How Shaina Rainford Built Bask & Lather Co, Why She’s Not Putting It in Stores + More

How Shaina Rainford Built Bask & Lather Co, Why She’s Not Putting It in Stores + More

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Flash, what's up? It's Way Up with Angela Yee and
I mean way up.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
And I'm excited for this because this is somebody who
is for real, way up Shana Rain for this here.
She is the CEO of basket Lather. These are the products.
I actually took these products with me when I went
on vacation with my friends and we were in Saint Martin,
and so everybody had to borrow like a you know,
shampoo and conditioner from me because nobody else brought theirs,

(00:27):
but you know, I had to and they loved it.
I was like, y'all can't be using all my products up,
But welcome.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
To the show.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Thank you for having me.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
And I also, before we even get started, want to
thank you for your partnership with Way Up with Angela Yee.

Speaker 3 (00:40):
Thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:41):
You know, I appreciate that Angela y Day is coming
up and we were just talking behind the scenes on
what basket Lather will be doing at Angela Ye Day.

Speaker 3 (00:47):
Yes, we're super excited. Am I allowed to share?

Speaker 1 (00:50):
Yes? Please?

Speaker 3 (00:50):
Oh yeah, let's break the news.

Speaker 4 (00:52):
I mean, so, Angela You Day is all about the community,
and basket Latter is also all about the community. So
we will be on site giving away haircare products and
book bags, getting the kids ready for back to school.

Speaker 1 (01:03):
Okay and listen, and what's in the in the book bags.

Speaker 4 (01:06):
And the book bags will have the edge control that
the kids need that way they go to school and
come home look in the same way. We'll have conditioner
deep conditioner, and we have book bags for boys, for girls,
different colors. So we're excited every year. We're always looking
for great ways to partner and do back to school initiatives.

Speaker 3 (01:24):
We're also happy that you're gonna have.

Speaker 4 (01:26):
Braiders and barbers involved, so we're definitely looking forward to
being being able to have as many kids as possible
get their hair back to school ready.

Speaker 2 (01:34):
Yeah, listen, I want to say this too. Last year
was a lot of adults as well. Let's let the
kids go first. Okay, Okay, but let's talk about your
history and your background and how you even got to
where you are, because I think people need to also
understand that this whole company basket lather was something that
happened organically for you.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
So just talk about a.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
Little bit about what shape, what Young Shana when through
to even lead you to come up with this product.
Because a lot of times there's home remedies that we
have coming up, and that is actually something that later
in life feels like this could be a business.

Speaker 4 (02:09):
Yes, so our original product, our scalp stimulator oil, far
precedes the company actually becoming a company. So a few
years ago, my younger sister Leo lost all of her hair.
She had a really bad ring worm that spread all
across her scalp and initially it looked just like dandriffs,
so that's what she was diagnosed with. And by the
time she got a proper diagnosis, she lost so much
hair that she had a big crop circle.

Speaker 3 (02:30):
She only had hair around the circumference of her hair dang. Yep.

Speaker 4 (02:33):
And then my mom finally found a black dermatologist who
was able to properly diagnose her, and the anti funcals
that she took cleared off the rest of their hair
lost so our scush yep.

Speaker 3 (02:43):
It was shiny.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
That's devastating.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yep.

Speaker 4 (02:45):
It was shiny and smooth at baby skin. And my
mom was really desperate to regrow her hair. She was
devastated and she took her to all different types of
specialists and they did scalp analysis and they said, we
don't know that her hair is ever going to grow
back right, Like the follicles could be scartle, and she
was too young to use anything pharmaceutical. So my mom
did research about natural afficacious ingredients for hair growth, whipped

(03:07):
up a concoction in the kitchen which is our scalp
stimulator oil, and then her hair started.

Speaker 3 (03:12):
To grow back.

Speaker 4 (03:12):
That's amazing, but it was growing fine and thin. So
she did more research, like, okay, what can I use
to thicken her hair? And she came across she making
black castor oil, and so she created our hair alixir
and that helped her hair to grow in faster and thicker.
Now her hair is all the way down to her
bottom and she has four seat hair.

