Advice Line with Bobbi Brown of Jones Road Beauty (September 2025)

Transcript from https://podmenti.com/t/8fa6866dd4de4d0a

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Alright.
Let's get to it.
Joining me today is Bobby Brown, founder of Bobby Brown Cosmetics and Jones Road Beauty.
Bobby, welcome back to how I built this.
So nice to see you again. You too. So when we first had you on the show back in twenty eighteen, I have before I even talk about that, I have to say
I find myself talking about you all the time because every time I give a speech or appear on stage somewhere, I end up talking with the makeup artists about you and how you started your incredible career doing that work and so many of them
are so inspired by you. I mean people know your story
Um, you know, by what you built this iconic brand, and and for for those listening who who haven't heard Bobby's original How I Built This Episode from twenty eighteen, we will put a link to it in the show notes. It's such a good episode.
Uh you talked about how you were doing makeup in the eighties and it was really this like over the top scooper glam.
kinda world and then you kinda created a new look that was more understated, natural.
Uh this is what became known as nude makeup and that's how you launched
your brand. And anyway.
Back when we had that conversation, Bobby
Uh you were still under a non compete with Estee Lauder, who acquired Bobby Brown.
But in
twenty twenty.
That expired and you launched a new beauty brand called Jones Road.
The day my twenty five year non compete expired, I did you know, right uh a week before the presidential elections, in the middle of, you know, everything. Covid and everything.
And you know what? You just sometimes you have to do something and if it doesn't work, then just oh well that didn't work. Let's do something else.
It's awesome. I mean you launched this at a time where some entrepreneurs would just say do a victory lap and say, You know, I I sold this business, I and and my name is kind of, you know, ubiquitous and
But you decided to start
Something from scratch all over again.
Tell me what what compelled you to do that. What did you see?
in or not see in the market that compelled you to

Start a do a start up again at that point in your in your life.
Well, I just felt even at the end of my tenure at S D Lauder, I felt the industry was changing, the world was changing, things were shifting.
And I didn't like the way it was going and I really wanted to make changes at the brand and I couldn't.
You know, when you work for a big corporation it's really it's really tough. So even if even when your name is on the label.
Even when your name's on the label, exactly. So
There was something missing in the market.
I didn't
Like
the texture of a lot of the clean makeup that I was playing with and I thought I I wasn't sure if I could do better, but I wanted to try to do better. And I did.
Yeah.
You know, I I you may not even have the answer. I don't think I have the answer for this'cause I think uh it's more of an intuitive thing, but
You know, you could have said you know
It was awesome. I really I
I'm considered a pioneer in this industry. You are.
And maybe I'll be a mentor and an investor and, you know, kind of dabble here and there.
But to to to muster all your energy'cause a startup is you know better than anyone else. It is a
Full time twenty four seven.
Shop.
All encompassing.
And
w did you feel like you just had to do it? Like it you just couldn't contain
The energy that was inside of you.
I it was not an option of doing it or non uh not doing it. When I when I started to make these products I just thought
These are so simple and they're so much better. People are gonna love these. I thought I would maybe start the company on Etsy.
Just put like the best brown eyeshadow and start there.
And and
Then I realized okay, there's a different way to do this. So no, I I could not wait to launch.
And I did everything completely different.
The second time that I did the first time.
But i I didn't look at it as hard. I looked at it as this is so cool. I felt I felt renewed. First of all, I was sixty two years old when I started this brand. I'm sixty eight. I'm sixty eight right now. I love that.
So it's like it it's invigorating to go back to the simple things. And by the way, guy, I love being in charge.
Mm. Like I just it was time for me to be in charge. I'm like, okay, we don't
have to do that. We don't have to have a big party. We don't have to d spend all that money. We don't have to advertise.
We just have to tell people about it.
So, you know, you figure things out and I'm very scrappy.
I don't like to waste money, I don't like to waste time or energy, and I like to figure out
What what is worth my time?
and energy and how to do things without spending a ton of money.
Yeah.
Um
I I wanna ask you about this thing that you pioneered which is known n became known as nude makeup, right? This idea that you were wearing makeup but you couldn't really tell. It was it was very a very natural look. And
I know I remember when we talked about this, some people all the time were like, Oh, this is gonna be a fad, you know?
uh it w people are gonna want to look like uh, you know, those those those porcelain masks from the eighties again.
But of course, decades later
Uh nude makeup is still
A big deal. We don't call it that anymore.
Right. It's still but it's the thing. Like and and we're gonna have some some callers today that are
you know, that w are worried that you know s that their success limited success or whatever it might be might be a trend or fad or so. How do you
How do you think about
The thing that you're building.
