Sara Happ – Founder & CEO of Sara Happ Inc.

Episode 174

We are talking lip hydration on this episode of The Kara Goldin Show. Sara Happ, the lip expert, is the founder and CEO of Sara Happ Inc., a company that’s in the business of keeping lips healthy and hydrated. Celebrities including Reese Witherspoon, Jen Garner, Katie Holmes, and Kate Hudson are all fans and know all about this lip obsession. Listen now for all her great advice for aspiring entrepreneurs everywhere. You won’t want to miss this episode.

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Transcript

Sara Happ 0:00
So it’s not that the problems get bigger or get less. It’s like you have to remain relentless and undaunted. And roll with the problems.

Kara Goldin 0:08
I am unwilling to give up. That I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be. I want to make sure you will get knocked down but just make sure you don’t get knocked out knocked out so your only choice should be go focus on what you can control control control. Hi, everyone, and welcome to the Kara golden show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world’s greatest leaders will talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs, and really some of the most interesting people of our time. Can’t wait to get started. Let’s go Let’s go. Hi, everyone, its Kara golden from the Kara golden show and I’m super excited to have my next guest here very excited to have Sara happ, who is the CEO of the most incredible incredible scrubs lip scrubs initially but so much more I think is probably coming on the horizon I have a feeling but So Sarah is the founder and CEO of Sara happ and she is just amazing lives in Manhattan Beach. So she’s a California girl as well. And she has just created like I said these products It was her own desire to find a product like this sound familiar where she just decided to go and do this. It’s super, super great. So her journey began while she was working also very familiar and entirely different industry as a programming manager at ESPN. And she started experimenting with lip products so we’re gonna get more of the backstory on that for sure. And like hint she is in her 16th year at at Sara happ and she’s continued to have incredible people who celebrities as well that have like loved her product including Katie Holmes, Kate Hudson, and also lots and lots of other people so welcome Sarah very excited to have you here. Hey Kara.

Sara Happ 2:28
I am a fan you keep me hydrated you know this button Hi everyone. Hi listeners. Hi viewers. So but Karen knows this. I am not a water drinker. I don’t like the taste of water. I like the taste of water with a berry in it. Enter hint with pineapple lover and blackberries in it and cherries in it and we drink hint by the case in case in case in case so thank you for keeping me hydrated.

Kara Goldin 2:54
Thank you for the shout out that is really really great. And by the way if you have some of your scrubs and then you have some hints you’ll still like lick them and and it’s all it’s all great together. There’s like combos in our future. I think of some sorts. I think there are definitely combos Yes. So Sarah, where did like who was little Sarah.

Sara Happ 3:16
Little Sarah was a girl who had big lips and always felt self conscious about them and very quickly took to Bonnie belt lip smackers

