She's Making AI-Generated Foundation In 90 Seconds | with Ruth De Leo, DCYPHER Beauty

0:00Rochelle: Today we're talking about what happens when years of industry experience meet a problem that you can't ignore. Ruth de Leo is the CEO and co-founder of Decipher Beauty, a beauty tech business that has now created more than 90 ,000 individual complexion matches. We're getting into leaving a successful career, building groundbreaking technology and what it really takes to disrupt an industry that you already know inside out. So let's find out why she's a lady who launched.

0:30Rochelle: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 0. All engines running. Welcome to Ladies Who Launch. Thank you very much for having me. I'm so pleased that you're here. I'm so excited about Decipher and the world that you've created. It's so, so interesting. But before we get all the way there, I like to start by going all the way back because that's what we do here. And you've spent around 15 years working in beauty, 20 years in retail, And you've worked with some of the biggest names, right, in that space, LVMA, Charlotte Tilbury, Bioma. And then you decide to build something completely different for yourself, which is always the kind of, there's always that light bulb that goes off for a founder where they go, hang on a minute, I've done this now.

1:18Rochelle: I want to do something for me. So what was happening in your life at that time when you sort of started to think, I want to build something of my own? so I guess I didn't I always knew that I would love to have my own brand you know fantasy world of you know for that kind of first decade I suppose but never really had the idea or the thought or the consideration and concept of what is it you know I knew that loads of people could launch a brand but I wasn't famous you know I wasn't someone that would be you know credible at that point and I guess it was just a fortuitous moment when I met my co-founder so myself and Adam So to be fair, he is the genius.

1:53So I can sit here and say I am. But realistically, realistically, he is the tech genius behind this. And I guess for me, I'd spent years in the beauty industry, like you say, loved it, loved everything about it, learned so much. But for me, there was lots of pain points that I saw. So, you know, as I moved my way through from retail to like chief commercial officers and, you know, second in command in most of these bigger businesses, I saw a real commercial opportunity or a commercial challenge where everyone was bootstrapped by having to invest in MOQs and, you know, kind of get restricted by what they could do creatively because the kind of engine behind was too expensive.

2:32And then really kind of got disappointed with beauty waste. So that was where it all started for me. I saw how much money I was writing off every year within the industry. And just within one brand, you know, millions of pounds worth of product that were never kind of on your face, would never touch a consumer. But because you have to cater and the world became this kind of inclusivity breed, I suppose everyone was talking about it. But for me, it was much more of a marketing tool. Like we do 50 shades, we do 60 shades, we do 70 shades. But reality is commercially that engine doesn't back that up if you're not selling it in the volume etc not able to do it in what you need and so therefore that would become waste and ultimately for me that was pretty painful and then the other side I saw customers who still weren't getting what they needed from those 50 60 70 shades they were

3:19Rochelle: still having to mix two or three shades that's the story of my life yeah yeah exactly well yeah we've got you some foundation now we've got some drops you can get there very generous but I think obviously for me for me that was it you know I saw this huge problem this huge problem that people actually weren't getting what they needed even though brands were spending and wasting and you know really trying to stretch themselves and failing you know um at being able to cater for the customer and so for me that was when I thought actually Adam has this technology aspect where we can be really precise we can really personalize everything how do we make it a brand how do we do something together and that's kind of where it born out of so it was really fortuitous it was really serendipitous to meet him so I can't sit here and say I was pushing you know part of your story of course of course and we'll unpack what it is you do and how you do that in just a moment because it's so blooming incredible it's it's honestly it's brilliant um we talked about you being in the beauty space for a number of years for 15 years and in retail can you tell us a little bit about what you were actually doing in that space and and how that time looked yeah so I started I literally went from so I was a singer so originally I was a cruise ship singer I don't really push that out too much but we could maybe do a duet one day yes okay what's your song of choice tell me a bit of mariah a bit of whitney a belter i'm a belter okay well i'm expecting big things now i am yeah well might be disappointed but you know i believe in myself that's the thing that's the main thing i have fun um but i think yeah i i started off as kind of like this entertainment kind of world if you like but loved makeup so obviously through entertainment you get it i don't know how you discovered makeup but i definitely didn't discover makeup there's lots of lovely stories about people with they're watching their mom put lipstick on other grab my parents and my grandparents not really into makeup.

5:02I'm the same as you, you know. I really think it become about working with makeup artists

5:07Rochelle: and having it in that performance space. Like how they would say, you know, do this, wear this. And I was amazed how they could make my eyes look even bluer. Yeah. All these kind of things. And I think for me it was like, I know I need to find something that I really love because I was enjoying what I was doing, but it was never forever and it wasn't really a career. Right. You know, all of those kind of moments I enjoyed it. and then yeah benefit I saw this role advertised with benefits as simple as that I saw it on wasn't LinkedIn whatever it was in them days um and I applied for it the head of retail went for it got it couldn't believe it they took a massive gamble on me because I didn't have that kind of experience I'd worked in sales and you know on the ship I used to do cruise sales director stuff and things like that so I was good at the gift of the gab kind of thing to get people talking but yeah I got this opportunity and yeah I really owe it a lot to you know those first kind of years I suppose like you say, they really bought into you as a person, which must sort of instantly give you a real level of confidence.

6:03Rochelle: Like you say, that's not your background. You've not done anything like this before. Yeah. Like that's, I think actually, yeah, now you're saying it, I probably didn't probably at that point. I think I definitely had massive imposter syndrome, you know, like what am I doing it for the first six months? I was like, I did the gift of this job. How does it work? Like I'm getting free makeup thrown at me. It's all, you know, Hula bronzer or whatever. This is amazing. Oh, the Benetton in the world. yeah like what is this um and you know you get a car and all this and it's just amazing like this most so they really but that was the that was their secret sauce and i still say to this day you know obviously they've got different scenarios now and challenges versus whether but when i joined them they were number one in the uk so they were doing over 250 million a year in uk retail um yeah and i was obviously looking after the retail teams and driving those force and trying to get it we launched browse you know browse weren't a thing for benefit then yeah we launched this 42 skew range of brows and everyone thought we were mad in the beauty industry and then it just went crazy still my favorite brand yeah give me the silver the silver precisely my back yeah i mean there's some great product ever there's so many great products on the market but i still use them today i still use till i think every brand that i have been a part of i still use genuinely and then when you moved to other brands such as tillbury biomer etc was it were you in that same space in that same role or had that kind of evolved moved a bit so benefit was definitely more retail focused sales field teams you know how do you drive business how do you drive those commercials you know so what we guys are really wanting now how do you sell the product in store with or without people but then with Tilbury I learned more that Tilbury was amazing I mean everywhere that I've been I've been have been really blessed I feel like I can't say anything detrimental or bad about anyone that I've worked with or for I've learned so much from every single aspect but I think with Tilbury she trusted me I definitely came into my own in Tilbury I think in benefit I was nervous a bit of a rabbit in the headlights like it's your first sort of bite of the cherry right this is your first how am I doing it and I remember this one time I like we won the number one you know in boots you know it's a massive deal you know obviously been the number one um and I thought oh my god I did do this so you know then I started to kind of like believe in it and the team and how we're driving the but at Tilbury Charlotte and Demetra really trusted me to do what I thought was right so when I joined Tilbury it was very early stage but when I joined Tilbury they were successful don't get me wrong but the growth was pretty slow right you know it was that real point of is this going to be something or is it going to stay in this league yes and I think realistically I brought a bit of benefitism to Tilbury so Tilbury was very like stoic and very kind of like I remember reading like all of the surveys and the customer surveys and people felt like they were excluded you know so there was disappointment from people going into Selfridges to the counter they felt like we weren't embracing them you know It was like, we are up here and we don't deal with you.

