How I Built This with Guy Raz - Beautyblender: Rea Ann Silva

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Working as a Hollywood makeup artist in the early 2000s, Rea Ann Silva designed a sponge that reshaped the face of beauty. She'd been looking for a technique to simplify makeup touch-ups without worrying about the smudges or streaks that were easily detected on HDTV. Her solution? A teardrop-shaped sponge—hand-cut from a foam wedge—that could apply makeup from any angle, and absorb just enough water to be extra-efficient. Actors and fellow makeup artists raved about the sponge, so Rea Ann cold-called an industry insider—who almost hung up on her before agreeing to listen to her idea. That call led to a fruitful partnership that helped Rea Ann launch Beautyblender in Hollywood pro shops, then Ulta and Sephora. Today, the bright pink teardrop sponge is at the center of a multi-million-dollar beauty brand, available in over 50 countries.  See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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And I have an idea. And they were like, I could just, I could hear the sigh in the other end of the phone. You know, and she was trying to basically get off the phone with me, and I, you know, I said to her, I said, well, who designs your makeup sponges? You never had a makeup artist help you design a tool to apply makeup for your companies. And she said, well, now actually we never have. And I said, okay, so then maybe you want to listen to me. Maybe you want to hear my idea. Welcome to How I Built This, a show about innovators, entrepreneurs, idealists, and the stories behind the movements they built.

I'm Guy Raz and on the show today, how a Hollywood makeup artist figured out a better way to apply makeup with a tear-drop-shaped sponge and grew that idea into Beauty Blender, a multi-million dollar cosmetics brand. If you happen to walk into a big box electronics store in the early 2000s, you might remember being slightly blown away by the new televisions on display because at the time, HDTV was just getting popular. And when you looked at those sets, even from across the store, the super crisp pictures would, like, pop off the screen. But there was one problem, at least for the people on screen, the actors and news anchors and talk show hosts, because high-deaf resolution made every pimple, every pore, every straight bit of stubble that much more visible on screen. And the makeup that was used to cover all those imperfections, well, you could usually see that too. So at the time, the makeup artists who worked in TV were struggling to figure out how to deal with all of this. And today's guest, Rian Silva, she was one of those makeup artists.

In the early 2000s, Rianne was working in Hollywood as head of makeup on the sitcom Girlfriends. And she was trying to come up with a way to apply makeup so that it wouldn't show up in high definition. And the way she figured this out was by inventing a special tool, a tool that was so small and so simple, It's almost hard to believe that it became a multi-million dollar business. Because the tool? It was a sponge, a sponge that is used to apply makeup, except Rianne designed one shape like a teardrop. And that shape, believe it or not, kind of changed the world of makeup. Pretty soon, other makeup artists wanted it.

Rianne called the brand Beauty Blender, and eventually her sponges got picked up by the big beauty stores, including Alta and Sephora. But how she built a multi-million dollar business is also an incredibly amazing story that includes NFL Hall of Famer Eric Dickerson, a Saudi prince, a cameo from Rick James, and years of struggle as a single mother. Rianz Silva grew up in a working-class family

in Southern California in the 1960s and 70s, and as a teenager, she didn't really have any serious ambitions. I really didn't have a direct-examination. My dad was a mechanic, an auto mechanic. He was like the fawns, you know, and like happy days. Like he slicked his hairbag. He raced motorcycles. He raced boats. He raced cars. He ended up being a mechanic. He came from very humble, you know, very humble background. And the same with my mom. My mom was a waitress. And, you know, I think they were kind of of the mindset that having a trade was the way to go. They didn't. There was nobody in their history and their family that had gone to college. And after high school, I guess it was your mom who kind of encouraged you to go into a trade, right? To go to a fashion school in L.A., right? Mm-hmm, yeah.

I think she started thinking about what is she going to do? She can't just get married and have kids. Like, you know, what is she going to do? Because my mom was very kind of, I think she wished she had more opportunity. So she was the one that found FIDM, the Fashion Institute of Design and merchandising. And my mom was a very fashionable person. And I think that's part of the reason why she worked. Her and her sisters like to shop.

So they liked fashion. She saw that I enjoyed fashion too. And I was also a sketcher. Like I like to draw a little bit. And I think she put those things together and then, you know, found out about the school. And yeah, she marched. me down there one day. We signed up and she took a loan out, you know, to afford for me to go to that school. And that's where I went for a couple of years. Tell me about how you got into makeup. From what I understand it, started, you got a job selling perfume at a department store. What department store was it?

Yeah. So I think it was an old one called Bullocks. Bullocks. Bullocks. Bullocks. I remember Bullocks. They grew up in Southern California. Downtown. Anyway, I got a job, and as a perfume model, they dress you up and they give you a bottle of perfume and you spray people. But spraying people with perfume is a great way to live a solitary life because nobody wants you to spray them with perfume. Right. Most people just like put their hand up and say, no, thank you. No, no, no, no.

So, you know, I quickly realized like, this is really a horrible job because I'm not making any form. friends, I'm walking around in high heels all day, making minimum wage. I'm sick to my stomach at the end of the day smelling this perfume. But I noticed that the girls in the cosmetic counters, you know, they were laughing and people loved them because there was this positive experience going on with the consumer. They were selling product, which meant they were making commissions and more money. And they loved their job. I was like, that is what I need to be doing.

I don't need to be spraying people with perfume. I need to somehow find my way onto the cosmetic floor and long story short, you know, fake it till you make it. I convinced someone to hire me in the department store. So I got a little bit of experience there. All right. So you switch over to selling cosmetics at Bullocks. And I think around this time, you also moved to a new apartment. And I guess by chance in that apartment, you wouldn't.

meet someone who works in the movie business. Is that right? Yeah. I met this woman who was a makeup artist. She lived in the building. She lived in West Hollywood. And so it was very interesting because I got to see two slices of life when it comes to to makeup artistry.

