:00 anymore. I mean, they’re staying up past my bedtime like, know, so, like, your own time changes. And Sarah was sort of in the exact same boat because we both have two boys that are essentially the same age one and the older ones are one week apart and coincidentally just graduated from the same college, in May, which is just a coincidence.
(0:15:57) Rochelle: And then our younger ones are one grade apart. So like we are in the same kind of very busy, busy schedules here. And, you know, we wanted to create products that people could easily understand and incorporate into their skincare regimen. So if you want to use only our products, who do you think? I am so wonderful and talked about this brand and there’s nothing else and you’ve never used anything but you know, drugstore brands, great.
(0:16:21) Rochelle: You’re going to have a great experience. But, I also love the idea of like, you know, try one product. Trust us, try one. If it works for you. If you need a face oil, if you need a C, your glow of vitamin C face oil in your regimen, try it. If you like it, keep it in there.
(0:16:39) Rochelle: If you want to add another one, you’ll try that too. So, you know, we kind of we want to grow organically that way. It’s not saying you can’t. If you use this, you can’t use that. We’re not we’re never going to be that. These are going to be easy to use. You have puffy eyes. You want to use our zero baggage.
(0:16:53) Rochelle: Go for it. You eating anything else?
(0:16:55) Courtney: Yeah. So really what you’re trying to do is make that type of skincare a lot more accessible. So like.
(0:17:01) Rochelle: Exactly. Sorry. Did I not say that? That was exactly my word. Yes. We’re trying to make it accessible and really relatable. Understandable. Like we want anyone, you know in starting in skincare 20 and up being able to say, oh well, I get it. That’s what I the price points were super important. Our margins are probably tighter than most beauty brands on this, because we really wanted to make sure that the ingredients were in its blushes.
(0:17:28) Rochelle: We possibly could be, you know, the maximum, doses of every ingredient to make it effective. So sometimes I’m making have you put 5% and want something in versus 10%? The effectiveness on your skin is not 100% more. So it’s it’s maybe not even helpful. It might actually that ingredient might actually take away from some of the other greens.
(0:17:47) Rochelle: So you’ve got to be very careful with how you formulated. But the other point of difference, which I forgot to mention before, is our patented blend that’s in every single product. So we have an entire, we call an anti-pollution blend of six antioxidants red, white and green tea, goji berry, pomegranate and grapeseed extract. And together in every product does do a bunch of different things.
(0:18:07) Rochelle: But what I like to say is it’s it’s almost like a natural steroid if you will boost the efficacy of all the other ingredients in there. So when you apply it to your vitamin C, I’m going to keep going back to that. It’s going to really just boost it. It’s going to give in the efficacy of it. But the other thing, and the reason why we call it an anti-pollution blend, and it’s sort of just read about in antioxidants and you can get this from any blend of antioxidants.
(0:18:30) Rochelle: But ours have actually been, you know, clinically tested on that is it really does provide, a barrier. To the, the pollutants in the air. And I always to say prior to 2020, prior to Covid, March 13th, you know, my, my life changed forever. Prior to that, it was like, you know, second you open up your door.
(0:18:54) Rochelle: Oh, my gosh, the wind, the pollution, the sun, everything is hitting your face. And then I realized during Covid, oh my gosh, it’s in your house. Yeah. That’s your apartment. You’re looking you can’t get rid of this stuff. It’s everywhere. Yeah. So yeah there’s you’ve got to it’s great to, you know, and you keep hearing about particles and this and that.
(0:19:13) Courtney: Right. If your skin.
(0:19:14) Rochelle: Protected. So we like having a nice little, suit of armor, but with, antioxidants.
(0:19:20) Courtney: Yes. That’s wonderful. And, and so, like you, you talked a little bit about kind of like drawing the same organically and and just trying to, like, connect with your customers. What are ways that you, as naturally serious are trying to are bringing your customers in and introducing kind of this simpler way of looking at this? Yeah.
(0:19:39) Rochelle: So I think, you know, you have to have right. Retail partners. And we started off with Sephora and and were on sephora.com and they were really in the kitchen helping us make sure we were coming out like that. Everything we were doing was on the right track. Yeah. Making changes where we might have been off and, you know, they continue to be, wonderful partner in that aspect.