Right, that i i in into something with more longevity, something that has more staying power, because as I say, I mean people
people at the time said, Oh, this nude makeup thing is just a trend and you know, it's it'll pass.
Right, and people thought that, you know, I mean, I had comments from people that said, Oh, that you're just putting your name on some package. No I'm not. That's not how we're doing it, because we didn't have fancy packaging.
But I think for anyone that is a you know an entrepreneur and a founder, you look at what you're doing and yes, it's gotta constantly not just
Like grow into something else, you've got to pay attention to what you have and make sure it's the best. And sometimes you have to make little fixes, and sometimes you have to make big fixes.
But you always have to make sure that it's the best thing.
On the market, so people will come back for it. People will tell their friends about it.
And people will rebuy the same thing over and over again.
But you need new things so people are interested.
So it's you know, it's just kind of figuring out the whole ecosystem.
Yeah.
Sure.
Alright, welcome to the advice line. You're on with the legendary Bobby Brown. Please tell us your name.
where you're calling from and just one brief
line about your business.
Hi guy, hi Bobby, thanks for having me on. My name is Mark Sokolowski. I'm calling from Chicago, Illinois.
I'm the founder of Cabbage.
Yay, Chicago. I'm the founder of Cabbage Labs.
We make a muscle and joint rub called cab dab.
It's made with cabbage leaf extract and it has all the natural anti inflammatory goodness of cabbage. Wow. Cabbage has a lot of good natural anti-inflammatory enzymes in it.
And when you crush the cabbage leaf, you get all the goodies out.
That's
Amazing. So wait, this is a
A bomb I rub.
that that that reduces joint pain and it's made from cabbage leaf extract.
That's right.
How did how did you figure this out?
All right, so I'm an orthopedic surgeon and we have a practice that's mostly first and second generation immigrants. And for years patients were like, Oh, I just put cabbage leaf wraps on my elbow or on my shoulder or on my hips. And at first I was like, That's crazy. But then
Younger kids were telling me, Oh, after I work out, I do cabbage leaf wraps on my muscles to relieve soreness.
And so I did a little bit of research.
looked into it, turns out it's real. There's actual data that shows that cabbage leaf wraps are more effective than usual care for arthritis and for even for like breast engorgement, any sort of inflammatory condition.
And so we said, Okay.
It's impractical to put cabbage leaf wraps on all day.
How do we put it into something more convenient?
Well, this is incredible. By the way, are do you focus on shoulders or knees or everything?
I'm a spine surgeon, but I speak Polish, so when the Polish patients come in and they see orthopedic surgeon, they're like look, it's great that you're a spine surgeon, but you're gonna take care of my knees. This is amazing. So what the idea was hey
On the side I'll start making a
And so and
you know, offered to my my
Patience.
Yeah, so we said we'll try to do this in a in a lotion form. And I said, I don't know anything about marketing, so I'm gonna give it for free at the end of every visit to my patients as they come. And if it works, great. If it doesn't work, uh
No obligation, no worries. And so we've just kind of grown this organically, no advertising, just from giving it out since twenty twenty one to every new patient at the end of a visit.
And how is the business doing?
I mean, is it making money? Is it Yeah, we've been profitable since day one. The margins on lotions are pr are pretty good. And uh we've
We're at thirty thousand tubes in and we have our next order of 10,000 tubes coming.
All right, and before we get to Bobby, your question for us today.
So uh
I give away a ton of product to my patients and this whole doctor to patient giving the tube is like a high trust, no obligation kind of trial. How do I scale this business beyond
Mie
having personal interaction with every potential customer.
Bobby, this is amazing because y it's l there are a lot of parallels, right? You were a makeup artist and then you're like, Wait, I can make my own
makeup and here but Mark is an orthopedic surgeon, he's like I can I can make a bomb that I think is gonna be effective for patients. So I'm sure you've got a lot of thoughts. In the in the very beginning I gave away lipsticks. Like not in the fancy packaging and in the testers and people said, Oh my God, this is so different. It's so good. I want it
And so they would come back. And so, you know, I
I gave a lot of product away. You're only giving it to your customers.
So your biggest thing now is how do I get other people besides my patients to know about me?
There's this little teeny thing called PR. It's old fashioned. It's free.
Someone writes an article about you in the Chicago Tribune. Is there still a Tribune or a Sun Times, whatever the papers are?
They write an article Yeah, they write an article about you and all of a sudden you've your phone's ringing off the hook. You've got all these people calling, I want this cabbage. You know, everyone has pain in their body.
Right? Everyone has pain. I I cannot wait to try this cabbage. My sister has back pain. She's in Chicago. I need your number.