8:52It was very painful to read when I joined, obviously on that sales side. And so for the first six months, I was really adamant to get the right people and the right jobs. There's so many great people, but they weren't doing the right jobs. They weren't really working as a great mechanism to get the business where it needed to be. And so, yeah, I think we brought a bit of humanism and laugh and fun and joy that benefit was in abundance. we brought that to Tilbury but still kept trying to make it very you know obviously makeup artistry focused a bit very different and still really premium but I know what you mean and have that sort of just engage human personality a little bit it was all very you know I mean the names of the products and all of that speak for itself so they're quite you know childish-ish now you know playful that's a better word yeah but yes I think you know playful in that respect but I think it was very adult it was very grown up but it was also quite serious seemed complicated and serious so I think then I started to hire lots of people in the field you know develop like the pro team where the pro team were actually engaging and really fun and had a bit of joy and you know we built all the things that I did honestly I feel so incredibly proud of everyone of that brand of what we did because obviously it's Charlotte and she's just she's incredible but it was definitely

10:07Rochelle: expert led wasn't it like if you look at sort of the way that the dialogues changed from i remember when it was first launched and it was you know it because i think it wasn't one of the first i suppose to really be focused around the makeup artist which felt really yes ish i mean as mainstream as it was as mainstream as it was i guess obviously there's brands i think what made the difference for me i remember i just remember going from benefit to tilbury and everyone in my family and my friends going, what on earth? Who is that? What are you on about? Like, who is Charlotte Tilbury Benefit or amazing?

10:42You know, what are you doing? I think you just believed in that person and she was this expert in her field and she's just charismatic, engaging. And it's like loads of people are Marmite, right? You either love them or you hate them. And I just love her. I loved her from day one, I think in how she is and that reflected in our relationship, you know, and I think she then trusted me to go and move to the, I moved to the Middle East for her to launch the Middle East of Tilbury and stuff for like 18 months, two years. So I got all these opportunities. But yeah, I think that I think she was the first in that space that really owned it.

11:14You know, I think there was moments where Mac had worked with an MUA and different brands. And then you've got the likes of Bobby Brown, etc.

11:19Rochelle: Yeah, yeah, yeah. But she was a real, it was a different approach, wasn't it? For that time, it was a real different approach. Do you think, like you say, one of the sort of key takeaways, I suppose, as you've just said from that moment in your life and in your career is the trust that Charlotte and the team had for you. Has that sort of really had an impact on the way that you lead as a founder or co-founder? I would love to say in honesty that it did. I think it does now two years into where we're at. I think in the beginning no if I would be lying really if I said I think it would be unfair of me to say that I just let everyone come in and do what they thought and trust them I think Charlotte really did I think what I would say is that she actually they did just let me go with that I never felt like I felt like it was my own business to a degree back then you know I was doing what we needed and we had loads of team I think for me it took me it took me a while I think I'm in a good spot now over the last year where I've kind of let the experts come in because I don't know it all I really don't so I know what I can do and I know what I can't but you've got a hell of a lot of experience so it's hard to be a little bit more like it's hard yeah like even I mean you know yeah there's things that I don't like doing like speak to me about financial and sheets and yeah okay I get it I understand it I've got that commercial background but it's not my play time it's not my enjoyable time you know I'll do it but it's a learned behavior where everything else feels quite natural and instinctive to me you know so when I'm looking at a launch campaign and how can we make this like the best thing ever or the formulas you know how do we actually make this so that the customer really is getting what they're telling us they wanted like all those insights that's what kind of gets me out of bed and floats my boat and makes me excited but I think it is hard because I saw everything I think as a general manager because Patilby as a general manager I had to take all of those things and learn also on the job of that you know and social media wasn't what it is now then you know 10 years ago um so it was a very different space uh to a degree but so I had to learn a lot of that PR things like that I didn't know the basics I mean the basics of those kind of things but I learned then obviously through and wherever I've gone I found her I work for uh I don't know whether you ever heard of a brand called Oma Beauty which was um founded by Sharon Tudor who's sadly no longer with us um but she um was a real pioneer for inclusivity so she was a you know a POC brand realistically it was really about driving that momentum you know five six years ago and it worked with her for a while she was at Benefit she used to be the GM of Australia Benefit and worked with her and she was really you know pioneering for something and really trying to change something and I learned so so much of the back end of stuff from her as well because she had the expertise so I was front and she was back and it kind of I learned from her being her number two in command I understood also a little bit more about production operations all the manufacturing side the distribution side that I really didn't get much to do within Tilbury either you know it was when I was in the Middle East it was a franchise so you're working with Oshaya working with Shalhoub and you're working with these big guys who just do it all for you yeah there's stuff in the factory over there but it's all good um but I kind of learned that's I think everywhere I've managed to pick up that's what I say I feel very blessed it's not been such a sponge yeah yeah I've just really tried to and now what I try to do is listen to my team so I think the biggest thing for me is not even if I know the answer or I'm I can be sitting in a meeting and I'm going so frustrated but I just let you get there you know so I have to let them at the end of the day I'm hiring these people I'm you know paying money out of my business to let it grow to drive it so I have to let them at some point and nine times out of ten they get it right yes which is great and then that makes you a proud mama exactly exactly um tell me about the moment that you met adam your co-founder it was funny so it was basically an investor so our investors our current investors kind of connected us which is interesting right so my um one of my investors now is the oreo group who they own the body shop and they're like a big investor and adam had been working with them behind the scenes for years actually on technology so realistically decipher as it is now was never meant to be a brand so decipher adam basically started trigenix which is the parent company and it was all about tech it was meant to be a b2b solution so it was about bringing the technology to retailers or to brands right we would be selling you the equipment to make your skincare brand okay that's kind of what we were doing so we would be selling you the machinery and the tech so that you could produce your products in a cost efficient way for you or you could do what you need without having to go to contract manufacturing got it without having to invest in more big emma those kind of things so that was how it worked really and that's what he'd done so the investors obviously believed in him and believed in the technology and he'd gone through various iterations i haven't got any pictures actually quite funny to show you what the machines looked like then versus what they are now you know like when you think about like one just looked like a plastic next espresso machine versus what it looks like super high tech with the investment that we've etc but yeah the investor the in sorry the investor introduced us um and then we just got on we got on really well we started chatting so at this point sorry you were you got connected by the investor because you knew that you wanted to start something of your own yes right okay fine and it was like finding the right part how could you find the right partner so I'd really thought about it myself like how could I do it and really I'd been blessed to work for all these people and these are the brands that were top notch yeah so then in your own mind do you think but they're they're killing it how do I be how I'm not going to go against like how yeah you know how do I do that and you know Bioma and the Skin Curl were was killing it you know we were killing it from that and I think it was all these kind of things uh just yeah but I I kind of met him and then I thought oh my god all the problems that I'd seen it just felt very fortuitous it still does today yeah I definitely feel like that I think it was just one of those moments and then we met and i'm like blah blah blah as you can see and he's like inside so we're like the ying and yang definitely the ying and yang like i'm like we need it now and he's like hey next month you take a little bit of each other which is quite nice so it's a little bit like so it's a bit like that but we yeah we do work well together now we never i mean we've never i was trying to think about it someone asked me the other day like what's your biggest argument you know what's the biggest disagreement but we genuinely have never fallen out i think because we he's logical reasoning and then I've got fact and realistically those make sense when you do converse.