You can work retail or you can be lucky enough to live in Los Angeles where you can be in production. So I was able to see, okay, this girl that I met, she goes on set and she works and she does makeup. And as my friendship went on with my friend who was the makeup artist and I met other makeup artists, I started to focus my attention to moving in that direction because their life seemed really exciting. They were working with, you know, all kinds of different producers, different jobs, celebrities.

And I thought, and they were making great money. I was like, wow, that's, you know, that's how I actually got the bug or the interest in makeup. And I think we're talking like somewhere, this is like somewhere in the early 1980s at this point. And I guess you decide to leave school to leave the Fashion Institute so you could concentrate on makeup. But I guess around this time, you also ended up going to London and spending time there for a while. How did that happen? Yeah. I was doing makeup jobs, retail makeup jobs. And I met. a Saudi prince. Wait, where? In Newport Beach. Just like hanging out in Newport Beach?

Just hanging out. It was the craziest thing. So I don't know, but if you recall in the early 80s, late 70s, the U.S. had started to do a lot of business of Saudi Arabia and a lot of the royal family and, you know, politicians and the important. important people were sending their kids, mainly their sons, to the United States, to go to college. Right. And socially, I had met this one guy. And he wasn't like anybody I dated or anything. But he would invite a group of friends to come to Europe and he paid for everything. Wow.

Yeah. And, you know, living in Newport Beach at that time, too, you have to remember, I'm not a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, yuppie girl. So I can only imagine when they saw me, and I heard this over and over again, you know, they'd be like, where are you from? Are you, you know, they will try to speak Arabic to me or Persian. I'm like, oh, I'm Mexican. And they'd be like, wait, you're Mexican, you look like one of us. So I think that was their initial attraction to me was like, there's somebody that looks like us, you know? And I actually ended up meeting somebody that I fell in love with. And I thought I was going to get married and move to Saudi Arabia and live happily ever after with this person. So I kind of didn't think about fashion design anymore. But then that

didn't work out. So now fast forward to coming back to America where I had been gone for a couple years. I lived in London. I had a flat in London. And I came back. What were you doing there, by the way? I was living my life. I wasn't working. I had a boyfriend. who supported me and we were going to get married and I was going to move to Saudi Arabia. Wow. And was your boyfriend a member of the royal family? It was just a wealthy Saudi. Yeah, no, he was just a wealthy Saudi.

His dad was like the attorney to the king. Wow. I mean, and that was, so that was in the early 80s. You were kind of living in London, hanging out with this guy. And my parents were freaking out. I bet. They knew nothing about Saudi Arabia. They were like, what are you doing there in London?

Who is this guy? What's going on? They're like, oh my God, you go to Saudi Arabia. We're never going to see you again. What are you doing? And so what? You were, what, 20, 21, and it kind of fell apart. And you came back to L.A.?

I love this guy so much. And we're still friends to this day. It just wasn't for me going to work because I did want to have a career. I didn't know what that was going to be. But in my heart and soul, my intuition told me, look, you have more to do than go. go to Saudi Arabia and, you know, have a bunch of kids and be the one he's leading in Saudi Arabia when he goes to Europe and parties, you know, it's like. Yeah, that would have been, that would have been a difficult life also. Yeah.

All right. All right. So you, you find yourself back in L.A. and let me, let me ask you about that time in your life because I think shortly after you broke up with a guy in London, you began dating someone new, a football player. NFL football player Eric Dickerson. I think he was already pretty famous at that point. How did you meet? How did that relationship begin? So I go out one night with my cousin to this place called El Provado, which was the second floor of Carlos and Charlie's on Sunset Boulevard on a Monday night. So I'm hanging out and I'm meeting a lot of different people in L.A. one of the people that I met, this is going to sound crazy, but it was Rick James. I met Rick James. Rick James, the Rick James, super freak.

And the thing about Rick is everybody knows, like, he's wild, right? We weren't wild. So the way we got introduced to Eric was, well, I got introduced to Eric was, Mr. Just Say No to Drugs. I want to introduce you to Mrs. No, say no to drugs. This is Rian. I think you guys are going to get along just great. And we just said, And Eric Dickerson was known for being Mr. Sanorda drugs because he was an athlete? Well, he was the like spokesperson for the Nancy Reagan just say no other drugs campaign. Really? Wow. Okay. Wow. I didn't know. I mean, I grew up in L.A. I used to worship Eric Dickerson because I was a Rams fan as a kid. Was he, when you met him, was he, did you know who he was? No. I knew nothing about football. And I think really that's why it kind of worked. And all right, so you meet this guy who was already pretty well known in L.A. And, of course, for people who know, Eric Jickerson's a Hall of Fame, Falafam or running back. And what, you guys start dating?

He kind of became a couple. Yeah. Well, we started dating. You know, look, he's an athlete, right? I mean, there is no shortage of women around, let's say that. But we started dating and, you know, one year went by, two years went by, three years went by, and we were still dating. You know, we actually got engaged and I ended up getting pregnant. And he asked me to marry him, you know, brought me on the Oprah Winfrey show.

And I thought, okay, I'm going to be an NFL wife and a mom. Wow. Wow, you went on Oprah. Yeah. And it's amazing. So obviously the relationship didn't last. You guys did not get married, right? No, it didn't work out.

And when it went bad, it went real bad. So, all right. So you find yourself, what, mid-20s as a single mom? Yeah. Mm-hmm. I had Erica when I gave birth to her when I were both October. And she was born in October. So I had just turned 25.

