A Real Talk conversation with Dr. Brent Ridge I walked into this interview thinking I knew the Beekman 1802 story. I had read the book. I had done the research. I knew about the goat farm, the recession, the 52,000 bars of soap. I knew that kindness was the strategy, not the tagline. What I didn't expect was how much of the conversation would feel personal, not just as someone who studies brand strategy, but as someone who is, right now, in the middle of building something he

Before I sit down with Brent Ridge, I've been sitting with his book. I came across Brent Ridge the way a lot of good things happen, unexpectedly, through a conversation that led somewhere I didn't anticipate. I looked him up, found the book, and by the time I was boarding a flight to Warsaw for a podcast recording, I had it downloaded on my iPad and ready. I didn't put it down for the entire flight. Not because it's a page-turner in the conventional sense, but because I kept

Looksmaxxing looks like a grooming trend. It isn't. It's the male version of something the beauty industry has always done, and that makes it both more familiar and more urgent than most founders realise. Sources: TikTok internal data; American Society of Plastic Surgeons, 2024; ResearchAndMarkets, 2025. You've seen this before "Why does the male version require a briefing when the female version has been running for a century?" Good question. The beauty industry was built, e

Japanese market data is signalling a consumer shift. Here's what European beauty founders need to hear. There's a consumer in the exosome skincare market who researches like a scientist and purchases like a poet. She knows what EGF is. She can explain the difference between PDRN and exosomes. She's read the group threads, watched the dermatologist breakdowns, cross-referenced the ingredient lists. And then she buys the product because a reviewer said her skin had a healthy gl

As fragrance booms, Byredo’s success reveals why insider codes, cross-cultural references and restraint are redefining value in beauty and wellness In an era where fragrance has re-emerged as one of the fastest-growing categories in global beauty, few brands have navigated its cultural ascent as precisely as Byredo. Once a niche Stockholm-based fragrance house, the brand has evolved into a €1 billion luxury player, propelled not by performance marketing or mass appeal, but by

What Rosalía’s LUX teaches founders about building sacred, human brands in a manufactured world. I remember the first time I heard “Berghain” from Rosalía’s LUX , released in November 2025. I played it on repeat for a week straight. There was something in it, the tension, the restraint, the orchestral swell against her raw voice, that felt timeless. It didn’t sound manufactured. It sounded carved. It shook me in a way that’s hard to explain without sounding dramatic. It fel

Kateřina Rydlová on Body Moody, chaos, and showing up anyway Kateřina Rydlová, CEO of Body Moody The pills to survive the day Eight years ago, Kateřina Rydlová noticed something. Not something new, but something so normalised it had become invisible: every woman she knew carried pills in their bag. Pink pills. White pills. Paracetamol. Ibuprofen. The kind you pop between meetings, the kind that let you get through the day when your body is screaming at you to stop. "I neede

Building brands with soul and structure. Four months ago, I made a decision that made complete sense and no sense at all. I left ten years in tech, a world I knew well, a world that trained my brain in systems and scale, and stepped into wellness and beauty. An industry where business collides with identity. Where culture moves faster than product cycles. Where the founder is often the most powerful ingredient in the entire company. I’m not writing this from the safe distance

Why brand strategy, not campaigns, is the foundation of trust, consistency, and long-term growth. If the past few weeks of writing have circled around one idea, it’s this:Strong brands are not built through more content, more campaigns, or more output. They are built through clarity, consistency, and deliberate decisions over time . This piece sits underneath all of that. Because none of those things, codes, clarity, cohesion, can exist without a strong foundation. And that f

Why the next generation of wellness and beauty businesses won’t be built on aesthetics, but on non-negotiables Across wellness and beauty, we’re hitting a point of aesthetic saturation. Not just in products, but in faces, lighting, copy, tone.The same skin. The same glow. The same language. Repeated, endlessly. And the data is starting to reflect it. Instagram, once the engine of beauty and wellness brands, now sits at some of the lowest engagement rates across platforms, hov

Discernment, product truth, and the quiet strategy behind enduring wellness brands. Last week, I came across a word in English that stopped me for a moment. Discernment. I looked it up. Discernment is the ability to see what’s really going on beneath the surface,to judge well, separate truth from nonsense, and recognise subtle differences. In other words, discernment operates at a deeper level. It’s the ability to recognise what actually matters. Not what is loud. Not what is

Why 2026's most magnetic brands stopped selling and started building brand worlds. Imagine you're staging a dinner party in a garden you've spent years cultivating. Not the kind where you stress over the menu or worry if the lighting is Instagram-perfect. The kind where guests arrive and immediately feel like they've entered another world, where the lavender smells like childhood summers, the wine tastes like a secret, and no one wants to leave. That's what the best brands fe

And why the right answer is also the smart one European founders might be asking: "Should we build for Gen Alpha too?" My answer: No. Not because the market isn't there. It is. $4.7 billion in the US and growing. Not because the opportunity isn't real. It is. Tweens are buying, parents are buying for them, and the trajectory is clear. But because the opportunity isn't sustainable. And more importantly, because it's not right. Over the past two weeks, I've shown you how Gen Al

And what European founders should be thinking about now While US beauty brands scramble to capture the Gen Alpha market, launching tween skincare lines, partnering with child influencers, positioning products for 8-year-olds, European founders are watching from a distance, asking: "Is this where we're headed? Should we be doing this here, too?" The honest answer: You're asking the wrong question. The Gen Alpha phenomenon isn't about whether you should create products for twee

Gen Alpha doesn't ask their mother what moisturiser to use. They ask the algorithm. Gen Alpha doesn't ask their mother what moisturiser to use. They ask the algorithm. This is the first generation where beauty literacy arrives before puberty, not through bathroom cabinet inheritance or department store sampling, but through an endless scroll of skincare routines, aesthetic codes, and creator-validated rituals. In this article: 💛 The cultural movement: How beauty became def

And why some brands gallop while others trot in circles Happy New Year! I’m so excited to kick off 2026 with you! This year is all about serving creativity, inspiration, learning, and most importantly, building community. Because it's always better together, right? Now, speaking of new year... anyone else's feed explode with "Year of the Fire Horse" content? Mine sure did. DMs, posts, emails everywhere. Naturally, I got curious, then one Google search turned into a full resea

When wellness becomes the thing that's making you sick. A real talk with Natalia Uliasz. Welcome to Real Talk ! My new monthly series where I sit down with a founder who's building something that actually matters. Not because they spotted a gap in the market or followed a trend, but because they have a stand. A belief they won't compromise on. A read on the cultural moment that most brands are too polite, or too afraid, to say out loud. This isn't your typical founder feature

We remember the brands that made us feel something, not just the ones that looked good. In this blog, I’m sharing thoughts on one of the most powerful yet misunderstood parts of branding: storytelling. Whether you’re building a skincare line, running a studio, or simply trying to show up more meaningfully online, your brand’s story is not just background noise. It’s the thing that makes people stay, care, and come back. I’ll be breaking down: 💛 What story-driven branding act