Kara Goldin 3:29
because I remember those,

Sara Happ 3:31
right, the strawberry one carrot, so I was a little girl and I can remember the first thing I ever bought with my own money was a strawberry lip smacker from the drugstore, because I wanted my lips to be hydrated. And I remember bringing it to Catholic school, cara, and I’m saying you can’t have makeup. And I was like, This isn’t my makeup. This is like medicine. Yeah, I need this. So that was little Sarah and I was also someone who was not a great rule follower. I wasn’t which I think maybe was an indicator of like entrepreneurship. I just never really thought outside the box. I wanted to do my own thing. I just kind of felt like why would we do it that way when we could do it this way that didn’t go over great. And lots of years of Catholic school. But that’s sort of I was sort of wild spirit. And I was also really into makeup and I have a hippie mom and a hippie dad who like raised me without you know, any sort of outside influence in terms of like makeup or hair or whatever, but I was really into that stuff from I mean, gosh, like three or four years old, I wanted makeup and I wanted to perm my hair and all this stuff and my mom wonderfully and my dad let me like dive into that. They were like well, we don’t do that. But we’ll take you I guess to the store and you can buy makeup. Yeah, so I was just always really into it and and I you know yeah. So you graduated from college and you decided to to go into was ESPN your first spot. ESPN was my first job out of college. Yeah. I had a degree in broadcast journalism from USC, which I loved. And I was super proud of. And I took a job with ESPN in 2002. And I’ll tell you, Kara, again, it was it’s a wonderful company. It’s a giant company. It is a bureaucracy, though. And it didn’t function well in that it didn’t understand why I had to go to like six hours of meetings and then go do my job, and then not book a dentist appointment. You know, there was all these things that didn’t make sense to me, or our approach to certain things was just very kind of like, this is the way we do it. And I felt like I was always coming up against resistance. And it was frustrating. So I loved I loved my job. It was marketing. But here’s the deal. I say that I was inspired by how uninspired I was because all my co workers would go home at night, and they would consume all of our media, they would watch four different monitors in their homes with sports center in every game, and then they would, you know, be reading ESPN, the magazine, and then they’d be watching our interviews, and they were just obsessed with our product, which was amazing. And it really is a company of sports geniuses, I was not bad. I was a journalist and a marketer. And so I would go home Kara, and I would take bubble baths. And I would make my own scrubs. And I would read every magazine out there from like Oprah to real simple to Vanity Fair to lower and I would just sit in the bathtub for five hours at night, you know, while other people were watching TV. I still do that today. So I realized I was inspired by how uninspired I was. I was like, wait a minute, you can get paid for what you love.

Kara Goldin 6:44
Yeah, no, absolutely. And find that thing that you really enjoy doing every single day I was just chatting with a friend of mine who, who has worked for a lot of entrepreneurs, but has never been an entrepreneur herself. And she talked to me about it her idea and and I said, you know the number one question is our Do you want to get up every single morning and do that? And that’s what you have to figure out? And only you can answer that. And so I think that you’re such a great example of this. It’s it’s not that you can’t do other things. That’s not who an entrepreneur is that you have this idea and this curiosity, and you have an idea. And oftentimes you want to solve a problem as you did that you thought well, if I just get this in the market, I mean, people hopefully will like it. And obviously they did so you started Sara happ Yeah, and 2005 so for those who are not familiar with it, talk to me a little bit about that.

Sara Happ 7:43
Yeah, so I kept reading in my in my magazine bubble bath time, I kept reading beauty editors, right that you should exfoliate your lips to like remove dead skin with a baby toothbrush. And at the time I did not have kids so I did not even know baby toothbrushes existed or scrub your lips with a washcloth and I was like we can do better than that. I have a scrub for every part of my body. Why wouldn’t I have a scrub for my lips? Google did in 2005 there were no results. I still have the printout Google returned zero results for the words lip scrub. And I was I got this fire in my belly Kara and you write about that in undaunted, everyone should read Kara’s book undaunted, shameless plug for the book that changed my brain. Anyway, you write about this, I had a fire in my belly that was so strong. I remember sitting at my computer and being like, Oh my gosh, this doesn’t exist. I can’t go to Nordstrom and buy this. I can’t go to support and buy this. I’m going to make this in my kitchen. And if you know me, I have a takeout salad right now sitting on my desk. I don’t cook. I kind of bake went to my kitchen though. And I was like, I can make this. I want it to be sugar and essential oils. I want it to taste really great. And I want my lips to be baby smooth when it’s all over with the same way the rest of my body is when I use any other scrub. So I went to my kitchen, Cara and I made it myself. What were the steps in your head?