So what ended up happening was, yeah, I had to figure out what I was going to do because I didn't think he was going to support me at all. And so at this point, I had continued to work doing makeup at a retail level. And this is when I kind of like put it into like turbo and like, okay, I need to figure out how to get into production. So how did you do that? I mean, L.A., obviously the world capital or one of the world capitals, because I think You could make the argument that Bollywood is another one, but a world capital of the entertainment industry. And so presumably there was work for makeup artists, but I can't imagine it's easy to get into. There's probably unions and there's probably, right, there's lots of people who want that work.

How did you break into that industry? So you're right. And if you think about the time we were in, you know, early to mid-80s, it was the MTV Revolution. And you're absolutely right. there are unions for makeup artists and literally for anybody who works behind the scenes. However, there are non-union projects that go on as well. And it was the MTV Revolution, like I was saying. And I started to understand through my research, you know, where these music videos were getting made,

where the production houses were, what their names were. And I'm kind of bold. I would just walk in and say, hey, I'm a makeup artist. Can I talk to, you know, the head of production? or somebody there. I'm looking for work. I just want to leave my resume if you guys ever need anybody. You know, these were the days when you walked in somewhere. You didn't do it online, which, you know, I find it so hard for young people now because nobody ever gets that eye to eye, you know, kind of connection with people anymore. You don't really get to know anything about a person other than whatever is, you know, in front of you on your computer. But I would walk in. So what were some of the video shoots that you got jobs on? Do you remember the first one where they were like, okay, yeah, we could bring you on? Well, the first artist I ever worked with was Tina Marie.

Oh, yeah. Yeah, and Woody Johnston, dear friend of mine, was her road manager at the time. And he was like, well, Rian, I'm going to give you a chance because she's looking for someone. And we don't have a lot of money. And would you do it? I said, I'll do it for free, Woody, you know, just to get in. Then I started working, doing some artists at Motown. I did the good girls.

And I did a ton, a ton of musical artists at Motown. People that you wouldn't know because they come and go. But, you know, they were turning out artists and developing artists like mad. People that would need photo shoots, album cover shoots, press shoots. I mean, eventually over a very fast time over a couple years, my skill set increased greatly. I mean, listen, I did the California love video with Tupac and Dr. Dre where it was all mad max. Yeah. But that was easy compared to like when I had to do meatloaf and make him look 20 years younger.

And you would come with your own kit of makeup, presumably. And did you, I mean, were you bringing in like really expensive high-end makeup or what? So I did have a kit and I did purchase makeup according to the job. So I eventually accumulated what I call a dead body worth of makeup. I mean, I would drag around 80 pounds, 90 pounds of makeup with me everywhere. Before it was very almost like the businesses were very separate. The makeups were very different according to the medium you were working in. Yeah, we interviewed Bobby Brown on the show maybe five years ago.

And I remember her talking about how, you know, when she started out as a makeup artist, it was about showing makeup. And then eventually she was kind of interested in using makeup that didn't look like makeup. And that was a big change, I think, in the 90s, right? That it almost didn't want to look like you were wearing makeup. It was so good that it looked natural. For sure. So if you think about the history of makeup, Makeup artists were basically men for the most part, and hairdressers were women, and it's reflected in the pay rates.

The makeups that were designed by men back in the day and the heavier makeups, when you go back and you look at black and white, silver screen makeup all the way to, say, the 70s or 80s, right, when you're talking about Bobby Brown, those makeups had all a red or pink cast to them. And that's why there wasn't a lot of great darker makeups. Right. However, what Bobby did was, what was so genius with her is that she started this trend of having makeup look natural by using yellow-toned makeup. So all of her formulations were based in yellow-tone. And that's when women and consumers and people that used makeup themselves were able to kind of understand a little more about color-man. and being able to have colors that actually look like their skin. You're, I mean, as you were sort of getting more and more and higher profile jobs,

like doing the Tupac video for California Love, which anyone listening, just pause and go watch it because it's so it. It's like Mad Max and Burning Man. It's such a wow video. Wait, and they flew Tupac from jail to the desert right there. We had a big circle of trailers. He landed. It was crazy. And then, like, you did Brandy and you did...

I did Eve. I did Brandy. I worked with Whitney Houston, Tony Braxton. I worked with Sean Diddy Combs for about 12 years and all of his artists. I did Faith Evans. I mean... And were you making a pretty good living? Oh, my God.

I was making six figures at this point. Wow, yeah. Yeah, but I was working all the time. I had spent a lot of time away from America. You know, production is not like being a CEO. You know, they tell you when to eat. You show up and you show up and you rap when they say rap. So, you know, sometimes it was a 12-hour, 14, 16, 18.

Sometimes I had jobs that were almost 24 hours. It was exhausting. And you had very high-profile people, so it was probably a lot of pressure. Yeah, I mean, it was, it was, crazy when I think about it now. But, you know, at the time, I was in it, man. I loved it so much. And it was like, almost like a game to me to be able to see how much I could do. Yeah, I mean, the sheer amount of work. And my agents were all about it. They were like, okay, you think you can do it? Okay, bet. Let's make that commission. Come on. Let's do it. How many assistance you need? Okay,

let's do it. All right. So here's what I'm wondering, because I think, think there was a kind of a turning point in 2000. I think HDTV started to be used. Like an HDTV, I remember this. I remember the first time I saw like a newscaster on an HD TV and you could see their makeup. Now you don't, that doesn't happen anymore, but I remember seeing that. And that probably really changed how makeup was applied, right? Mm-hmm. That recognition that you have was the singular reason why I was hired to do the show Girlfriends, where I create a beauty blender. So makeup's how we talked about it a few minutes ago early on for film were consistency-wise different, more opaque, more pink-based, more creamy, more creamy. and you would use a lot of powder to powder them down, right?