17:36I think sometimes the

17:36Rochelle: best partnerships are when you both know your place and you both know your role and it's not necessarily conflicting. Yeah. It's like we both know what our skill sets are and what we're supposed to do here. Yeah. And you just sort of fly in that in that partnership. Yeah that's true. For those that are listening that want to understand the tech and what you do and how you bring it to life tell us about Decipher and give us like a little snapshot of what who does what Decipher is so I guess from the offset as you see the brand now we make complexion products we are an AI generative beauty brand so we basically have scanning technology and matching making technology so two very different things we've got technology and patent technology where we scan your face and we'll get a unique read on your skin tone your opacity your undertone your you and we'll create then a code that is yours that code then gets passed to our scan and make technology which then creates a kind of formula if you like that is bespoke for you and one step for you that then gets made and it gets made in a certain way that is obviously ip and patented as well so we've got two sides really of that technology but for the customer realistically we're solving the biggest pain point that you would ever have had like if you have been shopping in the beauty industry for the last however long, I'm sure you will never probably have landed on your absolute perfect shade made for you.

18:58You might have blended something to get there or made something, but I don't believe, and we don't believe that you should have to do that. We believe that realistically, like in this day and age, realistically, isn't it a bit archaic that we actually, if you think about it, you create a beauty brand or you buy products before you even know what your customer really wants. You're projecting it on a number that somebody's saying is the right number to guess or you may have some facts and stats that say that lip gloss is the best number one seller in space nk so let's you know go with that shade yeah but realistically you're taking a punt everyone is guessing and gambling on moqs and guessing on what you should buy but it fits somebody right yeah yeah hoping it does and realistically it will don't get me wrong but 70 percent of the time so the stats say that 30 percent of all beauty products in the uk right now going to the bin every year so that's a lot you know it's a lot of waste it's a lot of unnecessary waste for the planet I mean you know I can wax lyrical about all those things but I think inherently it's about you as a customer I want you to have your perfect product with me and

19:58Rochelle: particularly when it comes to skin tone and stuff it's something that I've always struggled with they've always been too warm for me too or too ashy or too dark or not dark enough like I always at minimum will buy two foundation sheets and mix together there's no kind of any counter if I was going into a beauty hall i don't feel like i would be able to buy it one shade but also the light right the other thing the lighting and there's reason i like love retailers love them but you can walk in and honestly i feel really bad for like the muas you know because they kind of get a bad rep you walk out and then all that mua it's really not their fault because they're standing at you under a light and trying to match you versus those lights and so they're they are technically doing their job they're not bad at what they're doing they're just trying to work with what they've got in front of them right yes i think that's the difference with our technology is actually taking i don't i could do it in pitch black it's not that it's the late it's the actual reader of what we're doing on your skin is actually giving me all that information and all that data like your opacity and everything so we understand that and also you may have three or four different skin tones across your face right you might be lighter on your forehead darker on your neck all those things so we can accommodate that we can you know do that we scan where you want you you can tell me where you want to match.

21:12You know, if you want to match your arm, I can match your arm if you want. So it's good to you.

21:16Rochelle: So I think it's good, you know, and that's not where we started. I think, to be honest as well, transparently, we didn't start there. You know, I started in a world of let's actually give everyone the perfect match. And to us, the perfect match was when we've done your read, that is your perfect match. But you may think that's pale for you. You know, personal preference can overrule that, right? Yeah, there's also that, yeah. So I think on D2C, that was really hard for us to do because, you know, we hadn't at that point, We weren't able to kind of like, you know, you choose warmer, you go cooler, et cetera, et cetera.

21:45Now we can. And the evolution, obviously, is retail. That makes it obviously a perfect partnership for us going to retail. So let's talk about when you launch.