Kara Goldin 9:05
So you had this idea? Yeah, and you’re gonna go and do it. I mean, what? Like Where did you start? Yeah,

Sara Happ 9:11
so I went to I lived on the east coast. I live in New Haven Connecticut at the time. And for my ESPN job. And I went to like Whole Foods and stop and shop and I bought like McCormick extract. I remember spending like $300 on like sugar and extracts and different oil, coconut oil which you’re allergic to, but you know a lot of different oils to figure out what this would be and I just sat there for probably two weeks and measured table tablespoons teaspoons, a hint of this or whatever of that and I wrote down at six when it was all said and done after two weeks I had six lip scrubs that were own Bray from like cocoa which used Hershey’s cocoa powder. wick a really rich brown all the way down to peppermint which was bright white and use McCormick x strict peppermint, and cara, I was using these every single day they tasted so good. I was obsessed. My lips were like sick and people at work were like, what did you do to your lips and I was like, nothing. And I just I was like, I’m gonna take this to market because I’m obsessed with this so I have to imagine other people will be. That’s amazing. And then so you put it together. Did you literally do it in your kitchen? Or did you find somebody to pack it or when my kitchen I mean literally my kitchen I began I ordered hair nets. I this loft in New Haven and I turned the entire loft into a production center. So it was all these giant Tupperware errs, my parents bought me this like super cool KitchenAid mixer. And I was just making the stuff everyday by myself. And I was importing boxes and tying ribbons and I was getting labels printed like in downtown New Haven with like the flavors on them. I was doing and I was having friends come in from like New York to like, help me make the stuff. And I would pay them and cupcakes because I had no money. So I my house, I smelled like cupcakes and I was making lip scrub 24 seven. While I wasn’t doing like when I wasn’t at work, I was home making lip scrub. And I did it quietly. And I did it completely outside of my work time. It was like a hobby the way some people bake. But the real you alluded to this at the beginning, where it became an actual business where I could have a lab make it was well, first of all, so I took the product out to five indie boutiques female own indie boutiques in 2005, here in LA where I went to college USC, indie boutiques, and I said to these female owners, hey, I loved your store when I was at USC three years ago, no, like six years ago, sorry, excuse my math. Will you just try my product? I know you don’t have anything like it. And all five of them, like wrote me a check. And I put it in my back pocket. And I left like oh my god, like they just bought my big sale item, you know? Yeah. And, and then what I did was I made a deal with each owner. And I was like, hey, if if a reputable celebrity comes in, say this is a gift from you. And for me, give them whatever they want for free. And I will pay you back double. And they were all like, you’ll send me double. And I was like yes. And I was still making it home Cara. And then the next step, once it was in stores was going out to labs up and down the East Coast, and asking all of these people to please help me make this lip scrub. I was like, Listen, this is going to blow up. I’m making it in five pound batches and 10 pound batches right now we’re going to be making like 1000s and 1000s of units. And they’re all like we don’t even have the equipment for that. We’ve never heard of that. So why would we do that? And we make it for, you know, all these giant companies for Mac and for lotter. And for all of these giant companies. Why would we make you a look scrub. We’ve never even heard of it. And I’m like, exactly. It’s whitespace. It’s a hole in the market. Let’s fill it. Finally you and I talked about this offline a little bit ago. But finally the wife of one of the lab owners. I said take it home to your wife. See if she likes it. He came back on Monday and he called me and he said my wife loved it this weekend. All of her girlfriends who were over loved it. I guess I have to figure out how to make this. So then I began began having a lab in New Jersey make it

Kara Goldin 13:12
that is wild. Yeah. And what was your first store that you started selling beyond the smaller stores? And so did you really start in USC or where where was kind of like that? Where were your first stores? Okay, so

Sara Happ 13:27
my first indie boutique was called the beauty closet. It was on Ventura Boulevard in Studio City long before that was cool. And today, the woman who owned that store now runs all my sales. So she works for me now. Her name is Shannon Stuber, and she is my heart and soul. I love her more than anything. I love it the first person and we got it into Reese Witherspoon’s hands and that got me in half a page in People Magazine in 2006 my website crashed all the sales came in and then not that long after Marla Beck of blue mercury called who you know her we both love her yeah and when she calls that’s a really good day. And so we went from you know, 400 indies in the US to every blue mercury in like I don’t know 2008 or something like that. That’s amazing. So yeah, yeah, Shannon has been with me for 16 years now first stored up carry me for a store to get me press. Now she runs all the sales