Speaker 1 (03:30):
I know that's right.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
And you know, as much as we could feel like,
oh is this something that's just the idea of like
your hair. I remember I had a patch of hair
that was missing because somebody did my butN so tight
on the top of my head and it really like
ripped it out and then it grows back slow.

Speaker 1 (03:46):
It's like a little.

Speaker 2 (03:47):
Patch like right here that's super short. But it's things
like that our edges. We know how hard that is
when it's like look getting braided. Sometimes not these though,
shout out to Shot and my girl Destiny. But you
know there's times that things we do to our hair
and really affect that. And sometimes it could be one
style or something like you said with ringworm that didn't
get diagnosed and that she took the medication and it

(04:07):
really affected her hair. That can just cause like damage
that could potentially be permanent. But to also know that
there are holistic ways to approach growing your hair back
is important.

Speaker 4 (04:17):
Yes, but that's not even the reason we started the company.
So now fast forward to the pandemic. I'm working as
a nurse practitioner. I acquired COVID.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Can I say thank you for that first and foremost,
because no matter what, we always got to give praise
to all of the essential workers and nurse practitioners.

Speaker 1 (04:32):
And I want to talk about that before, but go ahead.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (04:35):
So I was working as a nurse practitioner, I acquired COVID,
became so sick. I was twenty seven on the back
of an ambulance on a nai breather, asking God to
let me live to raise my children. I recovered and
then a few weeks later my hair started to shed
and break It was horrible, and I was devastated about
my hair. And I'm like, okay, Well, for someone that
was literally just begging to live a few weeks ago

(04:55):
to be devastated over their hair, you would think that
would be the least of my concerns. But it was
really embarrassing. And I was like, mah, can you make
me some oils? Like, I don't know what else to do.
I tried emergency treatments. I said, do I need protein,
do I need moisture? Like what can I do? And
nothing was helping. So my mom made me the oils
and I started using them, and my hair reverted back
to normal. Texture, change back to normal, my hair started growing,

(05:16):
the breakage stop and I said, we have to share
these products with the world, and that's what we did.

Speaker 2 (05:21):
Can we talk about your time though during COVID working
as a nurse practitioner. What were some of the things
that you experienced and so and then you really literally
put your life on the line.

Speaker 3 (05:30):
It was like living in the twilight zone.

Speaker 4 (05:32):
Like honestly, even thinking back to it, it doesn't feel
like a real lived experience. I went from working in
the office my specialty was GI and liver diseases too,
going into the hospital and seeing yes, older adults, you know,
critically ill, but even younger people whose lives were just
turned upside down overnight couldn't interact with their families. Imagine

(05:54):
being sick in the hospital and your closest relatives can't
even come touch you or see you, you know, on
your life days. Literally it was I can't describe it
as anything other than the toilight zone.

Speaker 1 (06:04):
Right. I'm sure some of those things stick with you
like to this day.

Speaker 4 (06:08):
You know.

Speaker 2 (06:08):
We just always got to give it up for that
because that's such a difficult.

Speaker 1 (06:11):
Time to have been through.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
And what you said and what I said earlier is
so too that you feel like, is this just vain
that I care so much about my hair? But society
has so much to say and even for ourselves, like
the value on making sure we take care of our
hair and keep it healthy. It's such a you know,
it's such a big deal.

Speaker 3 (06:30):
Absolutely so your hair is literally the crown that you
never take.

Speaker 1 (06:33):
So my grandfather always used to say, I don't.

Speaker 3 (06:34):
Care what you're wearing. If your hair is done, you
look good. You don't even need makeup, just have your
hair done, Okay.

Speaker 2 (06:40):
So now as a nurse practitioner. But now you have
this product, right because after COVID you sell how much
it helped you, What was the next step that you took.

Speaker 4 (06:50):
Yeah, so this was summer twenty twenty that I was
able to regrow my hair using the product. So I
just started sharing my testimonies, my before and afters and
my sisters on my personal social media.

Speaker 3 (07:00):
And everyone's like, what are you using? What are you using?
I was like, oh, just my mom's making and they're like,
can I buy some?

Speaker 4 (07:05):
And I got bottles from Amazon and we were filling
the bottles and they didn't even have labels.

Speaker 3 (07:10):
People even asked me what was in it. They didn't care.
They just wanted it.