21:52Rochelle: The USP that you have at launch is just something incredible. Like you say, initially you were inventing the tech that you would give to beauty brands to be able to use to bring this to life. so you actually say hang on a minute we can use this tech to build a brand that is completely different to what's on the market because sometimes when you're doing something new it can be a blessing and a curse because if you're almost first to market with what it is you're doing it's like a is the world ready for it or and are they excited about it or do they not quite understand so how was it received all of those things everything everything you do everything that's exactly it I think it is every a bit of everything I think I this for me I always focused on the solution like the I thought to myself it's the solution like this is going to solve all the problems but actually I have to become obsessed about the problem because the problem is different from person to person as well and actually what I think is really easy to understand is not for other people so you you wear makeup every day right you're you could say you're a beauty aficionado right I'm sure you're in everything and skin all those things so if I said to you what finish do you want you'd probably say actually do you want to finish but you know not everybody does not everybody does actually know they want to be told they want someone to tell them yes there's lots of nuances that so I guess we launched with this incredible USP and it took us a while to really land that message and I guess that's where we are now and even what we've just done you know we're just launching new formulas now and I think that's the biggest learn you know when we launched we thought the USP was enough in full transparency yeah so I thought the USP is enough the formula doesn't have to be super charged like super skinified kind of formula it can be a good formula and it's a good formula it's done us really proud and done well but mainly the customer's pain point is the shade is amazing but the formula isn't what I expect now in the world right and so that's what we've had to do so we've had to really upgrade and skinify those formulas which is great you know we needed to do it anyway i guess you know the world moves so fast in terms of that one minute everyone wants to be matte the next minute they want to be dewy the next minute it's like skin tints are only what's in it kind of is really yeah the next minute it's back to full coverage it kind of it moves like that does it there's really cycles in skin and those finishes i've really noticed that you know i've always wanted skin to look like skin but when i look at the evolution of how my makeup's been over the years like it does it does really change doesn't it so how do you go from like you say sometimes the USP isn't enough and it's only great if everyone knows about it so what was your approach to hammering home that message and sort of really educating people about what it is that you do because it's a really new proposition yeah I think if I'm being really honest I don't think we've absolutely nailed it even to this day so I think there's still so many unanswered questions for people that it is a constant evolution every day so I think when you because because for me it's like we're creating a whole new category people think we're a new beauty brand but actually I don't see it as that I see us as actually a whole new category you know an ideal north star for me you know my manifestation is that we are almost like the meta of beauty the google of beauty right if you're picking up a Rochelle product it's been powered by decipher technology we've created that product behind that is the goal so people think I'm crackpot but that is Definitely, you know, for me, why would we not go big?

25:17You know, we've got all this technology that can be there. So I think there's almost these kind of like we approached it very basically by launching online to give people a simple step. You know, it's like this is what you do. This is how you do it and try to explain it. We tried visual aids. We tried, you know, consultation aids. We've gone through loads of different variations of it. I think we've landed like 85 % of the way there. but I still think there's something new that's coming in a month that will just add I think this extra kind of try on consideration so right now it's a bit of a varied thing but I think you will get the moment to really get a full holistic choice of do you want help do you not want help do you want scanning do you not want scanning like it's kind of fully personalized for you

25:59Rochelle: and how do you feel like you can communicate the message best do you feel like obviously because of the tech is online a huge focus or does retail pull a lot of that in it retail I think retail is important obviously because it's trying to we're also trying to cater for those women who don't want to go into retail like a lot of women do not feel comfortable to go up to a makeup counter and don't want it or don't or time poor or don't have the time you know all the things that we've all you know assumed or things have happened to us so I think those pinpoints are there but for me retail is this next big thing I think it came to us when we did um some pop-ups you know last year through the summer we did like a kind of trailer around the country and went out to people and actually people can see the product being made you know it's not just the match it is incredible I know it's not my brand I'm not in a non-egotistic way as a beauty lover actually standing in front and getting my foundation 30 mil bottle made in a minute and a half is like that's my dream that's brilliant so like you know and that's why i say it's adam really from that but i think it is a it is a an iconic moment and theatrical and i think you know retail is coming back around you know there was this world where it was all d2c everyone was d2c d2c heavy i think retail does really play a part when customers want to touch and feel again you know i think you know that post kind of covid lipstick effect is circling back around again in my mind you know so we all want to be out there touching things doing things maybe a little bit differently but But I think that's it for me.

27:22Retail is it. And I think, you know, our personal choice, you know, there's lots of retailers out there. I think for me, I needed space, you know, decent space. It gives you countless, you know, me rocking up when there's thousands of people touching the machine is almost like my idea of hell. It's more about actually the considered purchase, you know, the considered consumer who's got a bit more dwell time or who wants to do the full thing, kind of do like that whole kind of analysis with us has got five, 10 minutes, not a minute to spare.

27:49Rochelle: Yes. and so that's kind of you know why the next thing was retail and we just did actually like a pre-tease which on John Lewis we're launching it was incredible so like you know it's like 800 people the queues at the machine and the it was it was really incredible it's like the pinch me moment I bet and John Lewis do beauty so well I always like I'd really enjoy a little brows like if I've got time like you say if you're not time for it and you like that brows moment it's they're really good beauty halls aren't they yeah they're just well they've got a bit of everything yeah and I think you know they've got all that and they've got space to breathe yeah that's a bit of me like you know like I said Chloe she loves going into four and jumping in all this you know chaos and if I don't get me wrong I would shop in Sephora if I know what I want and I'm running in and out and I need something or space or all those places but when you want a bit of TLC and a bit of support education all those things then someone like John Lewis for me is a perfect partner and the loyalty that they have you know from their consumer and that's the biggest thing I think the The biggest strength that we have is retention.

28:49So for us, once you match with us and you love us, like the data shows you don't leave us, you just buy more into the other products that we have. Which is the best kind of data that you can have. Yeah, exactly. So we've got a huge replay and like returning customer and LTV, which is amazing. It's amazing for us to have that kind of opportunity, I guess.

29:07Rochelle: What are the practicalities like when it comes to having such an innovative idea? Because the idea of tech always terrifies me because I feel like I can't be trusted and it goes, it could go raw. I mean, listen, me and tech, it's not my best friend.

29:25Rochelle: How problematic at times has the tech been behind the scenes? A big problem. Yeah. I can't lie. Like definitely a big problem. More problem for Adam, but then also I'm his problem because I'm in his ear like, when's that machine ready? When's it ready? I think, you know, what I would say, it's a problem. It's like they say, don't they? Don't work with children or with animals. And I definitely have learned don't think that tech is easy to work with either. But I think once you get it right and when you're in that space of, you know, actually the mistakes have happened and you've learned everything possible now, then you, you know, it's pretty easy going.

29:58Then you can make it look pretty and do all the kind of things. But it has been painful. But the biggest thing is the investment, right? So I bet. Yeah, I think that's the one thing that I probably didn't realize at the time, you know, when we're starting was I thought, oh, my God, all this cash I'm going to have freed up because I'm not buying MOQs. of tens and tens of thousands of stuff and we've got ingredients but you know it's super cheap and we can kind of like get all that going I didn't really think about the tech aspects and all of that you know even like back-end engineering and the developing and the coding is expensive resource and we're doing something like I don't want to you know come across as all this but we are really doing something different to what everybody has tried and failed so like that is a big deal I think about that a lot there's a lot of big brands who have tried to do what we are doing yeah and have failed so sometimes i do wake up in the night really brave idea this was not a good idea so you know that that you know we don't have all of the resource and the cash that they did

30:52Rochelle: either you know so we've had to and text one of those things right that you could be you could tell me something cost 20 pounds or 20 million pounds and i'd be like right okay yeah because i you know i don't know yeah so it's obviously you've got adam and that's his strong suit right I think if I didn't have him, I mean, I could tell someone, but it would cost me even more millions, right? Like Adam will be sitting, you know, with like a welding machine trying to get things that like engineering as well is kind of all the other kind of algorithmic behavior that he is so strong in. But I think it's, you've just got to, I have to embrace it.