(0:20:00) Rochelle: And I think having someone with their expertise, experience and kind of credibility, really, it’s almost like a seal of approval when you, when, you know, you know what? It’s I think most humans, who shop and support. I know what it takes to get in, and it’s not it’s not an it’s not doesn’t mean like, once you’re in that door, you’re successful.
(0:20:21) Rochelle: It means that you’ve gotten some, some really smart, hardworking people behind, behind the scenes have seen great success with your products, and they want to take a chance on you. So that’s, you know, a really important aspect of it. And I think for us, it’s really, you know, the level of gifting, that we did early on to get the products into the right people’s hands so that, you know, I, I like authentic and I know in today’s world that’s a big, crazy word to use.
(0:20:50) Rochelle: So there’s so much it’s hard to be authentic in Dan’s world or more challenging, to be you really got to work at it. And I love it when you know somebody who has a huge following organically, you know, picks it up and says, wonderful thing like, oh my gosh, you made my niche. But that’s kind of like and it could be the housewife who has tons of friends but sees it too.
(0:21:12) Rochelle: And that’s what I really love, because that word of mouth from, you know, somebody who doesn’t have 1.7 million followers but has maybe 170, but those 170 are like really good friends, and they see her talking about a product and it goes from there.
(0:21:26) Courtney: So yeah. So it does sound like it’s you’re kind of like trying to grab these deals of approval wherever your product or.
(0:21:33) Rochelle: Whatever we can.
(0:21:33) Courtney: Like through Sephora or gifting it out or, you know, trying to get into people’s hands who have some kind of like, influencers totally make sense. And I think that, like with, especially with gifting, I like that strategy because people are a lot more honest because you’re not paying all these people right for their, for their review.
(0:21:54) Rochelle: So I also have one more I forgot the most important reason where I got with that, because I got distracted with my brain all over the place. But, we also have developed a partnership with Northwell Health Systems, which is the largest health system in the United States. And we have, a few, pilot things that have been going on.
(0:22:11) Rochelle: So we are in, for example, Lenox Hill, if you have any overnight service, we have tailored a very beautiful, overnight bag for any of their patients that are overnight. So we help them procure like with let’s call it I’m asking you’re in New York City with the ambulances. So there’s like, you know, earplugs and whatever else. Toothbrush, toothpaste.
(0:22:34) Rochelle: Because you maybe, you know, you were going to be there, but we put we we’ve actually changed our assortment every year based on their customer patient and calm customer patients feedback. Like, I actually don’t need a shampoo and conditioner because I can’t shower, right. Great. So we’re going to put a hand lotion in there instead because that’s what you need to do.
(0:22:53) Rochelle: And you want to wash your face. Okay. Great. So those are our new products. So we we are able to tailor that to their needs. But we’re working with them and we are rolling out to a bunch of their different maternity wigs which again, we’re gonna talk about credibility and validation. If a hospital that is, you know, run by doctors, you know, the administrators, almost all of them were doctors at some point.
(0:23:17) Rochelle: Right? If a hospital is run by doctors, says it’s okay to put this product on your face or your body that will be touching your brand new baby. I think that’s a huge yes.
(0:23:30) Courtney: A huge seal of approval. So it’s really like a partnerships is what you’ve kind of been. So they love.
(0:23:35) Rochelle: Partnerships. Yeah. So I guess today’s where you collaborate. Yeah. So but yeah, it’s really a partnership because we do work together. And because we do have, our own and operate our own manufacturing facility, which I’m as naturally series as sort of the, you know, beneficiary of all of my mother’s, interesting ideas from 1999 that no one thought would work.
(0:23:58) Rochelle: And now it’s like, oh, my gosh, that was the best decision you ever made. Yeah. Obviously, besides having me, but, you know, those types of things, being able to be nimble and change and make things that are important, I mean, just separate from naturally series. But like when my mother had breast cancer, and then I had breast cancer a couple of years after her, she created while she was going through radiation, special cream.
(0:24:27) Rochelle: That was really important to her journey on there because they gave her a product to put on her. You know, cancer radiated breast that had tons of different, product ingredients in them that were far from natural or far from clean. And she kind of refused to do that. So she worked with all the wrong breeding vendors and our chemist to come up with something that she could put on her breast and that, like, we could then share that information.