Speaker 4 (07:14):
People were like, don't tell I arrest. They're like cash
apping me. They were doing drop balls, pickups. I was like,
this almost feel is illegal. And then I said, you
know what, we need to make this a real legitimate business.
So come around October November of the year, I was like, Okay,
I'm sitting on the rug with my son and I
was like, we need to come up with a name.
I was like, I didn't want it to directly include

(07:35):
hair or anything relating cosmetics. I wanted it to be
kind of ambiguous. It's like, Okay, what exudes luxury for
the everyday black women that makes people will make people
feel good. So I was looking on up synonyms for
the word relaxation and I came up with the word
bask and then my son, who was fourteen at the time,
came up with He's like, what about in lather?

Speaker 3 (07:57):
And then we're like yes, yeah, so we came up
with a basket ladder.

Speaker 4 (08:00):
And then I remember after work one day, I was
going to the post office with a huge bag of
orders ready to ship, and the guy at.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
The post I was like, oh, basket in law, this
is a really nice name.

Speaker 4 (08:09):
And I was like, I go trademarket before the postman does.

Speaker 3 (08:13):
Yeah, so we trademarket trademarked it.

Speaker 4 (08:16):
Within three months of starting the business, the one month
revenue from the business was replacing my one year salary
as a nurse practitioner. Yeah, and then within seven months
we became a seven figure business. And now we've grown significantly.
This year alone, we grew from grew to twenty two
employees and still hiring.

Speaker 1 (08:34):
Yay, that's amazing.

Speaker 2 (08:36):
Yeah, just think about from tragedy something like this grew yep,
you know. And I want to ask you the process too,
because obviously as it goes from being like a at
home remedy that you can make yourself, but then it
just grew so fast it wasn't possible to do it
that way. And so how did things change when you realize, Okay,
now I got to ship out, like you know, I

(08:57):
got to get this mass produced, because that's something that
people consumers think about too, right, is it gonna be
different now?

Speaker 1 (09:03):
Is the formula changing?

Speaker 2 (09:05):
Like?

Speaker 1 (09:05):
What are the things that you had to do?

Speaker 2 (09:06):
Because then obviously you have to also make sure that
you know you can actually keep up with these orders.
It's one thing to have a bunch of orders, it's
another thing to be able to fulfill them exactly.

Speaker 4 (09:16):
So for the first seven months, we operated the business
out of my kitchen and living room, so we used
to have I was always blessed to have friends and
family and they would all come over every week and
I paid everyone from day one. They would come over
on the week, we would fill oils all week and
my stall hat a full time job, and on week
and on week dons we would both ship all of
the orders and Monday morning, trucks would back up back

(09:36):
and back to my house, like back up the driveway
and pick up truckloads for my house. I know the
neighbors were like, what was going on? I guess out,
but its face a haircare exactly. And then as we grew,
I said, Okay, it's no longer sustainable for us to
continue to fulfill the product market and also fulfill the orders.
So we got a contract manufacturer and they have to

(09:58):
we own all of our formulas, so they have to
benchmark and match all of our products exactly as they're formulated,
and then they mass produce them.

Speaker 1 (10:07):
Okay.

Speaker 4 (10:08):
And then as the business continued to grow, I remember
one Labor Day, our Labor Day sale went so crazy.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
You would think I would be happy, but no.

Speaker 4 (10:16):
I literally sat in my conference from and cried because
we have piles and piles and piles and piles of
orders just from everywhere, like we just could not keep up.
And it was it was at that moment I said, Okay,
we need to find a fulfillment partner who can fulfill
and ship all of our orders. And they do that
within one business day. Where they were shipping, we went
from shipping two years ago ten thousand orders a month

(10:36):
to not over one hundred and fifty thousand or yah.

Speaker 3 (10:38):
You can't do that alone exactly crazy family yep.

Speaker 4 (10:41):
So they handle that for us because I know that's
a great product customer experiences making.

Speaker 3 (10:46):
Everyone wants their things.

Speaker 2 (10:47):
U Yes, they don't want to be like, it's two weeks,
where's my stuff? And that's also hard as a business
owner when you're trying to understand the balance of like,
we want to get these orders in, but we also
want to make sure that we have enough time time
to actually fulfill and have enough Also, I think during
the pandemic some things were hard to get, like supplies
also exactly.