But um
You know, so you've gotta have more people know about this. You know, and by the way
PR can cost a little bit of money, but Mark I think that
it would be worthwhile considering saying let me let me get
Let me take ten grand or or fifteen thousand or twenty thousand and see if I can contract with a local
PR firm.
that can get me into
these papers'cause the story is so compelling. So you're not but I I have a better idea. I have a I think the ten thousand a month is great.
But why don't you hire like like a a
You know, like a Swiss army knife, like a kid who can
Post.
Shoot.
Do videos of you.
Like interview you and put you up on Instagram and they can call the local papers. Like it's not that hard to get a list of who to call to. You can hire a full time
marketing student, right? You can hire someone that could do a bunch of things, someone who's resourceful.
And then you can always take money, you know, later, like ten thousand's a lot of money.
You could probably get a good PR firm for five thousand too.
That's true. That's true.
Yeah.
Bigger the tubes you're giving away.
How many ounces? They're a hundred milliliter. We we don't have sample products, so we give away the full size product. See, that's also a problem. You're giving away too much. You gotta give away a smaller version.
So w what I would do is I would go to the container store and buy a bunch of empty containers and squeeze
And just make like little samples, however much you think people need for an area, and then just keep them in your pocket. And when you're at a restaurant or your whatever.
You know, just start handing it out with the card where they can order it.
give'em a ten percent discount, like
You know, that old fashioned
marketing doesn't really cost anything.
I also think that it's worthwhile and I'm sure you're in medical professional organizations and maybe you go to conferences
If there's a community that you can kind of bring in, particularly like you know
I I know this m may or may not, you know, resonate, but chiropractors. A lot of people go to chiropractors. I don't know what you think about them, but a lot of people trust them and and to me like that would be a natural
channel where you could get
you know, maybe you you again you create these smaller samples and it's
You know, and if somebody goes to the website
They can get a f uh
free trial and you pay for shipping or something like that.
Yeah, that's a great idea. I definitely, definitely think that we could expand our distribution. We definitely could do smaller samples to make it more economical just to give away lots and lots of them.
Bobby I have a question for you.
Mark is a very busy guy, okay? He is an orthopedic surgeon.
Th there's gotta be a lot of demand for his time.
And this is a side project.
You were a makeup artist, you were very busy.
How how would you recommend he starts to balance these things out? Because look, let's be honest, most of his income is coming from being a a surgeon. I mean come on, Doctor Oswa's a heart surgeon. Okay so you know, you start somewhere
And you go and you go whatever pace you're comfortable with.
And how could you get things done while you're actually at work?
You know, just whether it's a meeting in the morning with who's gonna help you this kid that you're gonna hire.
And and then at the end of the day you check in with them.
Things are working. The business is continuing because, you know, you have someone to do that.
So it's w but but there's no rush.
for for this to kind of take off. It's gonna happen.
U especially the more people that know about it.
Yeah. I think it's a great idea. Yeah.
I wanna take a cabbage bath right now. Yeah, see. Woke up with some lower back pain from exercise last night.
Yep.
Mark Sakolowski, uh thank you so much for calling in. The product's called Cab Dab.
Uh good luck. Congrats. It's awesome.
Thank you guys very much for having me.
Thank you.
You know
I'm now I'm wondering if this will work with sauerkraut. Like if you can spread sauerkraut, you know what I mean?
Yeah. But you wouldn't want to. Well I mean I love sauerkraut. I know, sauerkraut is good for your gut, but I don't think you'd want it on your extremities.
Alright, we're gonna take a quick break, but we'll be right back with another collar and another round of advice. Stay with us, I'm Guy Roz, and you're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab.
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Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab.
I'm Guy Roz, and my guest today is the legendary Bobby Brown, founder of Bobby Brown Cosmetics and Jones Road Beauty.
And we are ready for our next collar. Hello, collar.
Hi Bobby, hi Guy, I am such a fan of both of you guys. Thank you so much for having me. Um I'm Abby Rosalier, I'm calling from Dallas, Texas, and I'm the founder and own of Abby Rose, which is basically an online custom phone case business. So we do you can put anything on a phone case pretty much is our timeline.
So we do custom phone cases and we even created the first phone case organizer that the world has seen. So Wow Phone Thank you for calling in, Abby. Um tell me how you and I'm I'm just I mean you seem like you're pretty young entrepreneur, which is awesome. I love that. But do you mind t
Sharing held you? Yeah.
Yeah, I'm twenty three. So I started it when I was sixteen and now I know. Congrats, that's awesome. How to tell me how how this started.
Yeah, it's um there's kind of bits and pieces to the story because I had little small businesses since like fifth grade, it'd be like duct tape pins, I would sparkle people's chargers. Um but they would all just last a month because I would just sell it to my school friends and then get over it. So I actually sold phone cases in eighth grade, made a thousand bucks, got over it, and then in high school
I had to be homeschooled for my sport, acrobatic gymnastics, got the itch to sell again, had the phone case supplies, started it, blew up during COVID, and here we are.