Kara Goldin 14:25
That’s amazing. Yeah. And so and so you continue to grow the Sara happ you know distribution. And then you’re also available as we’ve talked about on your website as well that you can go on to the website. What did what is the most surprising thing about starting your own company that you just you didn’t realize going in? Okay, so

Sara Happ 14:48
as per your book undaunted, the deal is like I kept thinking for years Kara, that the next step would be like the answer that Right. Like, if we could just get into blue Mercury, we didn’t get into blue mercury. Now if we could just get into Nordstrom, we did get into Nordstrom. Now, if we could just get someone like Jen Garner to use the product. Well, she did. The deal is, everything is difficult, right? As an entrepreneur like you, I know what you did in COVID. To keep Hint, Hint, right? Yeah, everything is difficult. Whether you are a $200,000 company, or an $85 million company that’s gonna sell for billions. Everything is hard. And you have to remain undaunted, and there is no one answer. So it’s not so true. The more you grow, the more complex your problems. So it’s not that the problems get back bigger, or get less. It’s like you have to remain relentless, and undaunted, and roll with the problems. I had to get better rolling with the problems that I had to realize. One new retailer isn’t going to make everything, the answer, that’s not the answer, you know, one new adviser isn’t going to be the answer. So it’s just remaining relentless and unstoppable. And, like you said, showing up to work every day with grit and passion.

Kara Goldin 16:13
Yeah. No, and I think that’s, that’s so important and, and really treating it like I think a puzzle, right? That there’s not an end, right, that you just have to keep adding on to it. Yeah. And, you know, get over these hurdles. Like that’s the way that I view all these, you know, getting Jen Garner to use your product, getting into Nordstrom, all of these things, yeah, set up the hurdle. But then you will achieve those things eventually, and and then you keep going now, and keep find those new hurdles, you keep setting them up for yourself. I think that those are the best entrepreneurs, that the ones that just, I mean, it is about being relentless, and undaunted, and all of those things, but it’s also somebody who’s curious enough, and who is constantly seeking, you know, these challenges. And, and I think that there’s this, no matter what industry you’re in, I think that that’s the consistent thing. And that’s why you have to love what you’re doing. Because otherwise you don’t have a curiosity to go and hit, you know, find new hurdles, you’re just like, I’m done. I’ve talked to more entrepreneurs who, especially in the food space, who, you know, sold their company, and I, you know, give them a call and talk to them. Some of them were, you know, I was really surprised, because I thought that there was a lot more growth for them. And I was curious, like, why they would sell? Yeah, and a lot of them. The answer was, I just wasn’t passionate about it anymore. And I think that that is like, and that is like a fair answer. And an important answer, because you have to it is hard every day, like the struggle, you know, and and I think you have to really like what you’re doing. And that that’s the that is the trick to being able to weather these storms that you hit.

Sara Happ 18:03
Because you’re always going to hit storms, right? No matter how bad you are, or how cool it appears, or whatever deal you sign. You’re always going to hit the storms. And yes, you better love it. Because if you don’t love it, I almost look at it, Kara. As we both have kids, I almost look at it as a child, you’re gonna go through highs and lows with your child at the end of the day, you love them so much that you’re going to weather it and you’re going to grow together, right? Like you’re not going to give up. And so it’s like a living breathing thing

Kara Goldin 18:33
you do

Sara Happ 18:34
you have to keep nurturing it. And it is so yeah, I I think that is what has kept me curious. And going is like there are always problems to solve. And so what you did with him was like, we’re, you’re breaking the norm, right? You’re saying, okay, we don’t need to be addicted to sugary sodas. We don’t need to be addicted to juice, or all the things that people are putting into their bodies that like we now know, with children and every pediatrician is like whatever you do, do not give your kids these things. So you’re busting the doors off of that. For me it was I’m going to bust the doors off the fact that like lip products are empirically dehydrating. And I’m gonna put out products that don’t addict you. But that you become obsessed with