Because literally you were creating like a mask on someone's face because you wanted to recreate the campus, right? When you use that technique in high definition, it does exactly what you said. You just see nothing but like crazy-looking makeup, right? It's like sitting next to somebody who's just been on a TV set and didn't get their makeup off. Yeah.

You have these people that either look like they were wearing a shit ton of makeup. or people that just look terrible, like they just didn't do anything. So how did you find that balance, right? So one of the skill sets that I taught myself during this career of mine was to airbrush makeup. And airbrushing makeup is the art of spraying makeup onto a face. Right. Like literally an airbrush. Literally spraying it on with an airbrush.

It was used for many, many years, prior. to beauty makeup in special effects. And it creates a seamless look of makeup. Like there's no line of demarcation, like what you were talking about a few minutes ago. So although airbrushing was a wonderful technique to make makeup look natural and high definition, it's not a practical set tool.

So in the morning in my trailer, on the back lot of Paramount, I can be spraying people in my trailer. My music is on. We're chit-chatting and laughing, getting ready for the day. But the minute I walk on set and the rolling sound, I can't turn my compressor on. No. So how do you do touch-ups?

How do you maintain that airbrush finish when you can't turn your airbrusher on, but you have to do touch-ups in between takes? What ended up happening was you were still hand-applying the makeup because you were touching up the makeup with your brushes. and the old way that we had always been applying makeup. I want to get to the stuff sort of how you kind of came up with this idea in a moment. But just so I understand. I mean, I think for people who don't wear makeup, I'm going to try and explain my experience, which was in 2003, I went into television for a few years as a TV reporter.

And I was taught how to apply makeup. And I was brought to a department store. and we, I bought a bunch of, they bought me a bunch of Mac makeup. And I remember there was a, there was a concealer and there was powder. And I can't remember what else. There was a brush in there. But there was also a triangle sponge. And that was what I used to like put the concealer under my eyes and like anywhere I had like, you know, alongside my nose.

And I was taught how to do this. You know, it was not going to be honest. I got pretty good. But it was this triangular sponge, right? The wedge. Right, the wedge. Okay. So, and so what I'm trying to understand is that was what presumably you used and lots of other makeup artists use. So what was wrong with that shape? Why couldn't that shape do what you needed to do? Well, the thing about that shape, right? First of all, we never use the wedge just like you get it out of the package. Makeup artists always cut and bevel the sharp edge off of the wedge. That's something the kids at Mac don't teach you. They don't get taught that. They don't get taught that.

See, this is where there's that separation between fashion makeup, TV, film. You know, there's, and these are the kind of like proprietary trade secrets that makeup artists keep that make themselves feel different from that person over there or that person over there or whatever, right? So basically what we're talking. It taught, and if you were ever to go to a makeup school, a school of makeup for film and television, you would have been classic. taught to take that wedge and take some scissors and bevel the edges so that there's no straight lines of demarcation because it can look good to your eye. When you go in on a close-up and, you know, you're in a theater and a face is like, you know, 300 feet by, I don't know how many feet, you see those lines of demarcation. Like, you try to work as perfectly as you can. So you cut those

edges off the wedge to kind of ensure the fact that there's going to be a softer, line of demarcation. So, you know, Beauty Blender is a wedge that I trimmed into a tear drop. The sponge itself has no edges. We round the sponge. And listen, I didn't create cutting sponges into round shapes. I, you know, I did, like every makeup artist before me historically has had to cut sponges. But it's just something that happened for me. All right. So you've got like this kind of rounded sponge that you've just cut, right? And I guess it would kind of look like a tear drop or like an egg shape. And from what I understand, like around this time, you went to like some kind of workshop where you like you get another idea about how to use this sponge that involves water. And like,

can you explain that? What was the idea that you got? Yeah, yeah. I mean, I went to this one seminar with this really prolific makeup artist who's still working today. Her name is Kelsey Fry. And the thing that she said that stuck in my head was that she would wet her sponge. Like, I know it sounds crazy, everybody. And everybody always says to me, why are you wetting your sponge when you're using this makeup? Because it's going to dilute. It's going to eh, eh, eh.

And she said, but trust me when I tell you, this works. And by the way, it's not like a drippy sponge. Like you wet the sponge, you wring it out, and you towel dry it. But what ends up happening is then the sponge starts to repel the makeup. So it's then pushing the makeup onto the face as opposed to grabbing the makeup and trying to suck it in. So I don't know. Is that like physics or something? I don't know.

Yeah. I'm a bit of a sponge scientist now, guy, I have to say. You are. No, but it is very, it is really scientific. It's really complex. And these things that people don't think about. They're just watching a TV show. You're what when you want, but I bet when you watch TV, you're like, oh, that makeup sucks.

I'm the worst one. Right. I can see continuity. I can say that's a different makeup artist this day. That was a different day. That was a different hand. This is not good. Wow.