It's like
Wow. Just just double click for a minute. Acrobatic gymnastics. That was your sport. So is that like like trapeze and flying off like what is that? No. I know everyone thinks just like circus and clowns almost. Um, but it's it's like a mix of cheer and gymnastics. So it's partner based sports.
You throw them, you catch them, but it's with two or three people instead of a whole cheap team. Yeah.
It's i it's like being an entrepreneur. Yeah. Pretty much. Exactly. So so you had to be home schooled because you were a competitive
Acrobatic
a gymnast. Yes. We And that's when you started this business. Yes, Abbey Rose. Yeah, we had to uh actually got pulled from the middle of my junior year'cause we had to do two practices a day. So I had to go home schooled and yeah, that's when I had the idea for Abbey Rose and just
And so what you were initially what you were buying, y uh you people would order the custom cases and then you would we work with a third party and have them made? Like how did it work? Yeah, so it didn't start as customized. I kinda just well, I actually started drawing designs. I'm horrible at designing but
nobody would design for me because I was just 16 not knowing what I would what I was doing. So I started just selling basic designs to my school friends and to my ac girlfriends and I would heat press the design onto the phone case. So you heat press the design with sublimation ink and then the phone case is made. It's a little complex but
Yeah, that's right. But you would custom you would custom make'em originally. Yes. Yourself.
Yeah. And now and all right, and tell me w how the business is doing that. Give me a sort of a sense of where you are.
Yeah, so it has been going crazy specifically this past year, because I just graduated from college and we've seen like a 50% growth from last year. Um all the phone cases are still being handmade actually by my sister.
I just do the marketing, the customer service, the live streams, and then my mom is also involved, my sister, my dad and my brother. It's kind of all just like this family run business and we actually just purchased our supplier. So like things are wow. So um and so as you are you g have you guys broken a million dollars in sales?
Um, not in one year. We've done over two million in total. Yeah, no, that's awesome. Okay.
But so you've easily you've broken a hundred, two hundred thousand dollars a year.
Oh for sure, yeah.
And and most of what you're doing the most of your sort of channel is through
social media like going doing
Doing things live or whatever on the Yes. Yes. Going live, selling live, shipping live, everything is live.
Uh, TikTok is our strongest one. We actually just hit
Four hundred thousand a few days ago. Um, and then like a hundred and eleven thousand on Instagram. So
All right, before we bring Bobby Brown in, just um g tell us what your question is.
Yes, so um basically all of our growth has been organic social media and that's been great but it's been this steady linear growth and in order to keep this going and support my whole family we need to have more of an explosive growth soon. So my question is if we just double down on what's working, keep up the lives and the content.
Or if we look into wholesale or um paid advertising because we haven't really
Trip done that before, so
Yeah. You're trying to scale to a five, hopefully greater million dollar business. Bobby Brown. Absolutely. Yeah. What do you think?
Well, first of all, what you're doing is working, and not everything why does everyone think every business has to be like a rocket ship?
It's got it's gotta grow.
But but it's also it sometimes if things are so explosive and big, like you know, we've we've had tic tac moments that are like
You know, uh like
we could not keep up with it.
It happened and then a you look a year later and you're like, How are we gonna anniversary that
So that's I'm not gonna worry and figure out what else can I do to you know to go viral. No. Let's look at the business, what's working, what's not working. What what do I not need to be spending as much money on or time on.
You have a big success on social, and аміда.
a a z a sub stack, have you done YouTube? You know, there's other things you could do.
Are you doing like other company um giveaways and collabs?
Like a good thing.
Yeah, it's like all of those things together have been keeping us going. We love doing collabs with other companies. We love social media. I started up my YouTube channel, but it it's
I guess our biggest struggle right now is if like
If I'm not online, like sales aren't coming in. So it's almost like my presence has to like constantly be online for sales to keep going.
Tough. Yeah. It's just tough. Yeah. I have to constantly be making videos in order for s in order for you to say. Oh, absolutely. Or just live because they want to see their order. Live. They want to hear the cha ching and get their freebie, you know?
So you started something that's working, you can't walk away from it. How do you evolve it? Maybe you bring your sister in, or you bring a guest, you know, friend or something.
and just try to experiment and, you know, figure out a way, like maybe it doesn't have to be live. I know there's a way you could tape it to be live, or there's different things that you could that you could do, but do you really want to be in retail? That is a whole nother set of
of problems and issues it sounds grey
It's really expensive. Yeah. Like I know it's really expensive.
I guess.
That's what we're wondering,'cause it seems like that's what all of our competitors are doing, you know, they'll they'll be in urban, they'll be in Target. So it's like
Do we follow that or do we could try as a pop up or s like Target and and I guess Walmart has these great incubator programs for young brand and founders.