Speaker 4 (11:07):
So we started the tail end of the pandemic, so
December twenty twenty, so that's when supply chain and things
were easying up. But even so, it wasn't until twenty
twenty three that I actually got a fulfillment partner to
fulfill and ship. They're called third party logistics centers, and
there they have half a million square feet where our
products are shipped from and they fulfill and ship and
they handle the fulfillment portion of us.

Speaker 3 (11:28):
That way we could focus on other parts of the business.

Speaker 2 (11:30):
Speaking of other parts of the business, you said you
have friends and family over helping you.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
You paid them.

Speaker 2 (11:35):
What is that like, Because some people would say family
and business and friends in business don't always mix.

Speaker 4 (11:42):
So I would say, I think that so they always
showed up, right. I think it's no different right than
at the end of the day they were being paid.

Speaker 3 (11:51):
Right, they showed up.

Speaker 4 (11:53):
I think the difference is is that we have friends
and family that are not doing a good job. It's
easier when it's an employee that you don't have any
outside ties to right to kind of go your ways.
But now when it's your friend's family, a loved one,
that's where the issues arise. I've never particularly had an
issue with a friend or family member trying to get
paid and just not do anything because of our relationship.

(12:13):
But you have to hold everyone to the same standard,
and that's where the issue lies.

Speaker 2 (12:18):
Oh so you did have like some growing pains because
that is a high balance.

Speaker 1 (12:22):
It's one thing.

Speaker 2 (12:23):
Where you're like, I want to put my people in position,
we're going to do this together, and we have these
great lofty ideas of how it's gonna happen.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
But a lot of times it doesn't happen that way.

Speaker 4 (12:34):
Yeah, I definitely have my breaking point with the friends
and family and I said, no, I have to hire
real employees. I still remember the Sunday I saw that
on my computer and I went on the job posting
sites and I posted, we need warehouse associates, we need
fulfillment associates, because I just say, you know, I have
to if I want to continue to grow this business,
I have to do things the formal way, right because

(12:55):
we're friends and family too. They have their own jobs
and I'm having to work around their schedules and we
can only fulfill on the week. So I remember that
turning point where actually said okay, no, now I need actual,
real employees.

Speaker 2 (13:05):
How are you able to maintain those relationships or where
are you after that? Because sometimes those are hard conversations.

Speaker 4 (13:10):
I actually did lose my best friend yeah during this process,
because I remember it was one Sunday and she knew
I really relied on her, and she told me like
two hours before she knew everyone was coming over the packword.

Speaker 3 (13:22):
Its like, oh, I'm not gonna be able to make
it today.

Speaker 4 (13:25):
And I personally feel like it was done purposeful to
let me know very last minute. Know this ex happened,
why happened, whatever it was, and then I said, okay,
don't worry about it. But then she never followed back
up after that, and I had literally have to this
day have not spoken to her.

Speaker 2 (13:40):
So she just called out and never spoke to you again. Yep,
that is wild that something like that would happen. And
that was your best friend.

Speaker 3 (13:50):
She was in the delivery room with me when I
gave birth to my son.

Speaker 2 (13:54):
I'm sorry that happened. Let me tell you something about business.
It will really show you. You know, people two colors.
I wonder what that was about.

Speaker 4 (14:02):
I wondered, But you know what men above knows, all right,
and that's only for him to know, not me.

Speaker 2 (14:07):
What do you want to when you think about that.
I know you have your son, like you said, it
was fortund Do you have other children?

Speaker 3 (14:12):
Yes, to have a seven year old and a five
month old.

Speaker 2 (14:14):
Oh and in the midst of all this having a baby,
I had.

Speaker 3 (14:18):
One day of maternity leave this year.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
Oh my gosh.

Speaker 3 (14:22):
Man.

Speaker 2 (14:22):
So when you think about how you want this business
to grow, I also think about how we've seen things
like you know, with Carol's daughter, we saw Lisa Price.
People looked at it like, you know, she did give
up some control of the company, but now she has
it back, right. And when you think about getting to
the point where it's like, are you doing this forever?
It is, it's going to be handed down from generation
to generation. I've always been taught that you build a

(14:44):
company in case one day you want to sell it,
or like you would sell it, because that's how you
want to build it, regardless of what your plan is.