31:25And now I like tell him, I want like, he'll like laugh at me and I'll sit there and I'll be like, what's best for the customer is they can see all of this formula coming down out of the machine. It's going to spin Adam, it's going to spin and it's going to like all this yellow red is going to become it's going to be theatrical do what you can it's going to go along and run she's gone back to the cruise and he's like yeah and he's like okay yeah I'll come back but to be fair to him the machine now that we have like we have a conveyor belt that's going to you know so in John Lewis when we launch in two weeks you'll see it like you literally come up to the machine the bottle kind of drops in it goes along this little conveyor belt your little pigments drop in everything your skin care that's exactly what I want to see as a customer that is what I wanted yes

32:01Rochelle: I'm like he does deliver yeah yeah yeah so and also importance of the balance of having the two of you involved because they're the ideas that he might not have developed in that way no right so it's the creativity and that he's not aesthetically you know he says oh that's you that's not you know yeah but that's what makes that's what makes those relationships and the speed and everything that he does but yeah it is a bit it is a big cost but now we're over that hurdle to a degree yes i think all this you know so we're not self funded we have got investors i obviously watch you and i see that you've got lots of people and everyone's got their opinions on self-funded.

32:36Everyone's got a different story. Yeah. But I think my biggest thing that keeps me awake at night right now is that we need to be fast because I know that there's people who are trying to do what we are doing. Yeah. And your moment will be gone. Right. So, yes. So I don't have the luxury of taking 10 years to get me to where I want to be because realistically there will be somebody popping up very, very shortly and tech moves so quickly. Yes. So we took the investment to help us, you know, get and supercharged. supercharged and so that is what we're doing but you'll know yourself I mean you know mom wife doing all these it's a lot you know to try and go and push forward and do all that kind of but you have to but if you believe in it which I do I just think it would be amazing to break through eventually

33:18Rochelle: and get all of and everybody's strategy and everybody's like sort of road to the end game of you know trying to reach that north star as we all are looks completely different like you say the idea of doing this big tech business meets beauty business self-funded would be a really terrifying risk yeah right or you move to america yeah the only other thing is like i always think i mean american investors are like oh if you were here like you know we'd give you 20 minutes i'm like oh my god maybe we could move to la it's all right quite like malinois like in uk that you know the investment is is a bit more tough on the tech side to be fair and certainly female founded tech that we know that is tough um you know to get across and but i have to be honest my current you know investors are super supportive of everything we do so i can't you know complain and it's working incredibly well together and i think that's one thing that we often talk about on this show is that you know a partnership and investors and you know that kind of landscape it really is like a marriage so as long as you feel like you're in the marriage of the right people I think that is what the most important thing is.

34:24Rochelle: You touched on earlier about obviously nailing the tech and the foundation was, you know, a great foundation, but you actually realised that actually we should be offering different options of foundations and different finishes. So your new foundation collection doesn't only personalise the colour. Customers can now choose matte, natural, radiant formulas. How long did it take to create the new collection? about 18 months yeah about 18 on the formula so I think 18 months on the formula we what we do like I said earlier we do take like consumer data really seriously I know a lot of people say that but we I'm talking you know I have focus groups that come in every week and try in the product and are you know testing it and trying it for us and giving us feedback we've got MUA experts you know we've got everyday consumer giving us that feedback all of the time because I think you know we can personalize and do what you need so we don't only so we do it by finish so we do it by finish but we also do coverage so if you want a matte full coverage or you want a matte sheer coverage we can you know we can do all of those things so it's on your coverage and then you also tell us what skin type you are or we can ascertain with you what your skin type is and then we'll inject like skincare ingredients in there that would give you so if you say you're super dry we'll have more hyaluronic in there maybe that will give you that so it's kind of cultivated in that way you know so um i think yeah adam always says the easiest thing we could have done was do personalized skincare here right he says you do realize that we wouldn't have the shade problems and the challenges that we have with color i was like yeah yeah it's not that wasn't the biggest problem you know it's not the same now it's not the same it's all part of the story yeah it is yeah but i think you know personalizing something extremely like in that way is um good but it does take a while it has taken us time but we do take the insights from the customers very seriously and I guess that's where it was quite disappointing, I suppose, for me, you know, that we were starting to see that our formula was a bit aged at this point.

36:20Right, okay. It was kind of aged, you know, we'd been working with it realistically for five years behind the scenes. And so really it was, you know, it was slightly outdated and so we had to, you know, update it and it was the right thing to do, but why not use all that information from the customers and from some expert MUA friends who would tell us everything.