And you know, there's a way you could like dip your toe into it as a test.
And see if it's something but you you've gotta go try those things out. I I think that's great advice.
place to try and experiment. But I wanna go back to this challenge that you face, which is
Right now your biggest channel is you.
And you can't scale you.
Right. You can't make a million Abbeys, but maybe you can. And that's that's a question I have, which is can you feature other faces of Abbey Rose? Can you
bring in other people
And train them.
to be sales reps with a commission. I mean, is that something that you've thought about or experimented with?
Honestly, no. That's a great idea though. I think I it's always hesitant when it's your business, it's like your baby and you know, just someone else doing the role you do is scary, so I just need to get over that. But I think that's a great idea. Uh just finding like bubbly energetic. Try it once.
Try it once and
Just do it once. See if you like it. See if it works. And using your accounts, right? G having the person go on your account and say, Hey, I'm here today if for Abby you know is
Out at Urban Outfitters doing a pop up and I'm gonna t you know something like that. Or your mother or your father like use your family. Like you know, use your whatever, your next door neighbor, your grandma, your teacher. Like people love that
Інстепень тобі елс, вот унік бать.
That's comfortable for you.
And and y it doesn't have to be a big strategic anything. You just try it and say
Oh my god, that's great.
And it might not work.
Yeah, and
They know all the family, they know Papa Rose, a mama rose, and so I guess I've just never thought like let's try one with just them, you know? If I'm like elsewhere. Mm-hmm.
Who are your customers, Eby?
Are they m mainly young women?
You know what? I've learned a lot about this since graduating college because I thought it was typically, you know, high school and college students, but I've actually realized a lot of people are stay at home moms. That's who I'm talking about. Yeah. So on lives, a lot of them are stay at home moms, you know, like watching their kids and just wanting like a community. So
It's anywhere from like middle school, high school, college, stay at home, just young females looking for friends and a community, so
Yeah. Keep building your community. I love the phone that holds the three lip glosses.
Oh yeah, that's so cool, right? I I yeah, I w I wanted, you know, I wanted to go deeper in that. I'm like
Okay, you know, I'm like we're launching some new lip glosses next year. Let me go look at it.
Yeah, I mean uh who knew that you would you could carry lip glosses in your phone case. I mean there's uh the possibilities are endless. Oh yeah, we just got that prototype in and I was like, Oh yeah
Uh I I I have a qu quick question for you, Abby. Do you um because you mentioned
um sort of moms, which is super cool. Have you tried any like user generated content like, you know, every post your
you know, your design or or maybe design your dream case and and m the w the winner will get to make it with me live, you know, in real time or something.
Yeah, we've done design contests with our customers where they
send in their submissions, but never really interacting like live with the winners, so that's a really good idea.
For that. Yeah.
Yeah.
I wanna see like twenty different Abbey Roses. Like not obviously Abbey Rose, but like
different people just coming on and
You know, that's how you build your sales team.
Yes, that sounds amazing and a weight is already lifted off my shoulders just thinking about that. So
Yeah, I agree.
Bobby, I'm curious in a'cause cosmetics, you know, this is like one of those things where people say, Oh, the cosmetics industry is such a crowded marketplace. But I I don't believe in that. I think a good product can always break through, right? A good product, a well
design product and and and well marketed.
And you know that better than anybody else, uh when you started Bobby Brown people said that.
Right.
Uh the the world doesn't need another lipstick, absolutely. People said that all the time. And you know, I and I always say I didn't invent lipstick, I reinvented it.
So it's the same thing with your phone cases.
Right? It's like you didn't invent a phone case, but you know, your your biggest challenge is also
How do you make sure that people know that your phone case is cooler, more fun, and better?
You know, you have to show them.
Yeah.
Mm-hmm.
Uh Abby
Good luck.
Abby Rose Lear. Abby Rose is the brand. Congrats. Thanks for calling. Thank you guys. Thank you. Bye. Good luck.
Thank you.
Yeah, I it's interesting'cause you know, I you you think like and I'm sure you've had this experience too, Bobby, where
I look at a product like this and I'm thinking, okay
This is driven by
sort of teenage girls, um, you know, college students, young women.
But actually it's
It's moms, right? It's moms probably in their thirties, forties.
older um it's a little bit like you know you we did an episode of the show a couple of weeks ago about crumble cookies
And that brand was really propelled and still is by teenage girls who are super psyched about the
The drop.
Uh you know the flavor drop every week. So I'm sure you've seen this with your you know, your products where where some some things you make are
Just take off with like a certain demographic.