(0:24:52) Rochelle: And it’s actually a healing product that you can use in all different ways. So it’s not just for, you know, radiated breast, but you can use a lot of different things. So helping people, helping women, helping, find their confidence, get that glow, see themselves in in a better light and let you know, let them save the world.
(0:25:13) Rochelle: Since all I can do is give you good skin like this. Kind of like, snow.
(0:25:17) Courtney: And that’s that’s amazing. And I, I think that’s also such a testament to to say, like, when your mother was going through, like, one of the hardest things you can go through and she was able to create something really amazing out of that, like something that’s truly helpful. And that’s such a good kind of omen for your brand, too, I think.
(0:25:40) Courtney: So, yeah, that’s that’s really neat.
(0:25:42) Rochelle: And and that was it. Her intention was never to actually sell the product. Yeah, she was making it for her own personal use. But the doctor, doctor John Ng, at Cornell, he actually it’s like, what are you doing? Because your your breast looks beautiful. Like, it looks better than almost everybody else’s. That goes through reversing as you, you know, as you go through radiation, it gets darker and darker.
(0:26:04) Rochelle: And she was reversing that trend. So anyway, he’s the one who pushed us to test it and bring it.
(0:26:09) Courtney: Wow. That’s really incredible. Well so when you think about kind of founding naturally or co-founding it and growing it over the last, couple of years, like doing this with in Covid, with the beauty brand in a increasingly competitive market. Like it’s not easy. But you look at your leadership like, what have you learned the most about leadership in that period of time?
(0:26:40) Rochelle: Well, I would say the what I’ve personally, been able to do for the first time and maybe just an aging thing and maturity thing, but, is really I don’t want to use the word delegate, but I would say release myself from thinking I’m responsible for everything and really trusting and empowering the incredible team, that, you know, we work with and Sarah is she’s an she is really, an outstanding leader.
(0:27:14) Rochelle: But I think for us, you know, there gets a point in life where you think and when you’re, you have to do everything. And by the time I explain this to somebody, I could have done it myself, and. Oh, my God. And so that was a lot of my, I would say 20s and 30s and possibly into my early 40s where I was had to do everything, you know, I couldn’t trust anyone to even book a flight.
(0:27:40) Rochelle: Like I wouldn’t let anyone do anything. So I think really, the last decade, being able to empower those people who are helping us get to that finish line every single day has, and watching them and watching them grow and watching them fly for the first time, like giving them that, I guess the confidence really where they where they know that they’ve made like, you don’t have to ask me if you have to, you know, go to the bathroom, like, don’t ask me like that.
(0:28:07) Rochelle: Like you know, kind of, you know, you have little kids. It’s like, just go, go. Okay. But it’s it’s really seeing that for the first time. And I love that. And I love seeing, you know, everyone says 20s and 30s, you know, their work ethic, their this everything’s different. I am blown away by the teams that we work with.
(0:28:24) Rochelle: I love their work ethic. I, you know, they work differently than I did, but they work really hard and really care. And we have a pretty loyal team. So that’s important.
(0:28:34) Courtney: How have you found your team? But people like triangle who was like, oh.
(0:28:41) Rochelle: Yeah, I mean I can go through every like I could go through and tell a story about everybody. But I would say, word of I mean, yes, we’ve used LinkedIn. Yes, we’ve used we’ve used agencies when we’ve needed to. But yeah, some of the best people, that I work with, our friends of friends or retail.
(0:29:01) Rochelle: Friends of retail. I mean, it’s really the networking thing. We just had an interview today with somebody, which is I got a text from one of my close girlfriends, and I send it to this person now, like. And I just that type of thing where, good things happen to good people. That’s always what I say. Good things happen to the people that put that energy out there, where people want to work with you and they hear good things and, you know, they’re excited by our passion and our enthusiasm.
(0:29:30) Rochelle: And then they try some products and they love it.
(0:29:32) Courtney: Yeah. So you kind of went from this like, I have to do everything to really trusting your team with their like a breaking point for you where you’re like, I something has to change here because we’re not scaling in the right way or this isn’t working for me anymore, or the that’s a great question.
(0:29:47) Rochelle: And I think, as you said, that, I would say that what happened was I was reading, a case there was something to do with Meg Whitman, and it was, many years ago. But she had said, yes. I’m so sick of hearing about the work life balance. Because there is no such thing. So, like, women stop thinking you can do it all.
