Gossiping About Failed Beauty Brands, Not Having Kids, and Genius PR Moves (Maggie & Katie Sellers)

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1:03In case you missed it, you're allowed to be hot, smart, and rich. So let's get into it.

1:14Finally, I have someone that will clap with me again. Well, as the editor, I know how important it is. It is really good to ground yourself. Like, have you ever been stressed out and then you just take a minute breath and breathing? Yeah, breathing. I don't clap to myself. um katie sellers are ready to get hot for rich so ready we're back we are back i don't know if everyone can tell but i am somewhat back because i'm still sick yeah so i thought we would start out with consumption habits as we always do and mine is not cool because i just bought cold and flu this morning that's needed needed you're really struggling today yeah but i think um the last was expensive thing that i bought i'm actually going to bring it back to air one i after eating in Europe for three weeks realized just how expensive Erewhon is.

2:01Oh, it's disgusting. I think we live in this like illusion in this bubble when we're in LA that it's just the norm. It is not the norm. No, not the norm. $50. You're telling me that a combo plate delivery bananas and like a midday squares is that is insane. So what are you returning? I'm not returning. Oh, I thought you said I'm going to return it to Erewhon. No, no, I'm just saying that's what I bought and it was$51. So I'm saying that's the most expensive last thing that I bought. What about you? Uh, well the Uber to get here from LAX. Okay. PSA, if you are coming to LA, never fly in on a Sunday night at 10 PM.

2:38No, no. I mean, for me, I'm like, Oh, either it's super early Monday morning and like that's a grind or Sunday night. Like from, I ordered the Uber the moment I stepped off the plane by the time i got to the road i waited 35 minutes for the uber still and it was like 150 bucks it was 109 which actually i was like that's pretty decent yeah for a black from lax so that's probably the last most expensive and the last thing that i purchased okay yeah um we also have to talk about our new setup without things with the mics like i'm not holding something i know if you're not watching this we actually got built-in mics now and we're gonna to try to go with that.

3:16Yeah. Because the podcast is progressing. So the podcast is not just progressing. The podcast is, you know what I always say? I'm no longer just surviving. I'm thriving. You're thriving. So the podcast is no longer just surviving. It's thriving. And, um, it's so interesting because I said this in this content brief that I did with Spotify, which was like, we started this podcast with iPhones. We also started it with those road mics that you can bring with you anywhere. I will say the sound quality is so much better with a wired and mic. It is. And now that we have a producer that's doing video and audio, hi Christiane, we have someone that can like watch the levels as we're going.

3:52But it's so interesting because when you're starting something, you think it has to all be perfect. This is like six and a half months later. And we thought it was perfect. I know. That's the embarrassing thing. It's not embarrassing though. It's not embarrassing. Like you should be embarrassed by the first thing that you put out when you look back on it yeah and like I'm not but like I am kind of but I mean when you become the top three business podcast in the US and then you chart at number 44 like top podcast globally obviously we're doing something right yeah it's amazing and we joke about this we're like we had high hopes this is surpassing it this is way surpassing it yeah like beyond so how was Ibiza isn't that okay well I'm that classic person that like when I hadn't been to Ibiza I would say Ibiza and then when I had gone to Ibiza I was like Ibiza is amazing and so Ibiza was actually incredible this is the second year in a row I didn't go into a club like I don't know if I'm lame so you and I have had completely different Ibiza experiences because I went when I was 22 years old.

5:00I was at Shwaya. I was at Pasha. I was like out partying with my college friends. I never went on a Euro trip after school. Yeah. But I feel like Ibiza has turned into this like if you seek it, it's this wellness kind of sanctuary for a lot of really high net worth, really successful people. So it's funny when you're even landing into the airport, you just see like all the PJs lined up on the tarmac, which is hilarious. We had such a unique crew that kind of all came together we were staying at this compound called sabina ibiza which essentially is built on circadian rhythms which obviously we're super interested in you to explain that like in the newsletter you said it's built on some sort of like energetic plane um it's built on these ley lines and so it's supposed to help with like meditation and manifestation and then there's a lot of like old stories around the goddess of fertility and love and so there's just a lot of like wellness mythical aspects to the island but sabina that we were staying at is essentially a compound that is extremely expensive to buy property on but it's built on circadian rhythm so like every single thing in the compound is supposed to be for like you're waking up with the sun you're going to bed obviously not because it's like a party island but like even the light switches have on like a circadian rhythm sense so it was amazing we had the dopest crew of like really successful people new people in their career we had spent some time with this amazing family that I had met from London who just like brought such a different energy to the group.