And and surprisingly so. I mean when when Jones Road first launched, you know, there was women over forty that were buying the products. You know, and now there's more and more, you know, like I guess the millennials are buying it, but you know, and and I've been asked many times like how do you market to all the different age groups?
And I say I don't mark to the different age groups, I just mark to to women that wanna look
Natural and pretty.
Yeah, it's so cool.
I mean s you know, connecting with your customer is the most important thing.
Yes, to have a great product is is the most important, but then connecting with your customer. And it sounds like she's on her way.
Alright, we're gonna take another quick break, but we'll be right back with another collar. Stay with us, I'm Guy Roz, and you're listening to the advice line right here on how I built this lab.
Welcome back to the advice line on how I built this lab. I'm Guy Roz, and today I'm taking your calls with the Bobby Brown. Bobby, uh what do you say, you ready to bring in our next collar? I'm ready.
Welcome to the advice line you are on with Bobby Brown.
Please tell us your name, where you're calling from, and just a little bit about your business.
What's going on guy and Bobby?
Great to uh great to meet you guys. I'm calling in from Charlotte, North Carolina.
And my name's Henry.
I'm the co-founder of Tannin Oral Care, which is a lifestyle centered wellness based oral care company, and we are the inventors of the world's first post-coffee mouth rents.
Welcome. So wait, this is a
oral care, so it's uh uh post coffee what? Tell tell me a little bit more about this b this product.
Yeah, so it's a post coffee mouth rinse. So you know that mo uh do we have a co any coffee drinkers? I mean Guy, Bobby, you guys both drink coffee. Yeah. Love coffee. Two hands, right?
It's that moment right after coffee is really what we originally designed this product for. Um I was working at a coffee shop at the time making videos. I would bring this toothbrush to to the coffee shop, which was both gross, and also I learned that um it's actually best to wait thirty minutes after your last sip to brush your teeth, because you can actually
wear your enamel that has just been softened by the acid from the coffee.
And so I started looking for a solution and was just amazed that no one had ever made anything oral care related for coffee drinkers. Very sensitive in my mouth and
I was living with my roommate at the time, his name's Joe, and and uh we just got fascinated by this. And and we started by
One, like posting up in a a super busy part of Charlotte and just asking people, like, are you having this problem too? Like, what do you what do you do to clean your mouth after coffee?
And realizing that um it was just one of those things that people
were thinking about without really thinking about it. Um something that they they wanted a solution for.
And and we selfishly also wanted that solution.
Uh.
Yeah.
Oral care is that the same as a mouthwash?
So the mouthwash is really this is kind of and it will get into this in the question, I guess, but we
We started by looking we wanted to to cre to re engineer a mouthwash that would be perfect for coffee drinkers.
And so we went and got every mouthwash from the shelves.
pulled it off, l put uh ingredients into massive spreadsheet.
And started researching these ingredients.
And we were pretty flabbergasted to learn that and maybe you get
You guys have heard this that a lot of mouthwash is actually horrible for your health.
It's packed with synthetic ingredients, dyes.
It's alcohol based, it actually dries out your mouth even more.
And we've just learned so much about
the oral microbiome about oral care in recent years.
Um that it was one of those things where where we just felt like
there hadn't been a product that had caught up with the with the research.
How w what is your back do you have a background in like chemistry or science or
So no no I don't. Um I've definitely been an entrepreneur my whole life, but I I would say my fascination with oral care has carried me through my entire life. I think it
You know, like all good stories probably started with some childhood trauma.
I think I came home from the dentist when I was eight and uh
And I had four cavities, and my brothers just made so much fun of me. So I swore from that day, I'm like, okay, I'm never getting another cavity.
And so I've just been very
aware of my oral care ever since and I I've been doing the brushing, the flossing, everything that I feel like the dentists are telling me, but still having issues. And that's kind of what one of the things that too led me to look at coffee and be like, Okay, this is this is a real thing. Like this is actually having a real impact.
And how did you start to make this product? I mean, how did you start to come up with the formulation?
Yeah, I mean it started I thankfully had some dentists in my network. Uh we would meet with them and me and my friend Joe literally ordered
a chemistry set off of Amazon.
And I would meet with my high school chemistry teacher and we would just start mixing.
And just start like I mean getting deep into the research of natural ingredients, what is really
What is in these mouthwashes, but like what is actually working. And I think I've always connected with Bobby's story, that idea of reinventing lipstick. It's like people didn't say that we needed another mouthwash, but
Um I think
what we wanted to do was really just
Start from square one. What do you we what do you want in a mouthwash that's g really gonna make it as um as effective as possible. All right. Tell me tell us your question and then we'll dive in a little bit deeper.
We're at this point where people know us and we've taken a very localized approach in Charlotte. People really know us in the city.
As the coffee mouth runs.