(0:30:12) Rochelle: It’s actually a trade off. So, it’s in life. It’s not about, you know, 24 hours in a day. I’m going to dedicate this much to sleep. As much to my kids, as much to my partner, this much to work like. It doesn’t work that way. So, you know, you might have to go on a business trip.
(0:30:29) Rochelle: So during that time, you were dedicated to your business, but you also might go on a family vacation. During that time, you weren’t dedicated to your family. Like. And then there may be that perfect day every once in a while where you have that work life balance, where you get up and you go to work, you come home, you spend time with your family, you go to sleep.
(0:30:47) Rochelle: That’s great, but it doesn’t often happen. You might have to go to a doctor’s appointment. You might have to work late for for an A for, you know, a big meeting you have tomorrow. That’s where the trade off comes in. And and thinking I had to balance it all and be perfect. And realizing realizing I didn’t have to is so cool.
(0:31:05) Courtney: Yeah, yeah. I think that some people are very, like binary about work life balance, but it really is. Life is messy and everything’s messy, that everything kind of seeps into each other. So it really is just about, okay, what do I trade off today? And, report to tomorrow, that kind of thing.
(0:31:25) Rochelle: And you also make up for it when you do what you love. Yeah. So yeah, there’s a big part of that that was and I actually love being on Wall Street too, so I don’t want to discount that. But I felt like there was a point in my life there where I was trading my soul, like it was, you know, literally trading because, I mean, there were times when you never see daylight and you weren’t there.
(0:31:44) Rochelle: I had to be there at 7 a.m. and then oftentimes I worked late, late, late into the night. And you have three meals sitting at a little trading desk and like, it’s not healthy for me. It wasn’t healthy for me. I’m very that’s how I became so into wellness was just I need light. I like never closed my curtains.
(0:32:00) Rochelle: You know, I sleep with my curtains open. I wake up naturally with the sun, like just little things to help me. I don’t want to use every where balance, but really be one with life versus be, dictated by everything.
(0:32:14) Courtney: Yeah. Oh, I love that. So, obviously it’s not been, like, the easiest journey. Seems like a lot of stuff is kind of like falling into place really nicely. But what would you say has been the biggest challenge with match? Really serious so far?
(0:32:29) Rochelle: I would say, deciding how to scale the brand best and making sure, we are we continue to be relatable, we continue to stay, with, you know, whatever we’re doing and making it relevant for everybody. And, you know, like, it’s not a tick tock brand and that that kind of hurt you. So it’s like, we have to get over that.
(0:32:53) Rochelle: And I’m like, yes, that was a big disappointment for us when we thought, like, we’d seen all these other brands doing, so well and like, oh my God, that’s our audience. Like, she is that girl, right? And then it wasn’t so great, right? So and then you, then you speak to a whole bunch of other brands, and it’s not every brand that does well there.
(0:33:12) Rochelle: You have to there’s whatever that is. Like, these products aren’t transformative, in the instant you wear them. So there’s things that that make it less tick. Tock. Yeah. Right. So that was disappointing to me.
(0:33:24) Courtney: Yeah. But I think it’s also like recognizing that your brand has like a personality and the personality doesn’t like not very much. Yeah. And I thought you did.
(0:33:35) Rochelle: That’s right. So I you know, I thought you did an article intern base. Everyone was on TikTok. Like she does. Like it just wasn’t because I guess I don’t know for whatever. I don’t know the answer to that. Right.
(0:33:47) Courtney: Maybe I don’t know. You’re my early something.
(0:33:50) Rochelle: And I don’t know everything, Courtney. And that’s a really important like. And you’ve got to take risks. And you know what? Just because something doesn’t work doesn’t mean you’re a bad person or a failure. And it just means you’ve got to try something else.
(0:34:03) Courtney: Yeah. So, so true. And especially like in the beauty industry where things are like there’s all these trends and everything is constantly changing and growing all of that. So when you’re looking at it kind of from like this beauty expert point of view, are there any trends or shifts coming in the beauty industry that you’re kind of like looking forward to?
(0:34:22) Courtney: You’re kind of watching what?
(0:34:24) Rochelle: Watching everything I want you. Yeah. But I would say, some of the alert, I mean, I read a lot just I’m fascinated by technology and whatever. I even last week or last month, like, I can’t, you know, back in the day, I used to save magazines to read on an airplane. Yes, I do that now. Like nothing would be relevant anymore.