Kara Goldin 19:19
Yeah, no, I totally agree. So

Sara Happ 19:21
you mentioned you have kids is how many kids do you have one Julia? And who you met the she’s a huge fan of Kara’s to the point where she thinks it’s cool to dump his water on your head. And I’m like, Well, yeah, I get it that it smells good, but like let’s not dump water on our heads. Anyway, we’re a big hand household Juliet. You

Kara Goldin 19:41
probably saw the commercial that we did. We had a commercial, but it’s raining watermelon. Are you kidding me? As you probably did, yeah. She probably saw the commercial running and it has a big cloud over someone’s head and they’re and they’re sticking their tongue out and it’s raining watermelon and people are screaming Watermelon watermelon averaging Yes, that’s Yes. She probably did. Speaking of campaigns, I keep thinking about, you know, now that we are going maskless and will have not really been focusing on their mouth. I think there’s a huge campaign for you guys around that. Oh, Cara.

Sara Happ 20:22
It’s so crazy. Yeah, we, um, you know, in a company, we’re small, right? I own I own the whole company. Julia is our largest shareholder, she owns 10%. And so we get to make our own decisions. With that, though, comes the burden of knowing that every decision is on you. So in 2020, obviously, was a very hard year for many people. And luckily, we did not lose our jobs. We stayed in business, but essentially, lips were canceled. Right, like it was a government mandate to cover your mouth. And so we had planned for a lot of problems. We plan for the worst we went through 2008 2008 2009 when we went through a near, you know, recession. We did great those years. And a lot of people think that lips are untouchable. There’s this thing called lipstick index, where it’s like in times of economic distress, lips do well, because you might not be able to buy your Chanel handbag, but you can buy your Chanel lipstick.

Kara Goldin 21:17
Mm hmm. Well,

Sara Happ 21:18
it’s tough when your lips are covered. So we did, we weathered the storm in 2020. It was not easy. We did it though. And now, the amount of demand for our colors, which are not really even my focus, my focus is our lip scrubs and our lip slips and our overnight our dream slip mask and skincare. The demand for anything that we make in color is ridiculous. I think people are like, screaming for color. So yeah, we’re we I was just on a production call this morning. And it changed the whole trajectory of what we’re doing for the next 18 months.

Kara Goldin 21:57
Oh, that’s that’s so great. Yeah. Love, love, love. Yeah, what, what do you think? I mean, what did the panda the last year and a half? I call it 17 months of what Did it teach you? Like as a business owner? I mean, obviously, you know, you started 16 years ago, you’ve, you know, managed during the financial crisis, you you know, as you mentioned, earlier, you manage through divorce. I mean, I’ve had, you know, lots of things that you, you know, have managed what was kind of the key things that you learned about, maybe yourself and about the company and and you know, a pandemic,

Sara Happ 22:40
yeah, so I struggle with anxiety and depression. Those are my two sort of things. That’s my jam. And as an entrepreneur, that’s tough, because you know, everyday we’re writing, right? Like, you can get coolest press one day, and then also find out that your labels were printed wrong. You know, like, the coolest that can happen all within the course of a half an hour. Or the worst stuff. So So what COVID taught me though, with anxiety and depression, and with the divorce that I had that you mentioned, I kind of have always just released control of stuff. Like, listen, I don’t really have the monitor, right? Like, I thought I was controlling my marriage really well, I thought I was controlling my life really well, as an entrepreneur or as a CEO, you think you can control all the things? You can’t I learned that through my divorce six years ago, and COVID almost felt normal to me. Like I was like, oh, everyone else is joining the I can’t control that party. Or I’m kind of a hot mess sometimes. That’s okay to be that. That’s what I think I learned about like people and that was helpful for me. What I learned about our team, and I know you learned this too, was that your people rise to the occasion. And they get to work. So we didn’t stop. I know you didn’t stop because you guys were essential workers. We didn’t stop because we just had to pivot our whole company. We had to just think completely differently. The same day on the same day. Alta Nordstrom blue Mercury, Amazon, everyone cancelled their orders, right brick and mortar shut down on the same day. We were just like, Whoa, okay, we have to rethink everything. So what I found Kara was that my team was relentless. And they woke up every day from all across the country. And we did everything zoom and they just crushed it. So your people yeah, your people like also people’s true colors come through, right the people that didn’t show up, that was really evident too. So I think it was a it was sort of like a the the cream of the crop rises and what I learned about our team is that like 98% of them are the cream of the crop.