6:27The Brits. The Brits. Like I love the Brits. I was talking. They were asking me about the podcast and I was like, we talk about money and sex. And they're like, great. Everything that Brits don't talk about. I'm like aggressively watching Love Island UK right now. So like I'm feeling British. But yeah. So Ibiza was amazing. There's also just like it feels so nice to be home and wearing jeans and a sweater again. Yeah. And just to take a beat for a second. There is no place like home yeah I can't wait to be back um I feel like there's also so much to talk about today but I really want to start with beauty yeah because a lot has happened so we put out this case study two weeks ago about Amy Cole shutting down frack which isn't really like shutting down it's just been like sold and operated by someone else which I feel like is the same founder dilemma that someone like Ami Cole found themselves in but I think in general like we've seen a shift in the beauty space of just like how incredibly hard it is to operate businesses, specifically color cosmetics.

7:26And I thought it was really interesting today because it was announced that Mary Phillips is launching her makeup brand. And I actually, even amidst how incredibly hard it is to build a color cosmetics brand, think it will actually do really well. So for those of you that aren't familiar, there's this really famous makeup artist, Mary Phillips, and she is known for doing like hailey bieber and yeah the kardashians so she's launching mph beauty which is a range of makeup products across complexion lip and brushes it says do you think that meant blushes no probably brushes like if she's a makeup artist it's like the applicator okay well complexion already it's like shade range so we'll talk about that but it's launching as an exclusive at sephora.com on august 15th and then it's going to roll out to 650 retailer doors later this month so mary phillips is so iconic because do you know that makeup technique where you would do bronzer and your concealer underneath your foundation oh yes she came up with that okay okay i remember that being a huge thing like a year or two ago i still do it though like i didn't do it today and i remember that podcast i did for a dear media podcast and i looked at it after and like my contour was so poorly blended and i was like the one day i didn't do the mary phillips technique Okay.

8:43But so she calls it underpainting. Okay. And kind of like Jen Atkin, I do feel like she has a white space. Yeah. And she has credibility in the space. And I think that's the other thing we hear time and time again is like, if you have credibility, regardless of where you're building, but especially in consumer, it does make a difference. Well, and I think the other thing that we talked about in our case study a few weeks ago was like color is so expensive to scale because of the shade extensions that you need. And so I think not that I know the ins and outs of how she will fundraise, but like she knows a lot of people.

9:19She does a lot of really successful people's makeup that I don't feel as though it will be as hard to raise money as it will be for other founders that don't have those connections necessarily. And I think like it's interesting because the time that we're at in the market is like there has been to our point, this like disenchantment of color cosmetics over the last while from strategics and that's why there have been so many brands in the market that like haven't been able to move yeah but like I do believe that like that will eventually go away and there will be a runway and opportunity in the next say like five to seven years where there will be an appetite for strategics to acquire yeah and if she's starting now like hopefully she knows that it's like it's gonna take that five to seven year period but the timing of the market feels right yeah it feels right if you can get in now and build towards exiting in like the five-year timeline or if you're hailey beaver like doing it much faster in three to four but for every you know m &a either it's hot or it's not or right now strategics are offloading like assets that aren't performing i think it's it is a great time to get in and a lot of what we're seeing is these like you know summer fridays or merit makeup by mario rare beauty which like back until last year business of fashion was reporting like these are all of the brands that are on the market to be acquired and literally not one of them has been acquired except for road yeah the interesting thing about all those businesses and business and beauty in general is like the hero product it's like she has a method it's like the Tracy Anderson method of working out.

10:57It's not like abs. It's like Tracy Anderson method. Yeah. It's like you have to get it all to use the Mary Phillips method and to get the face and the look and the vibe. I think that there still is room in beauty, but it does take a very specific founder. And I think we've also just seen like such a saturation in the beauty space because it has never been an easier time to start a brand. It's also never been a harder time to keep a brand alive. Totally. And I think it's also like having this constant reinvention of yourself. Like we even find that as a, on a human level, you're constantly reinventing yourselves.

11:31Human makes, humans make mistakes. And so to have someone who just stays stagnant in the space and isn't evolving with the times is why I feel like we have seen a lot of brands that like haven't been able to keep up because they haven't continued to evolve, whether it's their packaging, whether it's like the way that they talk to their consumer, whether it's even like their formulas. And I think it's interesting is like, you know, I love Freck so much. I love the Freckles. Yeah. When I think about everything I've been taught about business, it's like, are you building a function or are you building a platform?