Speaker 1 (14:51):
Do you have a bigger plan?

Speaker 4 (14:52):
I do, So I would say that what really people
need to understand is that sometimes US founders don't sell
because they want to.

Speaker 3 (15:02):
It's because they're forced when you get into a certain part.

Speaker 4 (15:05):
So one of the reasons we strategically not going into
retail yet. Retailers have been after us right, and we
are very e commerce heavy, very profitable and successful online.
We purposefully have not gone into retail because when you
go into retail right, retailers will order a million dollars
worth of product.

Speaker 3 (15:22):
You don't get your money for two to three months
if you're lucky.

Speaker 1 (15:25):
And then if you don't sell through, they.

Speaker 3 (15:27):
Will return it back to you.

Speaker 4 (15:28):
And that's inventory and things that you could have sold
online and now you have inventory that's aging at their mercy.
They also have significant fees product placement fees to be
on the shelf, just to action their promotion fees.

Speaker 3 (15:40):
Right.

Speaker 4 (15:41):
So for us, right, we're like, Okay, we spent our
first five years in business accumulating cash and being profitable
and understanding our business and our consumer and strengthening our
supply chain.

Speaker 3 (15:54):
Right.

Speaker 4 (15:54):
For example, this year, we grew one thousand percent year
over year compared to last year, and we had stock issues.
We had this marketplace wanted product, and we have number
one products on TikTok and we have our own e
commerce site.

Speaker 3 (16:08):
And then I didn't even ever.

Speaker 4 (16:10):
Realize that wholesale beauty supply stores they want fifty thousand
units of this and they want that, and we.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
Our supply chain got stretched in.

Speaker 4 (16:18):
We all got stretched in, right, and we've had to
find now some of the biggest manufacturers that do taxtured
haircare in the US to be able.

Speaker 3 (16:24):
To keep up with our demand.

Speaker 4 (16:26):
If you are in retail and you tell them you
don't have product, and they're used to selling X amount
of product per week in their stores, they will charge
you full retail price for every product sale that they lost.

Speaker 1 (16:37):
Oh, I've never heard of that.

Speaker 4 (16:39):
So when you go into retail, it looks glamorous, it
looks great, but you need to be fully prepared. You
need to know what you're doing. You need to make
sure that you have cash. Otherwise what happens is right
stores can you can go into retail, go into all
these stores. It looks great, you need cash and things
to support that because what happens also now is that
you don't get your money back from them for months

(16:59):
and then you'll up in a place where you need
investors to sustain your business. And they got to sell
up this piece of business and take this loan and
this and basket allard that we have zero dollars in
debt and we have no investors.

Speaker 2 (17:10):
What a nice That is such a relief to be
able to have that. And I want to say people
have to understand also because I've seen businesses actually go
bust because they got into retail and that was really
like the biggest mistake that they've made.

Speaker 3 (17:24):
Exactly, it looks great, but I'm glad.

Speaker 2 (17:26):
You got it downlight that thing, because I don't know
if a lot of people understand that.

Speaker 4 (17:29):
They don't and it's because they're other founders, right, great
black owned businesses that got themselves into that situation because
they thought retail was the end all, be all, and
then they end up in really tight spots or they
had to sell out significant parts of their business, and
sometimes it's not that they wanted to, but they had
to sustain. So for example, at Carol's daughter, you see
she brought her company back right, right, So that's great

(17:51):
when it happens. It even happens outside of you know,
beauty and things like that. We've seen it with other founders, right.
It just something you have to tread likely And I'm
a person that I move when God tells me to move,
and I'm going to continue to be strategic and make
sure that I'm setting the company up for success and
my team.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
You know, Wow, that's amazing.

Speaker 2 (18:11):
I appreciate you for sharing all of that because there's
people listening that are thinking about how they want to
structure their business. And that was a lot of great insight.
Another thing that's been really great for you is TikTok. Yes,
and you just mentioned that, so can you explain how
TikTok has been really vital for the growth of basket
lad absolutely.

Speaker 4 (18:29):
So we love TikTok. That's my favorite social media platform.
I feel that TikTok gives everyone a chance. We actually
just they flew us out.