With the sponge, when you wet it, like I said, it's now pushing the makeup onto your skin. So you have control of the makeup. You can thin it out or you can just keep. adding more to it to get more coverage. So that was the lesson that I learned in that class. And I went back that next week to my show. And I started experimenting with it. And it worked. And I was like, oh, my God, this is amazing. When we come back in just a moment, Rianne pitches her new technique to a potential new partner, who nearly hangs up on her before deciding.

to hang on the line. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This. I'm Guy Raz. So it's around 2001, and Rihanna's working on the TV show Girlfriends and perfecting a tool to improve the look of makeup in high-deaf. She's using this teardrop-shaped sponge that she designed herself,

and to help the makeup last longer, she's wetting the sponge first. It allowed me to not have to apply more. more makeup on the actors, but rather kind of just redistribute the makeup that already was there, which if you can imagine take after take, scene after scene, you don't have time to recreate a whole look. So you're adding makeup throughout the day and trying to keep these makeup levels looking natural. In high-deaf especially, it's very difficult. So it just made, you know, it made the whole job so much easier for everybody. So basically you were taking just like rectangular sponges and cutting them into like an oval, rounded shape.

But it wasn't just the shape that mattered. It was also the absorption, the ability to absorb liquid. Well, that's where the creation of Beauty Blender came in. So, yes, I was sitting on set with my two or three other makeup artists working for me, and we were cutting sponges as we were sitting on, you know, the sidelines of the set during takes, and we would just cut them for the next day because you couldn't use them over and over again. And so one of the things that I thought about was the material. And I realized that the material that was hydrophilic, meaning it absorbed water,

and got softer and fluffier with the absorption of water, I started realizing that those materials actually gave a better, makeup result. What I'm wondering is even before you were going to talk about this a minute, how you figured out how to make them. But before that happened, when did you, I mean, you're cutting out sponges in certain shapes. And at what point did you say, you know, I should turn this into a business.

I mean, you had a makeup business. You were an artist. When did you say to yourself, I should see if I can, like, turn this into a product? So I had already started, before Beauty Blender even was an idea, I had already started to think about how long am I going to do this? How long am I going to be able to do this? How am I going to keep the schedule? And how am I going to keep making money? So I had started to think about alternative kind of like ways to create passive income. At the same time, I was cutting these wedge sponges and trying to figure out how. How can I make this a business? Because I think that there are going to be so many other makeup artists behind me and this experiment that I'm on on this TV show that are going to need these tools. Because, you know, the future was like the, you know, the buzz on all the sets is like,

everything's going high-deaf and you need a red camera and you need this and you need that and everything's going to be different. And, you know, how can I create a business for myself and take advantage of this, you know, technology that's going to take over? So you were, I mean, you were already thinking, what could I do? And this thing, kind of, all these things came together. It was like wet sponge, shape. But initially your idea was, I'm going to make this for the industry. This is going to be an industry tool. Mm-hmm.

I dared to dream on occasion, like, wow, whatever. this could be a consumer product, but way too complicated for them to understand. Like, it's so far in makeup artistry. I don't think anybody would, you know, why would they trade this out with whatever they're doing now? Like, I just, I knew that my niche and my, you know, little slice of, like I said, passive income would come from the professional community that understood what I was doing. All right, but here's the thing. This is like early 2000s. And you know, this is pre, not pre-internet, but it's like, it's not, it's like, the internet's like, it's one point no, right? And so a little harder.

It was pretty pre. It was definitely pre-social media. Yeah. If you wanted to make something, how did you start? Like, what did you, I mean, you knew this, you knew these products as a makeup artist and you knew who made them. So how did you start to like research what you. what to do next? Like where to get them made and what material do you use and like how to design it and all that stuff? So, you know, I used to travel all over the world with my clients and I used to collect sponges

from every country, every city because I was actually looking for a manufacturer to help me with this idea. But in doing that collection, I also started paying attention to the back of the packages like where it's made, where who distributes it. So there was this one company called Victoria Vogue.

Victoria Vogue was based in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. And what was Victoria Vogue? Victoria Vogue was a company that manufactured and distributed beauty implements. So that meant they created sponges for cosmetic companies, but the sponges that they created would fit into the compacts. Like think of a powder compact, and you have a little thin sponge in there. Any tool that supported your beauty routine. So I called 411 and asked for the phone number to Victoria Vogue.

And I cold called them and asked to speak to somebody in their product development department. And they said, well, okay, but who are you? And I said, my name is Rianne, and I'm a makeup artist. And I have an idea. And they were like, I could just, I could hear the sigh in the other end of the phone. And they said, hold, please. And then this lady came on and said, can I help you? And I was like, yes, you know, I'm a makeup artist.

I'm a professional. I work in film and television. And I have an idea. And I need someone to help me get this made. and she, you know, she said, well, that's great, honey. We hold over 400 patents. I'm sure whatever you have designed already is covered in our patents. So I don't know that we could help you much.

You know, and she was trying to basically get off the phone with me. And I, you know, I said to her, I said, well, okay, but wait a minute. Who designs your makeup sponges? And she stopped for a second. And she said, well, we have product engineers. And I said, so you never had a makeup artist help you design a tool to apply makeup for your companies? And she said, well, now actually, we never have.

And I said, okay, so then maybe you want to listen to me. Maybe you want to hear my idea. And she just kind of was like, I guess I was being pushy. And she was like, okay, what's your idea? And I said, oh, okay, so I have an NDA. because I did like my friend was like rant you have to you have to definitely have them sign this NDA because otherwise it could steal the idea from yeah right yeah and I was like okay so I got I got a little like I don't know like do it yourself NDA or something like that and I had an NDA and she was like

oh well this is going to have to go back to our legal department I don't know if they're going to sign it but I'll get back to you right so we hung up and and then she got back to me you know I don't know, it was probably a couple days later. And she goes, you know, I was thinking about what you said. And I've shared your NDA and they signed it. So why don't you share your idea with me now? Right. And when I did, she said, oh, my God, that's like the palm slapped to my forehead.