12:05And to me, they started with a function feature, right? It's like a feature. It's Freckles. And I don't know if Freck evolved into like a platform of a brand, even though that could have been their hero skew. Yeah. But I think the way that Mary's already starting to build it feels more like to our point, like a platform versus a product. Yeah. Like she's starting from the place of even building alongside a community. What do you think about her choosing Sephora over Ulta? I think that's 100 percent the right move. If you want to build a mastige type brand that you're going to have like one, the cachet of being in Sephora.

12:45and Sephora, like as big as all of these behemoth, you know, retailers are and how difficult they can be at the end of the day, they also do a good job of coming alongside brands and helping them grow and scale. But I think as a founder, you need to go in eyes wide open and be like, do I want a relationship that's going to be predictive with someone like Sephora where they tell me what I have to do and when I have to do it? And if that's not what you're looking to build, then like maybe Sephora isn't for you. And then on the Ulta side of things, it's like been described as that's the marketplace.

13:19Like that's like Amazon where not like anyone can get in, but it has a little bit of a different connotation. Wait, but I think that Ulta is actually like really catching up right now. So I think they I have a prediction that they're going to be like the mecca of supplements because like all of the announcements that have come out recently is like so many supplement brands. And I think that could be their white space, like not 100 percent. But I think if they do a similar playbook of Sephora, like finding the early stage brands that are growing and have the potential and then help them actually like grow as an exclusive.

13:53Yeah. I actually think that Ulta could become the place where it's like the Sephora of supplements. Or it goes back to your like it's the all of young kind of thing where it is more of a marketplace and you can get beauty, you can get supplements, you can get whatever else they're going to go into. But yeah, the big announcements of Ritual being offered in Ulta. And Serena Williams joining. and Serena Williams joining makes so much sense by the way as somebody that worked at that intersection of celebrity and beauty brands yeah because realistically Serena will be so helpful when she is trying to sell on shelf at Ulta it's a recognizable name that is always the time when I tell founders like if you are going into retail if you have been considering a celebrity face like that is always the time to really like prioritize that because retailers love it it's a recognizable face.

14:42There's so many options that like having Serena be a part of that, I actually believe is the right move for ritual. Do you use ritual? No, I've been using burden B. Oh, they do something similar. Well, they do like it on my, you know, second fertility journey. It's more for fertility. That's the first one that I've heard you say my second fertility journey. Yeah, well, the first one wasn't even really a journey. You just got pregnant on the first one. That's amazing. Which doesn't always happen. No. No. Let's be honest, founders. Returns are a nightmare for business. If you're scaling a Shopify brand, you already know the costs I'm talking about.

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16:03One brand cut refunds by 21%, saving$900 ,000. And the brands using freight retain more cash and convert more customers, period. So if you're ready to turn your returns into revenue, head to freight.com and tell them HotSmartRich sent you for an exclusive offer and white glove service. That's F-R-A-T-E dot com and tell them HotSmartRich sent you. Every ambitious woman has a secret weapon. So let yours be the Hot Smart Rich Insights. It's how over 250 ,000 women are owning their worth in business, wealth, and life. Whether you're building a brand, making moves in your career, or wanting to get control over your finances, the Hot Smart Rich newsletter delivers the cultural context and consumer intel to keep you ahead.

16:52With only six months left in the year, it's time to make consumer trends, financial hacks, and HSR Insights your best friend instead of mindlessly scrolling on social media. We've built one of the most powerful communities of women at the intersection of consumer, capital, and culture. So join us with the paid version of our newsletter, free, for three months with the link in the show notes to claim your free offer. Okay, in other news, did you see that Ty Haney is now back? Yes. What do you think? I'm so proud of her. I'm so proud of her because, and I distinctly remember this when I was working at Missouri.

17:29Emily Weiss was getting taken down. Ty Haney was being absolutely crucified in the press. And it's so funny because we talk a lot about being like a forward facing founder. And at that time, the CEO founder of Missouri Nora like made a definitive decision where she was like, I'm not being a forward facing founder because of what is happening to these women. And she literally got rid of her social media. Wow. And so to see a woman regardless of like the internal you know dynamics of what actually happened in the company I don't want to like belittle anyone's personal working experience but like to see a woman who was crucified and torn down by the media in a way that a man never would have been to not only start another business try your best but then and doggy and yeah and then become back in control of like the brand that started it all for you.

