Entrepreneur USA – September 2019

You made your name in a time
before the phrase personal
brand existed. Did you ever
think of yourself as a brand?
Not even a little bit. I didn’t
know what a brand was back
then. I was a makeup artist. I
just wanted to make something
that was better than what was
on the market, and that I got
really excited about.

I hear that a lot from famous
people—that they weren’t stra-
tegic about building themselves
up. It’s such a contrast to now,
where people consciously treat
themselves like brands.
A lot of them come to me for
advice, and the only advice I
have is: “OK, go home and just
do it. Put your head down, fig-
ure out what it takes, and just
do it. And if it doesn’t work,
then do it, but do it a little bit
differently.” Everyone wants to
talk about doing it and plan-
ning and strategizing, but peo-
ple are forgetting you actually
have to do it. I’m a doer.

Did anybody give you that
advice at your start?
No. The only advice I got at my
start was from someone who
said, “The world doesn’t need
another cosmetics company.
You don’t know what you’re
doing.” So I said, OK, and I just
kept doing what I was doing,
which was making a lipstick that
didn’t smell bad, that was actu-
ally the color of your lips, and
that wasn’t dry or greasy. I met
a chemist at a photo shoot and
told him what I wanted, and
he made it for me, and I said,
“Wow; people are going to love
this,” and he said, “All right. I’ll
make it, you sell it for $15—you
get $7.50, I get $7.50.” I said,
“Deal!” And that’s how I started.

“The world doesn’t need another
cosmetics company” sounds
dismissive, but I wonder if it’s
also good advice. Because the

world doesn’t need another

cosmetics company, any more

than it needs, say, another

beverage company. Which

means an entrepreneur really

needs to make the case

for what they’re creating.

Right. When times were quiet,

I thought, Well, to make some

extra cash, let me go into a salon

and do makeup for women. So I

worked with mothers and aunts

and sisters, and I would teach

them makeup, and they’d be

like, “Oh my God—I love this.

It’s so simple.” And as my brand

grew and my career grew, it just

was common sense. My brand

became the teaching brand.

You’ve said that if you wrote

a business book, you’d call

it Duh. Do you feel like, at its

heart, business is actually

quite simple?

Yes, and I find people waste

time, energy, and money on

things that don’t matter.

So, I want you to walk into an

imaginary business right now

and tell people to stop doing

things. What should they stop?

Well, first of all, stop putting

your head down in your com-

puter. At least once a day, raise

your head, get some fresh air,

and talk to people. And stop

having so many meetings.

Honestly, sometimes a discus-

sion just takes two seconds.

You left Bobbi Brown

Cosmetics in 2016, after

25 years of building the same

company. Now you’re doing

Joey Fatone. I’m not the

smartest in the room, but I’m

sure the most curious.

Speaking as someone who inter-

views people for a living, I can

say: That’s the right way to do it.

If you use prewritten questions,

you won’t listen to what some-

one is saying and ask follow-ups.

Prewritten questions are the

death of conversation.

Well, that’s good to know, because

I don’t look at them anyway!

If podcasting had existed at the

very beginning of your career, do

you think you would have done it

the same way—just walk into a

room and go?

No, not at all! I mean, the good

thing about being experienced

and getting older is that your

confidence gets stronger. And

honestly, after all these years,

people want to know from me:

How do you become confident?

The only thing confidence is,

is being comfortable in your

skin. I’m comfortable to make

mistakes. I’m comfortable to

admit what I don’t know. I just

think it’s interesting not know-

ing things, so long as you’re not

afraid to ask questions and say,

“Wait; what do you mean?”

People would rather you ask the

question and learn, rather than

pretend you know it and don’t.

Right, exactly. And for some reason,

people think that to be a success-

ful entrepreneur, you have the fairy

dust: Just sprinkle some on me!

And it’s like, guys—what I have is

that I just keep going forward.

totally different things—

supplements, lodging, content.

Is that disorienting?

No. It’s honestly no differ-

ent. Because I’m someone who

thinks about a project, thinks

about what it is, how it could be

better, how to really explain it to

people, how to curate it, how to

Instagram it, and how to visu-

alize it. Doing Evolution_18 is

the same thing I did when I was

creating colors for the season or

product categories. You know,

you just make things up. An

entrepreneur really is just some-

one who likes to make things up

and likes to get them done.

Not everything you’ve tried

since leaving Bobbi Brown

Cosmetics has worked out, like

a stint as a Yahoo beauty edi-

tor. Do you worry about failure?

I’m not afraid of failure. If

something doesn’t work out,

I look at it and say, “OK. That

was fun. That was interest-

ing. This is why it didn’t work.”

Because I always like to learn

from it. I’ve done things where I

say, “I don’t want to do it again,

but it was interesting to see.”

I’d bet that’s really freeing. When

you’re not afraid of failure, you’re

willing to take more risks.

Totally. Like, I’ve been given

an opportunity to have a pod-

cast. I don’t know anything

about interviewing people. I

don’t prep. I’m handed a piece

of paper, I go into a room, and

I just talk to the person—

you know, anyone from Mickey

Drexler to Jeff Raider to

PUT YOUR HEAD DOWN, FIGURE OUT WHAT IT TAKES,

AND JUST DO IT. EVERYONE WANTS TO TALK ABOUT DOING

IT AND PLANNING AND STRATEGIZING, BUT PEOPLE

ARE FORGETTING YOU ACTUALLY HAVE TO DO IT. I’M A DOER.”

September 2019 / ENTREPRENEUR.COM / 13