But what we wanna create is a brand, like a legacy brand that can really redefine and um
And have staying power as as a
an oral care brand. So I I wanted to get your thoughts on how you would recommend we move forward to kind of position ourselves in that way.
And continue to uh
Work towards that.
Alright, a lot a lot to dive into. D Bobby. So well I have a question. Um, as soon as I saw your package, I mean I love your Instagram, it's very cool. You guys are both, you know
Link.
cool looking and I l I love the vibe.
But my husband, who is a mouthwash guy, who's now using natural mouthwash, he does he's not a coffee drinker. And he hates coffee. So even if I bought him your mouthwash that said coffee on it, he'd say yuck.
Like
So what is the difference between that and a regular one and is there a way
And how are you gonna position?
another mouthwash that's not necessarily tied to coffee.
Yeah, it's a great question. So I I think like I said, we set out to make this coffee mouthwash and I think we in the process created the best natural mouthwash on the market, humbly. Like I I just I really do think.
We've done that, and so I think that's what we're what I'm struggling with. Like, do we expand the niche?
And we say it's great for coffee, wine, and tea.
In any moment you may need it in between.
Um or do we really stay niche down to coffee because there is obviously people that really connect with that story of coffee.
I think I my opinion, and it's only my opinion, is when you, you know, reach a certain point and you say
Yes, we're gonna re
Imagine the you know the packaging and then you reimagine the marketing. It started as for coffee, but we've learned that even if you're not a coffee drinker,
it's this. If you're you know a wine drinker or you're just someone that, you know, people that have stomach issues sometimes could use a little bit of mouthwash.
So I that would be my suggestion because I think
just doing the coffee thing is really cool and different.
But I think there's an opportunity.
I totally agree. I mean I think that that right now, if you look at the bottle, I'm looking at the website, it says post coffee, right? Rinse away coffee side effects. It says four coffee drinkers, buy coffee drinkers.
Th this is really
It it's it's a cool product.
It's just it's very niche right now. You can build a b business around niche product. I mean that's ha happens all the time. But there are limits to how big you can you can take that, right? Especially if you like, Well I don't drink coffee, you know, or uh or I don't really have this problem. I like the taste of coffee breath or you know, whatever. Some people
I wanna ask you qu before I get we drill into that, I wanna ask you a question about the name, Tannin.'Cause when I think of Tannin, I think of like tannins and wine or
Uh T, you know, there's there's tannins in there. Why is it called tannin?
Yeah.
It's great question. So tannins are also in coffee.
They're really in a lot of like natural things, so these compounds and trees and plants and probably know that and um
So while they're the things that give it this natural flavor, it's also the thing that dries out the mouth, which causes a lot of the oral health issues.
So quite literally we're rinsing those tannins out of the mouth.
When you talk about coffee or wine or tea.
But it also speaks to the just very natural elements of the brand. Like all our products are natural, we use sustainable ingredients, our sustainable materials for our packaging.
Um so it's kind of this dual meaning.
Uh and we thought it was a cool word.
You know, one of the things that comes to mind is
I and and and Bob you mentioned you mentioned their Instagram and you g you guys are young, you're cool
You've got you know, your storytellers
I wonder whether you guys can talk about like
oral microbiome or like you know, the way we're washing our mouths is all wrong or
Do you know, do you have
bad breath or even if you don't like
You're d you're not cleaning your mouth cr right in a r the right way. Like just starting that way and thinking about I and I think Bobby you alluded to this overall
mouth health, right? Or or whatever. Microbiome health.
And by the way, how could you not have like either a little spray eventually or mints?
Toothpaste.
Yeah, right.
Yeah. No, I think you're right on guy, and and that's that's definitely exactly where we want to bring it. I think we've been a little struggling a little bit to make that positioning, but
I mean, I think we've grown even more convinced um of the importance of oral care as we've done this.
And everyone's talking about the gut, right? The gut biome.
But very few people are talking about the world microbiome and the connection that it has to the gut, the connection that it has to total health.
Um and so I love that idea, guy. I I you know I'm I'm looking at your packaging and it, you know, all natural, vegan, alcohol free, fluoride free.
I I wanna know what's in it. And I feel like you you
should make that a little clearer in your uh I see aloe leaves in a picture, but like it would be cool if on the you know how R X bars you know was like
Three eggs and f two dates and one, you know, four almonds. Like it's so clear. I wonder if you could do a version of that without giving away your secrets, obviously, but I wanna what's in this and why is this better for me than Listerine.
And what it tastes like. I wanna know. What it tastes like, yeah. Is it minty?
Yeah, no, it's it's all good points.
I think we've we've wrestled a little bit with oral care, just wondering how much do people really want to know?
in oral care because some of the names are a little funkier, like it's not like a date or a
An egg white. Um
But I I also do think you talking about positioning to wellness, just the simplicity of really
Educating people to those ingredients and letting people in on our process is a great idea.