36:39Rochelle: and you've got the ability to move like that because of the tech you've created which is like i can create we can create things really quickly i guess that's the thing you know so we've got very i think i can say it we've got we're going into lip category so personalized lips which is you know you can make you can choose your shade and and then your tone yeah on your lip and then also your the opacity maybe you want a full coverage because you don't like seeing your liver maybe you want a sheer or maybe you want a gloss or a balm so you can do all those kind of things in the same way and that kind of same technology but that you know realistically in reality that's only been a six-month project where most brands if they're trying to launch a lipstick it would be oh my word a couple of years yeah so I think I've got the most incredible chemists in house so we I'm very fortunate like that you know because obviously the contract manufacturer has all of these people we need the same thing right so we are producing everything in Cheshire you know we do everything in house so we buy the raw materials ingredients I've got some chemists and formulators who make products you know 24 7 24 7 8 hours a day I would love nothing more than to hang out with you at work this is like my oh and everybody to be fair you should 100 but I would love to make you a product so I think that's the thing the dream for me would be for you to tell me what kind of what new launch do you want to make for your own range right oh my and we could make you something and I bet you we can make it better than the Italians or better stop yeah so I think that's the we can do all of that hang out and share yeah for sure next time I'm up north that is it you're getting a knock on the door we can even yeah I think you can do what you know you can make everything you know you can make a lipstick you can make you know all that kind of thing and I think that's I'd love to do I keep saying this to the team and they look at me like I've got 10 heads I'm like I would love to do a competition out there to the world to the UK that someone can make their own lipstick with us like I think that would be cool if I was in the community oh my gosh can we do it on ladies who launch that'd be so much fun not right now not right not right now the second but yeah yes it's almost like actually you could make it yeah so we could run a competition yeah or whatever you wanted you know in that with the community where they can come and make i don't know we could get 10 winners yeah they come and make the lipstick and then we make them for sale and they could get profit off it no this is the best idea we have to do this we have to do this my team tell my team are like oh you're crazy let's say would you do that no that is amazing because like we we you know we should always focus on this right for startups for businesses that that you know that girls and ladies that we speak to on this show and we do these live events and we have so many questions and messages constantly the moqs of these kind of big manufacturers it just blows everybody out of the water when you're starting up and you're self-funded and it's kind of you know it's it's really hard so to be able to not have the kind of that's the thing like we red type of an moq you know i'm a red lipstick wearer normally which is not the top selling color you know the nudes and the pinks are the ones that everyone goes for but like i can do that i can launch a bright orange red and if i only sell 100 it's fine because i make it one at a time that's the difference so i think that's the thing i think you know and also think about the indifference of what you can do you know you might go to a factory and create a product or make a you know a contract manufacturer but that formula is probably based around five other formulas there's some benchmark whatever but you can actually we can really just get in the lab and make what you want you tell me you want like this that and the other so i think it's that you should never have told me this just so you know but i want to do it my team are all like oh my god you're but i i would i just think i would have liked the opportunity you know yeah yeah and now i see other you know there's people who i mentor and you know other founders and other CEO wannabes that you know want help and stuff and i try to help them and i think that's the other thing i think to myself how could you just do something that gives a little bit back right i'm having the time of my life here like i'm loving every day like you know it's stressful of course it is but i absolutely adore what i do and adore my team but nothing great isn't stressful when it when you love and you care about it in the way that you do right yeah there's always going to have that level of stress because it means so much yeah if you wasn't stressed you know it's because but imagine those makeup artists like who you know they don't have the funds to make a product but actually they know exactly what would make a filler product.

40:45Those are the people that we should be.

40:46Rochelle: And they're the ones that are spending the time with the palettes and they're crafting the perfect shade and then you try to do the combo on yourself, but you can't because they've used five different liners and six different lipsticks, you know. There's definitely something big in this. Let's talk after this. This is very exciting. I want to talk about, because this has been, it's been a full-on few years, right, to say the least, to bring this to market, to get the investment, to get the tech, to get everything in the way that you want it and the message out there. And as you said, that continues to grow.

41:19Rochelle: It's a lot on a founder, on a co-founder. What do you do? Because you said before that you wake up at night and you're like, oh my gosh, what do you do for yourself to switch off? When life is a million miles an hour, what do you do for you? It's a question that we need to ask ourselves more. Yeah, I think I do need to ask myself that more. I think a family, right? So I guess the thing for me is family trying to always have my family time because that definitely makes me not grounded because it's not that I'm grounded. But, you know, they give me like comfort, I guess, in through those stressing moments or challenging moments.

41:53It's nice to just be around those that you love and your friends, etc. but I think I really am right now it is difficult to have time off I've got to be honest like I'm not really spending much time seven days a week in free time mode right so I think it is very hard but when I do I just try to switch off I let literally try to put my phone out of the way you know laptops out of reach or whatever or it could be a cinema it's a simple thing you know it's not anything crazy right now just give my brain just stepping away from it and like you

42:21Rochelle: It's not always, I mean, it's rarely that a founder can take time off in that way. I took my first ever month off this year and it terrified me. I mean, I was like, were you switched off? Were you? It then resulted into I said to the team, right, let's do a, I was in America and I always wanted to take the kids to Disney. And I'm like, okay, if we're going to do it, we went to some World Cup games. It was lovely. And it was, it wasn't, it was no spa and I beat one day. So I was quite tired when I got back. But mentally, it was really, really restful because I was walking around Disney and I didn't have time to think about anything else is the actual truth.

42:56Rochelle: I was at two weeks prior to it. I started to get really stressed about the fact that I was being off and like, is this going to be OK? And then what happened in the end is we said, OK, let's have a phone call every day at 10. And it could be like for my time, America time, which was like three o 'clock in the afternoon. And I could just yes or no stuff. And it could be a five minute call or half an hour call. But then after that, unless like the world's falling down, we'll speak at 10 the next day. That's good. Yeah, but that's a good. Do you know what? I'm just having that. That was, that's, that's me off.