Why didn't we think of this? And I said, because you're not makeup artists. What were you seeking from them? You were hoping that maybe they would make them. Okay, so they would maybe like license this idea from you. And what did you present to her? Did you like fax over a picture? No, I cut a sponge and I sent it to her.

I mean, we'd been cutting these. So and and and and and but it, but it was cut by hand. So it wasn't like machined and smooth and, but it was basically this idea was sort of that egg shaped or that tear drop shape of a sponge. And maybe this is a stupid question. But why do you think that right away she'd recognize that this was different and unique? I mean, I'm trying to understand, like, when she said face, palm, you know, plant on my forehead, like, why? Mm-hmm. What did she see in it immediately?

Right. So I, you know, I went into detail about why the shape and what I was doing and the show I was working on and high definition. Unbeknownst to me, the company had charged her for finding to find innovation. So she was looking for innovation within the space. already. But she didn't imagine, like, because I never told her it's a 3D round ergonomic egg-shaped sponge. So when she saw a beauty blender, she recognized, like, this is something really different.

All right. So you send one out over there, and this is Catherine Bailey who gets it. Yes. At Vogue, Victoria Vogue. Yes. But still, there was no, like, Catherine didn't say, what do you want from us? Like, at what point did she say, okay, this looks cool. now what? Like what then? Yeah, so timing is so important, right? So again, unbeknownst to me,

Victoria Vogue was suffering at the time and she had gone back to her bosses. Apparently this is what she told me. She'd gone back to her bosses and they wanted nothing to do with my project. But if you want to work on it, you can work on it, but you need to work on it on your time. You can't working on it on our time. And it'll be your project. We want nothing to do with it, which was such a blessing to me because I was not tied to Victoria Vogue. However, I was able to work with Catherine who had all of this knowledge about sponges and tools. So we then continued to discuss the development of Beauty Blender on her free time. What I'm trying to understand, Rianne, is how did it, So Catherine was working for Victoria Vogue.

And how did she, this is sort of like a side project she was working on. But like what was in it for her? I mean, what would incentivize her to work with you on this when her own company was like, eh? She was probably looking to exit the business anyway. And then I come along and there's something here that interests her and it can be hers. And there's a part and a heart to Kathy where she's a mentor. And I think that she saw me as a young makeup artist with an idea, single mother, just wanting to help.

I don't think that she had any kind of preconceived collateralization of it because she literally worked for me, Guy, for years without a dime. It was very much a labor of love for both of us. And how long did it take before you sort of landed on the right blend of material and shape and like six months a year? Oh, God, no, it was a couple years. Yeah. It almost felt like it was going to take forever at one point because, you know, when you're making something that has never been made before and you don't have a huge investor behind you throwing money at labs and manufacturing companies, you're relying on the goodness and the kindness of people that believe in your idea to make the time to

help you make that idea happen. And it's not happening in that nine to five space. You know what I mean? They have to do it in their off time. So I remember, I remember going to set because I was still working. I was still very, very active in my makeup career. And my friends, the other makeup artists would be like, what are you doing here?

Aren't you starting a company? I'm like, girl, I still got to work. Yeah. So in the beginning when I first decided that this should, you know, I wanted to try to make this a business, I had invited another makeup artist to work with me. I eventually bought her out, but we had both, I think we both invested like $75,000. And when you're working all the time, you don't have time to spend money. So, you know, and there was no internet.

I couldn't be on my phone buying things. So, you know, I amassed and saved so money to buy a house. And I mortgaged my house. And that's how I did it. I'm still working with the same fabricator. and manufacturer from the very beginning. Like, they've grown with me in this business. And, you know, they took a chance on me.

It was really them on off hours, you know, from three different entities when you talk about the foaming and the fabricator and then Kathy. Like all three of them were very much just, I don't know, being philanthropic. I don't know. I look at a guy, I look and I think like I'm the luckiest person in the world. All right, 2000, I think, sort of four or five, you start to, you have them and you're using them because you're working as a makeup artist. But how are you like marketing it? And because you needed to sell them and you needed people to buy them.

Are you just kind of selling them to other makeup artists? Mm-hmm. Yeah. So we have these pro stores that we create POs from the studios for. and the studios then pay for all of our supplies, right? Right. I had created very strong relationships with three or four of the main pro stores in the United States because by this time I was a very active makeup artist working all over the place.

So they were my first clients, my first customers. And people were asking if they carried the product because I would give them out to makeup artists. So in a way, it was the pro community with my marketing. Like I would be like feeding them sponges and they would be using them and they would want more. And then that's just really how it happened. I had to have a place to sell them. I didn't have a website. I mean, even to this day, my digital, my e-commerce business is the smaller part of my business.

All right. Here's what I'm wondering. This is a product that is, it's unique, right? And we've done this in the show. We've had, you know, Randy Hedrick of TRX, talk about the TRX straps. This is a unique product that you invent, and it's going to be really revolutionary for the makeup industry, and you don't patent it. And it strikes me that it immediately, once people caught wind of it, this would be copied. First of all, why didn't you patent it?

Well, it's not that I didn't patent it, is that I wasn't awarded a patent. I tried to patent it for years. And it kept getting rejected? Yeah. There was a conflict. There was a conflict. There was a patent owned by a company that, and this is the craziest thing, and this is why I fought so long and hard about it.

But there was a medical ear cleaner that was like, if you can envision, almost like a Q-tip, only bigger. It was like it had a little handle. And then on top of the stick where the Q-tip would be was a foam tear drop sponge. Right. And that was my conflict. And so the ear cleaner people wouldn't sell me their patent. And so I just, I was never able to get one.