(0:34:45) Rochelle: So the, the, you know, the average person stays on a video for three seconds. Okay. Now it’s 1.6 seconds up. Now it’s 2.5. Like it’s you got to you’ve got to really understand what because there’s so many distractions, there’s so many alerts. It’s like the average person picks up the phone 150 times a day. Hundred and 50 times a day.
(0:35:06) Rochelle: And that’s the average person. If you take like from someone 20 to 30, I’m sure it’s like 300 times like these types of things are fascinating to me. And, and we have to figure out how we can kind of how does that help our business? How can we grow it? I don’t know the answer for everything. Right. But I I’d love to figure it out.
(0:35:22) Rochelle: Yeah.
(0:35:23) Courtney: I think it’s just like keeping an open mind, just absorbing as much information as you can, and the solutions will present themselves. I always say that, like, you can take in all the information at some point, something will click and be like, oh, that’s the thing that we need to focus.
(0:35:36) Rochelle: On, right? Like, I’m hungrier for knowledge today than I’ve ever been. Yeah. You know, and I think that’s important because if you get too comfortable with what you think, you know, I really, you know, my 89 year old mother in law said to me, I think she was only 70 something at the time, but she said something to me is the older.
(0:35:55) Rochelle: So I think of her as the wisest woman I’ve ever met. Right. Yeah. And she says the older I get, the more I realize, the less I know. Yeah. I was like, oh, that sucks. I thought that.
(0:36:07) Courtney: Yeah, yeah, I love that because it’s it’s so true. It’s like the more you know, but the more you realize you don’t know. Like the world gets so much larger every year.
(0:36:18) Rochelle: It’s right, you know. Yes. You my 23 year really my 23 year old, he’ll tell you he knows everything about anything and everything. So it’s that sort of that humble pie that you get as you, as you really realize how little. Yeah, each of us know individually and how much there is to learn.
(0:36:35) Courtney: That’s perspective for you. So I ask this everybody just to think it’s helpful to look back. But if you could go back and give yourself one piece of advice before launching Naturally Serious, what would it be?
(0:36:51) Rochelle: Oh my goodness, I, I would say to really understand at the time how social media would impact the growth and and how a digital first brand is truly, I can’t think of another brand that hasn’t been successful since we launched. That was a digital first brand and I think, a lot of founders and co-founder, you know, a lot of of entrepreneurs out there really believe if they’ve got great quality innovation and product, whatever it is, whether it’s skincare or whatever it is, that it will sell because it’s superior.
(0:37:30) Rochelle: And I think understanding the impact of the digital world is, was underestimated. Yeah. So don’t underestimate that. Yeah.
(0:37:40) Courtney: I mean, going into Covid to, like, you kind of know how much more important it would become almost overnight.
(0:37:45) Rochelle: Spike. Right. And don’t and don’t launch a year before Covid. Yeah.
(0:37:50) Courtney: Just planning around the pandemic.
(0:37:52) Rochelle: Right. Yeah. That was that was not. Yeah. Right. But, I really do think that and let me change that a bit to say that just to not underestimate the social, you know, digital brand impact, but really the changing, in like, technology environment and, you know, when we launched actually series, I don’t think anyone had TikTok.
(0:38:16) Rochelle: So like, you know, just watching what’s happening there is AI out there and, and really, you know, never, never resting on your laurels because things change.
(0:38:27) Courtney: Yeah. I mean, that’s why you’re taking in. You’re so hungry for that information. Yeah. And, Sam, you got it. You got to be ready for it. It happened fast. Yeah. Amazing. Well, where can people find you online quicker?
(0:38:41) Rochelle: Sephora.com. You know, naturally serious skin.com Amazon. Or follow us on, on Instagram. I would love that. Naturally serious skin. And no, no love reading with you. Go.
(0:38:53) Courtney: Thank you. Thank you so much, Michelle, for your time. I appreciate it. And thank you to everyone at home or on the go for listening to you. Join today’s episode. Please subscribe, share with a friend, leave us a review. And if there’s anything you’d like to hear on an upcoming episode, just let us know. And for more insight, follow us on LinkedIn or visit Right Left agency.com and we’ll be back next time with more stories of success, innovation, and marketing strategies to help you grow.
(0:39:21) Courtney: See you on the next one.