43:26Rochelle: You know, that's me switched off. Yeah, that's good though. And that was amazing. And I've never done anything like that. And I think it shows, it also shows the place that the team is, that our team has come such a long way and everyone knows where we need to be. And I think it's real credit to the team that actually that I didn't, I didn't need to worry. And it was the first time ever. And it's awful, isn't it? Because you feel like you're not really, well, for me anyway, I feel like, oh I'm not really trusting them enough it's not that it's genuinely not that you know I think it takes time to feel comfortable it's just that kind of like letting go of it and also for me Adam and I have been really doing it ourselves you know the first year it was like everything you know I was retail I was cleaner I was producer I was packer I was you know all of those things and even now if someone like someone posted yesterday amazing person posted about us yesterday and all of a sudden it's like ting ting ting ting ting ting ting you know and then now I feel like I'm not here you know I'm I'm not with them helping them pack and I know they've got it I know they can deal with thousands of orders but it's hard to switch when you've been sour in the weeds of everything and also it's quite enjoyable you know like I know it sounds like whatever those moments of like you know doing you know 100 grand in a day it's like whoa let's do it you know like do it and let's go crazy yeah so it is like enjoyable as well but yeah I think you've just got to learn to trust them but do you are your family like do they support do they understand and get it then that you're working so much I think I just I think it's oh a hundred percent more than but I think it's something that happens to me where I think I really I want to be present in all of this but there's always this cloud above me and it's a nice cloud of work which I love but I find it really hard to put down so I'd sort of really prepped we had this holiday book for two years and I was like right okay I know I'm away for I'm away for a long time and I was sort of working up to being off but it's really it was it's a really hard thing to do which sounds silly because you're also an incredible time as well that launching something new yes is super exciting yeah right whether it's a launch whether it's a brand you could bottle that baby and it is amazing because you it's all coming together now you know obviously i've been and i enjoy it yeah i enjoy it to switch off to it isn't it but i wanted to be present because i knew it was like a once in a lifetime holiday for us all yeah you know like oh yeah for sure england the world cup being and you know in america us doing this it was i knew it was a once in a lifetime we were friends that are really special to us so i was like okay i'm going to be present for life stuff yeah as much as i am for work yeah that was kind of the deal that i definitely need to take a moment of it i think you're right i think yeah you know you do i think two and a half years of like non-stop no holidays no you know at some point you do have to think right okay i can take i'm in the room like i hired someone recently um and she's like not my ea but i'm not in that privileged position to that but you know she's business ops you know and help and support she's like my mission is to let you have a week off see yeah you know i'm like yes go girl how do we do it this is amazing but you will you will and she will help we will do it and i was like what about next week she's like oh john lewis launcher oh it's always something it's my mission but yeah yeah she's got to december yeah she's got to the end of the year yeah to prove so yeah i think that'll be good when we get there um i want to do our rocket round now and essentially we ask all of our guests the same question same eight questions um and it's supposed to be quick fire it never ends up being quick fire when we've got two women that love to talk which is you and i the first one is what do you believe are the non-negotiables for running a business i think passion is my only i i think primarily you've got to undoubtedly and unequivocally be passionate about what it is that you're doing that is not cash related or end goal related it's literally just in the what you're doing trying that problem that you're talking about that you're trying to solve or you know the product that you really believe is that I think it's that I think don't be so you know on the end goal moment at that point it's really just about it's in that way and then I think compassion so I think for sure in that with your you know understanding so passion compassion for me are important in the brand but I also think structure and kind of process as boring as it sounds now you know make it all come good when you're trying to scale at a rapid pace so I think those are non-negotiables yeah you're right because sometimes we focus on the end goal or you know like the finances or you know it can be for the wrong reasons you have to be passionate about what this is you're doing and where you are now yeah you can't just sort of cheat it and be like I'm passionate for the end I met yeah I met a founder once I didn't work with them but um I sat down with them I was going to work with them and um I was like you know I always ask them questions like what do you want and i was like what's your you know what's your passion what's your and they're like to have the yacht in the whatever and the exit and i'm like okay the exit straight away i was like that's a little bit before you've even you know very presumptuous yeah okay yeah i'm not sure if i'm on the yacht yet but you know so that i always think actually there's got to be some emotive reason that's way more monetary of course that keeps you there it keeps that fire burning that keeps that because we always say the days are so long and without that like flame that you can't put out about what it is you're doing it's you know the the yacht's a lovely idea but that's yeah doesn't really get you there exactly that exactly that um what moment did you first realize that you truly launched god i think that's really recent you know i think as much as we've been doing it for i think the john lewis event that we just did those first two days like there is nothing like honestly I would get emotional now I seeing like hundreds of people queuing for your brand when they could be going to all these massive brands that they know and love and they've tried and tested but they want to get matched like that was just like I thought oh my god this is gonna be this is gonna be good yeah and this is gonna be great and seeing that like physical representation of who particularly if you've like focused on online or it's been it's looked in that vein seeing those people and understanding i have it when we do the live shows for this podcast and i'm like oh my gosh you're the next thing it's like and it's like everyone's here and you you're spending your money to be here and it's that is always a moment for me where i'm like yeah i've really gone out of the way yes really kind of you can just see the emotion and i think it's that you know i think having matching someone that's never been matched there's something in that as well like when they say to me you know i had judy love recently come and she got matched she was like you're never going to match me so i just can't find it anywhere and then we match and she's like oh but you know she's like oh and she's the best so she was and i was like oh my god and she was like you have no idea how like life changing that is for me particularly and i'm like yeah when you're a diverse background and you've struggled your whole life to find a match like that is like the problem solving yeah that's happening here is like is emotional yeah as well as that kind of like the vanity piece it's an emotional thing to be able to give that to people is incredible.

50:16I think in real life is great, isn't it? Yes. When you do things with customers and community. Human contact is the best. It is the best.

50:22Rochelle: What is the first thing you do when you wake up and the last thing you do before you go to bed? A cup of tea in the morning just to be really boring. But yeah, a cup of Yorkshire. I have to definitely have a strong tea in the morning. I guess I do always think what am I, I always, my first thought, I guess, is what am I doing today? What do I need to achieve? So in a, you know, it's almost like I try to give myself two or three things that I know I'm going to do today. Because it is a whirlwind. And I've learned to do that because if I don't, it can be a whirlwind forever. And then the thing at night, I try to put notes in my phone to get them out.

51:00Rochelle: Get them out of the brain. Before I, yeah. I mean, I still wake up at three. Do you know I now leave a notepad and a pen next to my bed? I did do that. Just because I feel like I need to get it out, but my phone isn't good for me because then I'm up. my husband that's what he said he's like why do you do it on your phone you've gone away for it and i'm like i know yeah it's just easier yeah and i know to get it because then i forget the notepad and then i you know that's my problem so you know first world problems but i forget my notepad yeah but i think it is i think there's something about getting something out of your head that's worrying you or the list something that you haven't solved in that day it could some days it's like 20 things right i'm not gonna lie one other days it can be one or two things and giving yourself the beat for the next day like okay this wasn't completed today but tomorrow tomorrow this is how that's gonna look um what is one piece of advice that you wish you hadn't listened to oh my god i literally said this to my team yesterday i wish that i hadn't listened to them when they said that cream cushion foundation wasn't going to be a thing two and a half years ago so two and a half years ago i you can see i've bent it i'm like really yesterday i was like guys you know the glow boot like we created the skin tint and they were like not sure you know does it doesn't it take away from the foundation i'm like no because there's tint people that's about it and glow boost now number two seller and it's amazing it's wonderful but i two and a half years ago i when we said i said we should do a cushion foundation made like at this point like here we're just kind of yeah and like now i'm seeing all these brands do it and now i'm not a follower so i'm not gonna that's not in my dna it's like oh they're doing it so i'm gonna do it you know like that's not in me um but i i wish that i had not listened to that advice on the table i know yeah i was like oh we could have been like killing it now with a personalized cushion but they're everywhere aren't they yeah they are yeah they are some good ones I mean Amy's is great and there are some good ones so just for the YSL one I haven't tried that yet but I'm sure it will be good oh yeah I expect big things from that I bought one from a Korean brand I can't remember which brand it was but it was the colour wasn't quite right but the texture was insane that's the other thing you see the thing is all these cushion again cushion compact they're even more limited in shade range so for Decipher it would have been like a perfect oh don't I'm getting annoyed for you let's stop this now um what is a skill that you'd love to learn

53:20I probably I probably have learned more of something than I know because I think where I've gone like multifaceted and done things I think I feel like I've done it but I definitely think I would like to learn more about colour theory so I do know about it obviously because I'm around it and with it but Adam is definitely that expert you know in that field with it and we have chats about but i wish yeah i'd definitely love to learn more and hopefully i will get to do that you know through this lip concept because obviously through lips it's way more color theory to understand exactly how you're blending you know like who knew you put green in nudes to make it this and do this and i'm learning all this stuff so it's really interesting yeah that is so interesting with the chemist but yeah i think that i'd love to learn more about that it's not that i want to be an artist or makeup artist or anything but i think i would love to it's just interesting right what complements that color to get that exactly in that way and it's all part of the dna of your brand