Kara Goldin 24:55
Yeah, I love that. That’s, that is such a great way to explain To Yeah, when you when you think back on, you know, 16 years ago, when you were starting the company, somebody has a passion, they have this idea that they want to go and do it. I mean, what would you say to them? Like, what are the key things that, you know, you need to remember about jumping into being an entrepreneur,

Sara Happ 25:18
okay, like you said, you better have like such a fire in your belly and you better want to get up and do this every day. You better want to get up if you do, if you want to get up and do this every day, and whether it’s good or bad, whether it’s a good day or a bad day, if you want to be there. That’s a good indicator, and think as big as you can. So you and I were talking before the show about how I just got to meet Leslie Blodgett, founder of Bare Minerals, who sold it five years ago. She was like my hero for so long. She’s amazing. Think as big as you can think as big as you can. Julia, my seven year old grows up in a household. Both my house and my ex’s house, her wonderful dad, who I’m best friends with, we both have these households, where in our house, we know everyone who makes everything. So Julia drinks hint water. And she knows it’s a girl named Cara who makes it. My t shirts from the great she knows it’s my friend Emily, who makes it. So we go to dry bar, it’s my friend Ali who makes it like dream as big as you possibly can think of, and, and surround yourself with the people that are going to help you get there.

Kara Goldin 26:28
I love that

Sara Happ 26:29
no one could have ever told me I’d meet Leslie or that I’d get to talk to you. When my publicist called was like do want to be on Kara Golden’s podcast, I was like, did you have? Did you have to beg her? Because like, do you know I listen to that all the time? And they’re like, No, it’s okay. You can be on it. But um, you know, so just think think big and like, and I would tell people to like, Look at yourself the same way you encourage your kids. And I encourage Juliet to think you know what? Anything’s possible, right? Like in her world, of course, that we’re talking to Kara who owns hint. Of course, we go to Dr. R. And it’s Allie, whose wedding she’s going to be in.

Kara Goldin 27:01
You have to believe in yourself. Believe in your right now

Sara Happ 27:04
bet on yourself, man. Yeah, like bet on yourself. And like, it is possible. No, I

Kara Goldin 27:11
totally. I totally agree. So just a couple last questions. So first of all, take a talk to me about the F project.

Sara Happ 27:20
Oh, man. So this is something that I wish I could have told me 16 years ago, there were not many female founders. When I started, there was Bobby Brown. There was Leslie Blodgett. Shortly after that, like Josie Marin came into the game, and a bunch of, I would say, Good five years after a bunch of female founders were there you were there. But like, there weren’t. Today we are so female founder heavy, right? Like female founders are the jam. And like, we all know that women are creating incredible things. The F project is there to promote that and surround that. And we are just this open book. If you are part of it, you have to commit to being an open book for anybody that’s in it. So if you want to text somebody that’s in the app project, you better be ready to tell them about your best or your worst day. And you can ask really blunt questions like how’s the money going? Or what happened with that product? Recall? What What’s that about? You know, and it’s just as very honest space for female founders. And I love it and had someone had I had access to a network like that 16 years ago, I think it would have been a lot different because I was really, really lonely when you started when I was lonely when I started my, my company.