And I'll tell you, like I was saying, I was able to create real brand recognition during this time where we were patent pending. How? How are you able to do that? Because I kept selling beauty blenders to pros. Yeah. You know, some people would say don't sell anything, you know, wait, but I just kept selling. So cosmetic companies, they had started to notice Beauty Blender, you know, backstage at fashion week. They'd started to notice Beauty Blender.

But none of the big companies had like swooped in and really thought that there was any real revenue generating business there. So I didn't have any competition from them. So I just kept selling Beauty Blender and it kept growing within the pro community. And then when consumers were walking into places like Sephora and asking for them, that's, you know, that kind of was like the game changer. Because they were not, they were not available at Sephora at that point. But one of the things you did was it was pink. The color of it was pink. And that was very intentional, right?

Oh my God, that story is so funny to me. So during this time when I was trying to get the special material that was hydrophilic and expanded a certain amount and got soft enough for all of the things I wanted it to do, the company that I was working with, the foamer, would send me different variations of substrates to try. And every time that a new formulation was sent to me, they would dye it a certain color so that I wouldn't confuse them. So when we talked, they could say, hey, remember the blue one, remember the green one, remember the yellow one, remember the purple one. And I remember getting this, the last box was a note when I opened it up and said, hey, I think, you know, they wrote, I think we've made it. I think

this, you're going to love this material. Don't look at the color. Just use it and tell us what you think. And I opened up the box and it was the beauty blender pink that we all see today. It was this beautiful neon bright pink color. And I mean, I just remember opening up the box and being so hopeful and optimistic and thinking like, this might be it. And when I, you know, went back to the company and I was so excited. I said, we did. We found the material. This is perfect. I want you to be able to see it in a sea of black across the room. You know, when you walk into the store,

I think the fact that it's an egg shape is so different. People are going to look at it and wonder, what the hell is this thing? And I want it to be pink. I want them to pick it up and actually ask, what is this? When we come back in, just a moment, how Beauty Blender moves

from pro stores into Sephora and beyond, and why Rian isn't worried when the knock-off start to come out. In fact, she kind of welcomes it. Stay with us. I'm Guy Raz, and you're listening to How I Built This. Hey, welcome back to How I Built This.

I'm Guy Raz. So it's 2008, and Rianne is ready to take Beauty Blender to the next level. Out of the pro shops and into the mainstream. So she decides to leave L.A. and move to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, where her partner, Catherine Bailey, is based. Yeah, we worked out of her bedroom. Yeah, and I know you sort of moved the business to her house to Bethlehem. But at what point, right, did you say, or were you able to take this into a retail store? Did you say, did you go to, because obviously, Sephora, Alta, these are big mass distributors, you know, these are big retailers.

Did you go to them and say, hey, you know, you should take a look at this or did they come to you after seeing the. Alta came to me, Alta Beauty came to me, Alta Beauty came after Sephora. But I started in small private boutiques, boutique beauty stores. So the pro stores like Friends, Namies, and Nigels that I was selling at, I asked them, like, who is your favorite sales rep? I think I need a sales rep. And so they gave me the name of this woman, Laura Garletos, who still works with me today, too. And her and I met, and we decided that the strategy we need to take is to not go to big stores because you have supply issues, right? Right.

Go to the smaller boutiques where you can control the messaging and you can do education too, because when you have a product like Beauty Blender that no one's ever seen before, you're talking about sustainability, cleaning it, it's a high-deaf tool. Like, those are all like things that are like way over the heads of consumers. Like they, you know, if things become too complicated, then they walk away and get what they know. They don't try something new. So marketing and selling initially in a controlled environment where you have the opportunity to sit and talk with each customer and explain why and what and, you know, the ins and outs of the product was the way we grew the business. So, so, Sephora, honestly, I went after Sephora because.

because it was going to be the only way to really justify the costs for me. And because Beauty Blender was an expensive product based on cost of goods and, you know, me, probably not negotiating, you know, the best deals because I didn't know any better. It made it a very expensive product. I needed to have more people buying it. Yeah. Because it was $20, right? $20, yeah. And people were used to getting sponges free.

For free, yeah. Because if you think about sponges, they come in the compact already in the price, you know, that you pay for the product. And that was funny because, you know, that, you know, I tried to get financing early on and everybody looked at me like I was crazy. Who did she try to get financing from? Just different investors, you know. So you went out to see if they would invest and you could not raise money? You know, there were people that would be interested. And they're like, well, I don't know.

I don't know. People are going to spend $20 for a sponge. and I try to explain to them. They spend $20 for a brush. They spend $100 for a brush. Yeah. It's that disposable mentality that we've been taught about makeup sponges that makes you feel like it's not a worthy tool,

but it's the most recognized tool, but the least developed one, because it's been marketed as a disposable product. Yeah. So I thought, why can't I make a cleaner and clean your sponge keep it longer, it would justify the price point because you're not throwing it away. So I created the World's First sponge cleaner. You know, when retailers like Sephora, you know, came calling, it would also justify the price point because they're prestige retailers.

So, I mean, that's kind of how that happened. So, all right, so you managed to get this into Sephora and Alt, I think, around 2012. Obviously, the groundwork had been laid. I mean, makeup artists had been using it. It was in magazines like allure. So people, regular consumers, kind of were looking at this product. What's amazing to me, though, is that I know there were knockoffs, right? There were, and there are.

But how did you maintain, I mean, why were you not ever, why did you never feel threatened by knockoffs? Or maybe, did you ever feel threatened by knockoffs? Every time one came out. Yeah. And what could you do about it? Because you couldn't, you didn't have the patent protection. So how are you able to stay ahead of that? There's a couple things.