54:06Rochelle: Yeah, yeah. Makes perfect sense. What's one thing that you wish someone had told you before you started out? I think probably. I wish that I'd understood the tech complexity to a degree. So I was on this like, oh, my God, we found this amazing thing we can do. It's going to solve all this problem and the tech. But I think the tech was restrictive in the beginning. Right. So, yeah, I think if I'd known and understood that I could have maybe navigated better through it. I've made lots of mistakes so you know where I've thought oh we can do this and we could just run for it and go for it but the tech does end up holding you up until you're that point it doesn't now like I said it's amazing no but at the start it must limit limit you to a degree I kind of wish Adam had been more not that he wasn't honest nobody totally was but I think maybe given more of the downside of it where he's obviously a believer as well in what we're doing it's amazing but I think the the challenge and the nuance of all of this and the investment that we would need right almost like managing your expectations yeah yeah and that was a whole like there was a whole learning curve yeah I was not in my thing you know it was not in my DNA or but now I mean I don't know how much you involve it and evolve it in the business but it's everywhere for me now like so I mean who would have thought it right it's kind of it's and if you like you couldn't call the way that this was going to move well like you know for me I'm not in tech right a few years ago I wouldn't believe that I'd be using a tool as much as I do now which is yeah it's yeah it's so so interesting what or who i suppose would be the dream collab for decipher oh that's hard i love everyone that we collab with so it's really hard um what about how we're seeing these kind of brand on brand yeah yeah i think more than a it'll be a brand i guess for me a dream collab would be a skincare brand so that for me right now it would be definitely a skincare brand because i think that's not our expertise you know we're more in color and i think working with a really great skincare brand to make the best ever personalized skin tint or best ever moisturizer together i think something like that would be the kind of dream would be amazing like an incredible bespoke tinted spf yeah because i think they do these tinted spfs and i'm always like oh they're even really warm or really really you know cool they're not ever quite right but if you could like yeah personalize it yeah so there is a way to do that i have looked at that so there is a way to do it it's just it's quite complex and complicated so you don't anyone can you can but yeah we could try anyone can you can and lastly if you could choose one female figure as a mentor past or present who would that be i think am i allowed to say charlotte still because i think realistically speaking i think like you know for me she is the icon for me she always has been really over the last decade so I think you know it's not that I would you know it's more of a mentorship friendship now than it would have been you know that it would have been years ago but I think she's still got it she's still got the idea she's still got the creativity she still brings it to the forefront there's I think so for her that mentorship you know is a lot was a lot and is great and would be great to yeah carry on absolutely have her on speed dial at all times I don't think she'd like that what would Charlotte do I'm really going to use this each episode I ask our guest to leave a tip almost like one piece of tangible advice to a listener to a lady that's looking to launch right now who's like oh my gosh I love the idea perhaps you know that wants to sort of look at going down and route in the way that you have perhaps that's mixing tech with beauty or however that looks what would like one piece of advice that you've sort of learned from your journey so far be to a lady looking to launch?

57:58I think I've said it earlier. I think to me, the biggest thing is to focus on, like be obsessed with the problem, not the first solution that you think of. Right. Because if that makes sense, because I think for me, you know, I knew what the problem was, was in the colour matching. But if I actually had been obsessed with, I was obsessed a little bit with the first solution and then that slowed us down a little bit, because actually there will be iterations of the solution that will get better the more obsessed you become with the problem yes if you really understand the problem so i thought the problem was just color match it's actually not you know it's color match it's texture it's sensorial feel it's finish it's cover it so there's multiple facets of that that i didn't think about at that moment i just thought oh my god we've got the most amazing yes it's like keep picking apart problem yeah they're always having that kind of true problem regardless it doesn't matter what now with lips it's a different problem right lips is a different problem to that so you know every category so the idea for us is we'll be across all of the categories in the next two years and there will be a problem in each of those nuanced kind of parts of category of color that will have a problem and so I have become obsessed with that rather than the first solution

59:02Rochelle: you're right because you're gonna always have to tweak the solution yeah consistently particularly like if you know when you're taking on customer feedback and what people now want and focus groups and everything else in between. It is just the problem. And if you focus on the problem heavily, you'll always get to the solution in the end. Yeah, in the end. I think that's the thing. It can take a little while to get there. But I think... Thinking you've got it. Yeah, and we do think you've got it at first and then actually it's a second iteration or a thirteenth iteration of what is now. It's like the new formula now with the foundation.

59:34Realistically, if I'd thought about the problem first, I would have also thought about, really, we need to deep dive on that formula.

59:41Rochelle: yeah so and lastly my last question I like to ask every guest because I am nosy um and we talk about ladies who launch but when it comes to being a lady who lunches us founders don't get much time for this so it's normally like a desk or wherever we can grab it but if okay let's do we can do this one of two ways if you're going to take the team out for a treat meal as a celebration what would be your favorite meal where would you be going what would we be eating or if I was going to be your assistant for the day and I was going to just order your lunch and I know that you're going to eat and you're going to love it what would you eat at your desk I think team both similar iterations but I think sushi sorry we're a bit of a like you know kind of personalize your sushi in the way that you want so it's all personalized like everything you have to choose you know you can choose what you want you just have to have a set menu yeah What's your sushi of choice?

1:00:37Which flavor? So I'm pretty basic in the sushi sticks. I do kind of just like a nigiri. Salmon nigiri. Yeah, salmon nigiri is all right. I do like a tuna kind of nigiri sometimes. So pretty simple and basic. I like a good poke bowl. Nice. I like a poke bowl there. Really good. Out around the world, a bit of a sauce.

1:00:52Rochelle: Yeah. But yeah, nothing too, and also it's, you know, it's kind of easy to eat and talk together, isn't it? Yes, you're so right. Yeah, then you're not going to create a big mess. If you're chatting, we chat a lot, you know. I don't want to just eat it quickly. No, yeah. Exactly. There you go. Thank you so much. It's been so great to talk to you. That hour has gone incredibly quick. Congratulations to everything that you've built already and what you're continuing to build. It's so wonderful to watch the growth and it feels on the outside super quick. I'm not sure how it feels for you, but the success is just incredible.

1:01:27Thank you. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it. Thank you.

1:01:30Rochelle: Thank you. I love that. Don't forget to follow us on Apple and Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts to make sure that you don't miss out because next time I'm going to be talking to another incredible lady who launched. If like me, you're a watcher, then please follow us on YouTube and don't forget to like and subscribe.