Kara Goldin 28:35
Yeah, I mean, I think like, that was the thing that it was, you know, not only my first startup that I had ever created myself, I had worked for other entrepreneurial kind of companies. So so I felt like I could, I think more than anything, for me it was it was kind of getting used to not being the most knowledgeable person in the room. Because I think like, that’s the hard thing that when you I’d been at America Online for seven years, and had, I had my, you know, game down, right. Like, I knew what I was doing, I was managing a bunch of people, I was like, you know, really kind of thinking about how do you know, how do I continue to grow someone else’s business. But when I decided to kind of get off that train and take a little bit of a break, and then ultimately go do my own company, I think that the thing that I had to get used to was not actually having all the answers. And so it was very humbling, because I was just really, you know, dealing with CO Packers. I also had never done a physical good, right, right. You hadn’t either right now he has, you know, all of those things. And so now it’s actually I seek to have places where I’m not the most knowledgeable and the right man. right and i just i

Sara Happ 29:58
get freaked out if I am if I If I do think I’m the smartest person in the room, I don’t want to be in that room.

Kara Goldin 30:03
Yeah. And I think it’s really it’s sort of like counter to help people think about even, I don’t know, you graduate from school and you know that the journey is supposed to be you get your first job, you become a manager, you become a director, you become a VP, CEO, whatever. Yeah. But I think there’s more and more people today that I mean, that are kind of craving, or maybe they haven’t focused on it yet. But they’re sort of, you know, not as happy as they might want to be. And I always say to people, are you learning every single day? Because if you’re not learning every single day, yeah, that could actually be the challenge. I think, you know, you’re on overload learning every single day, because you’re an entrepreneur, but if you’re not an entrepreneur, and you’re kind of in a, you’re in a wheel, yeah, you know, within that within a company, doing the same thing day after day, that’s when you kind of stopped learning. And so I think, for me that that was kind of the biggest thing to get used to. And now I just crave it. And I want, you know, to be in that situation all the all the time. And so that’s why we’ve done sunscreens and all kinds of other products, because I like to innovate, and I like to learn all these new categories. So anyway, it’s been it’s been a lot of fun doing that. So, so beauty industry question, what do you think is like the biggest trends that you’re seeing? And what are your predictions for, you know, 2021 and beyond,

Sara Happ 31:29
so there too, so it’s people’s focus on skincare that was born in 2020. The idea that maybe you didn’t have an hour each way commute and you had extra time on your hands, maybe you could not go get your facial when you couldn’t go get your facial, right. So people’s focus on self care, as being not an indulgence, but an actual necessity, in beauty that, that translated into skincare. So I’m someone if you know me, I take a bubble bath every single night, and sometimes in the morning, and sometimes on conference calls. Like whether it’s 10 minutes or four hours, I will literally stay in my Jacuzzi tub for four hours. That always seemed crazy to people suddenly COVID people are like, wait, I love a bubble bath. We I love. I love a four step skincare regime. So I think self care and skincare are, they are here to stay and people have realized that it is okay to take care of yourself and that there’s a lot you can do at home. So I think care at home is going to be like really important. Oh, yeah, yeah. And, and then color color is going to come back. I mean, you read stuff about like the roaring 20s being a thing, but the data is so real, every female founder I’ve talked to across any beauty space color is going to win the day because it’s like almost a very visceral thing where people are literally I don’t know about you and Moran but like, here in Manhattan Beach, everyone is like out and they’re smiling at each other totally. And there’s so happy to be at Starbucks, or they’re so happy to be at like our local you know, restaurant and they’re expressing that through like color. And I’m really not a color wearer that’s not really my thing. I kind of have like the same makeup routine that I’ve always had, but the data is showing and people are showing the people are going to come out literally expressing their excitement to be out on their eyes, and so on.

Kara Goldin 33:33
They’re interesting, and I think ingredients obviously is becoming you know, more and more critical and people are so much more aware. You know of ingredients and and

Sara Happ 33:46
so interesting. Yeah, clean beauty is the deal and it’s here to stay. Whether it’s luxury. You know, like whether it’s like Bergdorf Goodman and Neiman Marcus are whether it’s CBS and Dwayne Reed, clean beauty like people are aware that you are eating your cosmetics or that your cosmetics are going all over your skin or that you’re putting them on your child. So yeah, the the push towards clean is never going away. It’s not a trend.