Yeah.
Um I think I think I think you have a um an opportunity and a challenge, right, which is
You don't want to just appeal to coffee drinkers and also
you wanna show people that what this is is is gonna benefit them and I think I think um part of big part of doing that is really and maybe maybe starting out by looking for a tribe.
Maybe it is young men like you.
Maybe you start that way.
And you try and appeal to that.
group and you build from that group. I mean our X bar started out with CrossFitters at CrossFit gyms. You know, now everybody, you know, working parents, mommies, everybody's using eating them on the go.
But that's not how they started.
Yeah.
Yeah, maybe they it could be in a gym. It could be, you know, it could be in a dentist office. Like
You know.
Yeah, we've been I think we've been trying to uh to lean into this kind of social wellness movement that's happening. Like cold plunges, saunas kind of
where people are are doing that kind of stuff. Um there's a great community in Charlotte that we've
really tapped into it. I think we found a little niche there. And so I I hear what you guys are saying and like really grow in that niche. Like what does it look like to really
Lean into that.
Um
'Cause I do think, you know.
at least that I've seen, no oral care company has really aligned.
to the wellness movement.
Um where people are thinking about oral care when it comes to wellness.
Mm-hmm.
Cool. Yeah.

Uh good luck. Thanks for calling in.
Yeah, good luck with everything.
Cheers, guys.
Thank you.
You know, it's it is interesting and uh
You know, it is complicated when you're a young founder and and there's so many different directions to go, and you know, my biggest advice is don't jump into something, but just like
Like try it, like dip your toes in and see. And even if it's just you're putting it in your dentist office.
and his patients are using it. Or maybe you put it in, you know, your equinox just in one gym. Like you just kinda
Dip your toe into those things and
You know, you don't and don't get overwhelmed to think, Oh, well if I only had the money, if I only had
You know, the next series. Like l like grow your business first. Yeah.
Totally.
Yeah, and and he's gotta look at the competition. There are a lot of clean mouthwashes on the market. Like what you know, and and and there's a couple mouthwashes that are
You know, Dennis found. Yeah. You know, and they're more natural ingredients. So it's good to kinda know what's out there and position yourself.
Away.
Differently.
they're gonna have a t slightly harder battle to to wage, but if they do it right
Which is why I think maybe
trying to get a certain tribe of users first, they could it could work. It could succeed.
Yeah.
Bobby before I let you go, one last question for you.
If you could go back to Bobby Brown makeup artist, you know, getting people ready for their TV or whatever video shoots
And you could give her advice as she was starting to build this business out.
What would have been useful for her to know?
Um
Dead.
She should learn to breathe. She should learn to.
Ha you know, to shut off your brain sometimes.
And learn to recover. That's the same thing I'm telling my, you know, myself now. It's I'm a work in progress as we all are.
Love that so much. That's Bobby Brown, founder of Bobby Brown Cosmetics and Jones Road Beauty. And by the way, we recently got an update from that last caller, Henry. He says that coffee will always be an important part of Tannin's origin story, but now they're repositioning the brand around a new prebiotic mouth rinse set to launch.

Also, if you haven't heard Bobby's original How I Built This Episode, you've gotta go check it out. It's an incredible story, and here is one of my favorite moments from that episode.
I used to hire and interview every person that walked in that brand.
And then I didn't anymore, and all of a sudden there were people
working on my brand that I never met before.
And then I might not have hired, and you know, it was a struggle, and I tried to let go of the details.
but then I realized the details were what makes the company so special.
And so I kept thinking I could fix it. If we could just do this, if I could get this.
It could be better.
And it didn't get better.
Thanks so much for listening to the show this week. Please make sure to check out my newsletter. You can sign up for it for free at gyros.com. Each week it's packed with tons of insights from entrepreneurs and my own observations and experiences interviewing.
Some of the greatest entrepreneurs ever. And if you're working on a business and you'd like to be on this show, send us a one-minute message that tells us about your business, the issues, or questions you'd like help with, and hopefully we can help you with them. And make sure to tell us how to reach you.
You can send us a voice memo at hibt at id.wondery dot com.
Or call us at one eight hundred four three three three three three three.
One two nine eight.
and leave a message there, and we'll put all this in the podcast description as well.
This episode was produced by Sam Paulsen with music composed by Ramteen Arablui. It was edited by Andrea Bruce, and our audio engineer was Cina Lafredo.
Our production staff also includes Alex Chung, Elaine Coates, Carla Esteves, Neva Grant, Casey Herman, JC Howard, John Isabella, Chris Massini, Catherine Cypher, and Carrie Thompson.
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