Speaker 3 (18:36):
This week.

Speaker 4 (18:36):
We were at the US Black Chambers with them representing
the company and we actually got to speak at the Capital.

Speaker 3 (18:43):
I let's say politicians name good. So when we were
speaking with Schumer's.

Speaker 4 (18:47):
Office of all that is done for our business and
so we were early adopters of TikTok shop and TikTok
is a huge acquisition channel. We have video after video
after video organically with no paid dollars behind it, go viral,
blew us up. We have three best sellers on TikTok.
Our edge control is the number one styling job in
the country, now only on TikTok, but all platforms.

Speaker 3 (19:09):
Because of TikTok.

Speaker 4 (19:10):
We have the number one n hair grow throws sold
on TikTok and the number one scalping hair bomb. And
I just love TikTok because it's a place where the
everyday average person could roll out of bed make a video.

Speaker 3 (19:21):
We have creators who've.

Speaker 4 (19:23):
Been able to leave their jobs and they just promote
products full time right and they get commissioned.

Speaker 3 (19:28):
I just love the platform. I love what it's doing
for businesses.

Speaker 4 (19:32):
For us, it's got us in front of audiences that
no other platform would allow us to get in front
of for free. Right everywhere else is heavily off of
you got it, you pay to play. So we absolutely
love TikTok. We have a great partnership and relationship with them,
and we really do hope it's around to stay.

Speaker 2 (19:48):
Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that now seeing
all the At first it looked.

Speaker 1 (19:52):
Like remember TikTok went off for who had long?

Speaker 3 (19:54):
Was it gone hours?

Speaker 1 (19:56):
Like a day? People were losing their minds.

Speaker 2 (19:59):
But now we're also figuring out what's gonna happen like
with TikTok and so. But I also think when things
like that happen, it also makes you realize I gotta
have And I know that's that's what twenty five percent.

Speaker 4 (20:11):
So last year, actually TikTok was about sixty percent of
our business, Okay, And funny enough, Mi, so I told
you we grew one thousand percent year over year. So first,
when we went viral on TikTok back in twenty twenty three,
that's when I first got to the point in business
where I'm like, Okay, I have to stop trying to
do everything on my own. I was like, I'm going
to hire a social media manager. Hire a social media manager.

(20:32):
My son, Jayden, who was fifteen at the time, he said,
my your social media manager sucks. I can do your TikTok.
I say, you don't know anything about woman or hair.
You cannot do TikTok. He says, it's not about women
and it's not about hair, it's about content strategy. Sure enough,
he took off our TikTok viral video after viral video.
I swear we would post out like seven pm on
a Monday and by Tuesday morning have like half a

(20:55):
million views on the videos and these are a shoppable video.

Speaker 3 (20:57):
To hire him exactly. Well, now he's our head of grow.
So that's why we grew.

Speaker 1 (21:01):
And we get him over here.

Speaker 3 (21:03):
We grew one thousand percent year over year he took over.

Speaker 4 (21:06):
Now he leads all paid media strategy across all of
our marketing channels, Like we have agencies with cmos and
people with more experience than he's been alive, and he's
leading the strategy.

Speaker 3 (21:18):
He lives in BREATHS Marketing and he's a straight a student.

Speaker 1 (21:21):
Yeah, what's his salary?

Speaker 3 (21:25):
Don't so fast up.

Speaker 1 (21:27):
As for a raise?

Speaker 4 (21:28):
Okay, but literally, and not only that, like he's looking
at our profit margins and making sure we're advertising profitably.
And he's even like, I don't come from a corporate world, right,
I come from nursing, and I knew nothing about team structure, right.
So I remember I promoted my operations manager to director
of operations and he's like, Mom, what is she directing
the circus?

Speaker 3 (21:47):
You have no one under her? You can't have a.

Speaker 1 (21:49):
Director, that's so funny.

Speaker 4 (21:53):
But now we have operations manager and operations coordinator under her.
So he's always like he loves business and structure, and
he's always studying and always watching podcasts like he lives
and breathes it. And he's grown the company like crazy.
No one believes he's seventeen. He's been on some podcasts
with me. Very smart, he like, so great, great kid.
But again he's the one, right, So I actually do

(22:13):
think we're gonna end up in international retail markets before
we're in US retail stores. And that's also a strategic play.