Kara Goldin 34:11
It’s just what we’re doing. I love it. Yeah, it’s, it’s so true. So if your favorite Sara happ product oh my gosh,

Sara Happ 34:19
I was asked this yesterday and I have an answer. And I feel like you’re a mom of four and I feel like you know you’re not supposed to have a favorite kid. Or like a favorite family member but like I do and it’s the dream slip. So we made this dream slip it’s um I should have it really handy but I don’t it’s an eye cream for your lips Cara and it is filled with lip filling lipids and the coolest chemistry ever. And there just weren’t any lip masks for like overnight. Like creams like rich luxurious, like decadent creams for your lips that also tasted good that were also clean and adjustable. So we put that out three years ago and Be honest to God can’t be keeping in stock it is running all the time at our lab. So it’s my favorite it’s what I’m the most proud of it is skincare for your lips and the consumers are just it just got named by like Vogue and women’s wear daily as like the best lip product the

Kara Goldin 35:15
best lip product the best product. Oh, that’s that’s awesome, so I feel like I shouldn’t have one but truly it’s the best one. Oh, that’s so great. Yeah, I can’t wait i can’t i have not tried that one but I can’t wait to try it. Okay, I hope we sent it to you if we didn’t we will. Yes, we are definitely so well thank you so much. So Sarah where’s the best place to purchase your product

Sara Happ 35:36
so I always try to give lots of love to our retail partners and you know we are at Ulta we are at Neiman Marcus we’re blue mercury please go to Sarah happy calm though I always forget about that. But when you go to a company’s actual website, it’s better for the company right so if you want to support you know female founded brands or brands that you really connect with go to their website and so Sara hub.com I would say go there and I was thinking Kara I buy your product at Target I really should just buy it from you so in all frankness, the margins are better for me you’re you’re absolutely support our retails retailers for sure. I’m grateful to be in Nordstrom but go to Sara happ.com helps her bottom line love it

Kara Goldin 36:21
yeah well and you probably have they have everything at Sarah have calm we know we do we do

Sara Happ 36:26
if we’re sold out on their hub.com that means literally every one is sold out. So yeah, everyone’s out. So great to know.

Kara Goldin 36:33
Well thank you so much and I hope everybody loved this episode as much as I did please share it with others and and go ahead on your social platforms and talk about the Sara happ interview on the Kara golden show. That would be amazing. And give Sarah five stars as well. Subscribe to my podcast if you haven’t already, and obviously go by Sarah hat prod products and maybe with a case of hint.

Sara Happ 37:03
Yeah, well, yeah. And get the pineapple for summer and the watermelon for summer. It’s

Kara Goldin 37:08
so good, right? It’s so good. And definitely pick up a copy of my book undaunted, especially if you’re an entrepreneur or thinking about maybe becoming an entrepreneur or you’re a student who wants to really know about the entrepreneurial journey beyond Sarah’s journey that she just articulated. So well. I would love for you to let me know what you think once you get my book. And thank you, everybody. We’re here every Monday and Wednesday, interviewing amazing people and brands and I appreciate all of you for spending your time and have a great rest of the week. before we sign off, I want to talk to you about fear. People like to talk about fearless leaders. But achieving big goals isn’t about fearlessness. successful leaders recognize their fears and decide to deal with them head on in order to move forward. This is where my new book undaunted comes in. This book is designed for anyone who wants to succeed in the face of fear, overcome doubts and live a little undaunted. Order your copy today at undaunted, the book calm and learn how to look your doubts and doubters in the eye and achieve your dreams. For a limited time. You’ll also receive a free case of hint water. Do you have a question for me or want to nominate an innovator to spotlight send me a tweet at Kara golden and let me know. And if you liked what you heard, please leave me a review on Apple podcasts. You can also follow along with me on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and LinkedIn at Kara golden thanks for listening