18:27I feel like that's a very powerful, like return to self moment for her. Well, and I think also just, did you watch the commercial of hers? Like, hi, I'm Ty Haney and I'm 23 years old and I just graduated from Parsons and like, I'm starting outdoor voices to like bring movement to people. And then the commercial that just came out this morning started with her daughter being like, mommy, what is outdoor voices? yeah and to see a woman who's evolved from that period of time that's now a mother yeah and like be able to bring that into the fold is just such a signal to women to like never give up and I think it's interesting because there's so many ways I could take this but overall I'm super interested to see how this plays out in terms of like what her role and structure is because what I've read so far is that she's not the CEO.

19:15She's the owner, founder, and partner. I'm interested to see who she brings into that seat because that's a make or break kind of role. It is. And someone that she has to be super aligned with. Don't you think though that this is the biggest reminder as to why like having a strong mission is so important when you're building a brand because she is doing the same mission 10 years later, which is like doing things. So she's coming back to that. And like, I think that's why I'm cheering so hard for her and like I really want it to be successful because you can just tell every single bone in her body wanted to build this company not for the headline it was like because she genuinely wanted to bring the love of movement back yeah and I remind myself of that with hot smart rich so many times it's so easy to like completely just forget why you started or what you're doing and when you face things when people are mad at you or you ruffle feathers or you do the wrong thing or you get distracted or you see the competition, it's so easy to like fall into that and spiral.

20:17And when you just remind yourself, like, this is why I'm doing this and I am maybe going to piss some people off and like, it's not going to be for everybody. It's okay. And I think seeing this for me today was like everything that I needed to see to remember why I'm doing what I'm doing, which is like to truly help women in business, like on the personal and on the professional side because in that 10 years of Ty from her starting Outdoor Voices leaving in 2020 now coming back five years later think about her evolution as a person totally who talks about that we do yeah and her story as like a founder to where she is today like that's the whole reason why Hot Smart Rich exists because women have been told for so long like you can't be all of these things like if you're going to be the founder and the ceo and the ceo seat like only be that and when you deviate from that it's outside of the norm people don't like that and so i'm so proud that we're creating a space where you know if hot smart rich was around 10 years ago like maybe ty haney would have had a different experience listening to our show and like connecting with women who are going through the same thing wait can we talk about the fact of like how many women are connecting in our WhatsApp channel, like thousands.

21:33It's insane. Like people are self-selecting to do like working sessions online. They're putting a directory together. Like it's so crazy to me because I feel like having created this space, it has nothing to do with me anymore. Like I, that's actually one of the things for everyone that's listening that is in the group chat that this is not our first rodeo. We failed before on trying to create something like this. Yeah. We did a Slack channel when we first started, that was like 2023, man, 2023, when it was like trying to facilitate these conversations that were so forced. And then all it ended up being was like everybody direct messaging me to be like, can I have your advice on this?

22:15And then that's not scalable, which is why I started doing content in the first place. And two, it didn't actually solve the problem of like building a community around women. And I think that is something that like you can't buy and women need. And nothing is more obvious than with that company, T. Okay. Well, we need to talk about this because I'm on a completely different algorithm, obviously. And like, I didn't even know what this was. So, okay. T is this app that has blown up because they ask users to upload a selfie and a photo of their ID. Okay. Women then post photos of men, review them, ranging from like bad dates to warnings to scams.

22:59Okay. Other women can then add their experiences or react with like red or green flag emojis. And then there's some things that are behind a paywall, like background tracks, which our MBA intern was actually in it and was watching it before this data leak happened, which is such an unfortunate situation. Yeah. Here are my thoughts on it. And this is going to be controversial. You can be toxic for somebody as much as they can be toxic for you and they won't be toxic for somebody else. I 100 % agree. It took me so long to figure out that like I was the problem in previous relationships sometimes because I was triggering for that person as much as they were triggering for me.

23:50And so on the one hand, I can hold that. And then on the other hand, I have this other truth where it's like women banding together and being able to share experiences. Like I love this trend on TikTok where it's like if your husband is having his bachelor party in Nashville and like his name is Kyle, like he's doing X, Y, and Z. And they have literally found men that are about to get married and that are cheating on their fiance. So on the second hand, I hold the truth of like women banding together and being able to like build this community and help each other. I love it. So I think with everything in life, like it's all about the user's discretion, like choose your own adventure.

24:33And with something like this, I would always, maybe if I was single and I was on it like I would look at it with not a hundred percent certainty yeah people evolve but I do think the timing of the data leak is just too coincidental way too coincidental like it starts blowing up in the app store it's climbing the charts and then all of a sudden like there's this data leak and like that's really gonna hurt the business totally would you ever use that if you were single? Oh, I feel like this. It kind of does remind me like I'm really dating myself here. Like I started using Facebook when I was 16 years old.