Speaker 1 (22:21):
So what's his title?

Speaker 3 (22:22):
Head of growth?

Speaker 1 (22:23):
Okay? And he has a team under him.

Speaker 4 (22:24):
He's the director of well, he leaves our agency, so
he strategized as they.

Speaker 1 (22:29):
Actually got that. Was he always liked that or was
it from watching you?

Speaker 3 (22:32):
I think it's innately in him.

Speaker 4 (22:35):
Like when I had Jay and I was seventeen, I
graduated high school, he was one years old on my hip.
I graduated with honors. He then watched me go through
my first bachelor's degree. I went to Leman College in
the Bronx, and then I went back got an accelerated
nursing degree from Patrie University.

Speaker 3 (22:49):
So we literally in.

Speaker 4 (22:50):
The summers were in my living room with the blinds closed,
and nursing is the hardest batcher's degree you can get.
I was literally studying morning tonight. Thank god he was
a good kid and he watch me study from morning
to night. Graduated, became a nurse. I was working full
time nights in the er while getting my master's degree
to be a nurse practitioner. Then I became a nurse practitioner,
started the business. He watched me always grind onin NonStop.

(23:12):
So I think it's just really in him right that grinding.
Now hustle, and he loves marketing.

Speaker 1 (23:17):
Right and a relationship wise, how is that for you?
How do you have time to even he's.

Speaker 3 (23:23):
The boss, my son.

Speaker 1 (23:24):
No, I'm just talking about outside of it.

Speaker 2 (23:26):
I'm talking about like chromatically you like leg we got,
but how do you have time for that? Just don't
and what type of what would you tell people who
are trying to balance like, because it is true being
an entrepreneur, we're being a founder and wanting to have
and having the success that you have, Uh, that does
cut into your social life.

Speaker 3 (23:46):
It cuts into your social life.

Speaker 4 (23:47):
And I also think that when you're at certain levels,
you're pool of people that you could even entertain.

Speaker 3 (23:53):
Should well, not that it is, but it should be
this long.

Speaker 4 (23:56):
Right, because especially when you're a woman, it's difficult to
a man and like men naturally, right.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
Need to be needed, they need to be the leader, right.
And if you're a.

Speaker 4 (24:06):
Woman and now you're a boss and you're powerful, you
know you need someone who's like on your level or higher, right,
And I think that creates friction now but right now
I'm very very focused on okay, business.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
So all right, all right, you know you might have
some itches, That's all I'm saying. But no, and I
do want to say I love this guy. When I
have braids, This is when is the best time for
me to use the scalpstdent because I come in here
every day, so I keep this here and I come
in here every day in front of the mirror, and
I'm always like putting this in my scalp because I'm
like perfect. You can see every single part of my

(24:41):
scalp and it feels so good. Yes, but like I
told you, you know, your products have been absolutely amazing.
It's all I use now, thank you, So I appreciate that.
Are there plans for expansion of the line to other
products that you're going to be introducing, because that's another thing,
like how do you know when it's time to, you know,
add more products to the line we create.

Speaker 4 (25:00):
So we never just sit around and say, oh, well
we want to create this. It's always what the customers
ask for. So every single product in our line now
is complimentary and customers have asked for it. And now
next year we have about three products coming out per quarter.
It's been long overdue and these are all products that
customers have asked for. They're all about strengthening your hair,

(25:21):
healthy scalp. Scalp first products and we'll make sure you're
amongst the first to use them.

Speaker 1 (25:26):
I know that's right, all right.

Speaker 2 (25:27):
Well, I appreciate you so much, and again, are you
going to be at Angela You Day?

Speaker 1 (25:31):
When people see you?

Speaker 4 (25:31):
There will be at Angelae You Day, the entire basketball
of the team, along with myself, very very excited.

Speaker 2 (25:37):
Okay, Well, I'm excited for it, and I appreciate you
so much, and thank you and just amazing. Your story
is just incredible and that's what wigh up is all about,
to highlighting these incredible stories.

Speaker 1 (25:47):
And your success is well deserved and I love to
see it.

Speaker 3 (25:50):
Thank you, Las,