25:12This was like early. I was like in grade early days of it coming online because we had an education email address. And this was back in the day when Facebook and I'm thinking back to like the leaks that happened with Facebook where it was like rating guys or rating girls or whatever. And that was like the big controversy that caused Facebook to actually like pop off in the beginning. So part of me with the data leak is like, are they trying to take a page out of like Facebook's page with like just causing attention to themselves? But I mean, I totally agree with you. One person's adventure is not going to be the other person's.

25:52And even from my experience of dating and marrying my husband ultimately like we went on dates when we were 25 we didn't continue dating and we ended up marrying each other marrying each other yeah um but he wasn't toxic when he was 25 but it I could have been like oh you know like I just didn't want to continue whatever it is like I obviously we had an experience where we didn't want to continue seeing each other so I think like but yeah then if it's someone who's predatory and is toxic and genuinely a bad person you know the women need to band together yeah but so I I don't know and I'm not in the place in my life where I need to or want to so it's really kind of hard for me to answer that it's so funny because it kind of reminds me of like reddit and now these companies are paying for professional redditors to like start community on their behalf and I I still don't know if that will be successful it'll be interesting to track it like can you really buy community I don't know maybe if you have somebody and I can like name some I actually really want to name some of the people that have just like been so amazing in this since I started HSR but like Kayla Nina Lily Lily Paige like I know these girls all by name you know because they have been unofficial HSR angels um Brooke like Brooke from Australia is literally hosting meetups like we are trying to find a world in which like we can actually engage this on a professional level because that is what these companies are trying to buy and fabricate.

27:27It is so hard to do that. We're looking for a sponsor. So, but I don't know if you can buy community. Like, I don't think you can, even if you're buying professional Redditors, like it would have to be someone who's so deeply passionate about what they're writing about. Because we say all the time, the consumer is smart and communities are smart. They know if it's not genuine. And they know if it's also like coming from a place of genuine interest or also being paid. The other thing, and I'll say this about Reddit, is like you can go onto someone's Reddit profile and see what else they're commenting on.

28:02And so what sub Reddits or whatever they are in. And you do get suspicious. Like if you're on it like a, there's a hate Reddit thread or whatever. You can go in someone who's posting something nasty. if they're only posting something about that one person constantly all the time it's like you're a troll who hates whoever it's the same thing with community building like if you're only posting randomly like oh my god I love this and I love that it's like well that's fake it's interesting though because I think more than anything women need community digitally than they do physically because did you see that report from the wall street journal that women are falling behind in the workplace.

28:46Obviously I said this on the last podcast episode and upon reflection, it can come across in the wrong way where I was like, if you're not going into the office, you're never going to be successful. So true in your twenties. Like if you are not grinding your ass when you have no responsibilities, no kids, no husband, no mortgage, like that's on you. You know, you're choosing to have a different life. But I think where maybe I would self-reflect and say, I would maybe change my opinion is like related to this wall street journal article where women are falling behind at work again because of all of the responsibilities they have outside of the work.

29:18They have them in the home. And the more successful women get at work, the more they actually take on in their home. Why? It's like a weird phenomenon that you would think that as earnings and career trajectory equal out between men and women as they're married, you would expect that the mental load and burden of the home becomes more equally shared. But what has actually happened is that as the women become more successful, they actually take on more and the husband takes on less. And I think in self-reflection, thinking about it is like if you are a woman and you're in business mode and you're like a type A high performing, it's like you have a to-do list.

30:06I'm already doing things I'm just gonna add it on and I'm gonna find a way to make it work like it just becomes like a cycle a cycle of I know how to do this I can do it maybe more efficiently I don't need to I'm making my own money so I actually don't even need to ask you for your perspective if I'm just gonna pay for it um but it is highly concerning that like one women are taking on more. They're not being, you know, equally sharing the burden with their partner. And then two, if you're falling behind in the workplace because of having kids and whatever, like I just don't want to be saying that in 2025.

30:48Well, it's interesting because for the first time the U.S. just reported that fertility rates are dropping and not shocking, not shocking a mom. So women are having 1.6 children per woman on average in 2024. That is lower than the U.N.'s projection for the world's overall rate which is 2.25 as well as the figure for the U.S. was 1.62 in its world population prospects report for 2024. Not shocking when like women are falling up behind. It is so incredibly expensive to raise children. The mental load of raising children. Why do you think people still do it? Still have one or two? Still have children.