So the fact that Beauty Blender is rooted in the pro community is a very important foundation for my business. Because the consumers, the editors, and everybody listens to the pros, right? So when pros only use Beauty Blender, then that's, you know, that's an important message about the knockoffs. Secondly, the way that I soothe myself about knockoffs is that I remember this fact that, you know, Coke needed Pepsi. Xerox needed IBM. Yeah. Beauty Blender needs knockoffs in order to prove why we are the category creator and the best. I mean, there's still even in my biggest retailers now, there's brands within those retailers that have beauty blender type sponges.

But all that does for us is give us a target to market our superiority to. Do you know what I mean? Like if they didn't exist, we couldn't talk about why we're the best. Speaking of, I mean, product development, as this product really began to take off. really began to become a significant business. I think to date, like what, 60 million beauty blenders have been sold, something like that? Probably more than 100 million. I mean, it's amazing.

You got into the cosmetics business in 2018. You guys launch a line of a foundation called Bounce. Did you have any, I don't know, was there any, I don't know, pushback? or anyone from the makeup industry sort of saying, sort of like, well, wait, you're getting into that business? Like, we've been like supporting your thing and now you're kind of coming into our territory. Did you hear any of that at all? You know, you're never going to hear it. Yeah.

Like in any industry, we all try to hold hands as partners. But, you know, there was definite fear from companies because Beauty Blender had been so widely successful. they recognized that I had created a foundation or a net to really make an impact and complexion, like quickly, right? Because if I, you know, my whole thing was if I could get every person that uses a beauty blender to just try my foundation one time, I would, you know, be killing the game. Yeah. So there was definite, like, fear. There were, you know, there were makeup friends of mine, founder friends saying, oh, just stay in your sponge space. You don't want to be out here in this makeup world.

It's hell. And to their point, like, I don't know if maybe you don't know about Shadegate guy, but when I launched. Yeah, when I asked you about that. Yes. Well, I know that when you launched different shades and very consciously wanted to do this to represent all skin tones, you got criticized by some people who said, actually it's not broad enough. and it doesn't cover the entire spectrum of skin tones. Tell me about how you, you know, I'm sure that that was not a, there was a tough pill to swallow for you.

Tell me about what happened. Yeah. I created a line of foundations. By this time, my company had grown. I had an internal PR. I had gone to work with this really super amazing creative agent. that created a lot of beautiful assets and you're ready to go. It's like going to be, this is so exciting.

And so I go to New York and I do press with all of these editors. And now, you know, it's not just editors of magazines anymore. Now you're talking to editors of blogs. And they're all wanting to get everything first, right? The editors and the bloggers. So there's this competition for them to be the first. one to have something. And so one of the bloggers that we agreed to do this with, they re-photographed my shade range with a flash photography. And the bottles that I used in my original

packaging were frosted. So when they took this picture, it looked like all of the colors were the same color. I mean, you know, there was a beginning and an end. There was a very light front end of the shade range, and then there was a very dark end of the dark shade range. But in the middle, there was this, what they would call like a sea of beige, right? And they thought that I didn't really support diversity. So I will tell you that we got like a whole hellstorm of really, really angry and terrible responses to that one photo that that blog, that blog or put out. So we had to do a lot of control, you know, a lot of spin on our whole launch. But at the end of the day, we sold out of 22 shades.

You know, it's like, it's a crazy thing. It's in the entertainment industry, they say good press, bad press, it accomplishes the same thing. It's kind of true because even though that was like the worst thing that could have have happened at the time. I mean, I invested, you know, over two million dollars into this launch. And, you know, it was probably the worst thing that could have happened, but the best thing at the same time because everybody knew we launched. So even with that, even with that negative, you know, attention, it was not all bad for you, is that what you were saying? It was not all bad. It's not to say there weren't aspects that were really super challenging. They're,

absolutely was. But it also set us up for more conversation, more explaining, more trying to kind of undo that narrative, if you will. And so also set me up to be able to create other products. So that's why now, I mean, I have a full line of complexion products that we sell at Sephora. You know, we're doing really well. We've, I mean, it was challenging. I'm not going to say it was horrible. It was challenging. My whole team was stressed out. It was so not what we were prepared for. Yeah. But, you know, luckily, I can say, I mean, we survived it. It's all good. Let me ask you about, you know, obviously, you've got several other products now. You've got foundation and you do, you know, other, you know, makeup and cleansers and you make accessories and other things.

But I have to imagine that the blender is still the core of your business. She's the queen. Right, the main seller. Tell me about where, you know, sort of what your ambitions for beauty blender is. I mean, do you see this as like an estate lotter? I mean, do you see this as a, because you own, you still own all or most of this company, right? I don't think you took on outside investment or maybe you have. No, I still own it 100%.

I have no investors. And, you know, that's an interesting question. Listen, this year, this next year, 2023 is going to be 20-year anniversary for Beauty Blender. And nobody is, you know, more surprised at that number than I am because when I went into this business, if you recall, it was like passive income. So I could pay for private school, send my kids to college, you know, just take a vacation because I was working so hard. Like I just needed some extra money. Yeah. I'm just now really starting to think about it.

I don't know. Like would I love for this company to end up being an Estee Lauder? I mean, from a legacy perspective, of course, but then I also now understand how brutal the business is. And, you know, I would really need to have one or both of my kids really in it, right, to keep it a family business like that. So, you know, I don't know if that's going to happen. Like, I don't consider my company a big company right now. Like, maybe we're mid-sized. I don't think we're a big company.

But, you know, how much? Like $200 million in revenue, something like that a year. Yeah, something like that. But, you know, we're coming out of COVID. What can I say? Where people stopped wearing makeup. Right. But, boy, are they wearing it again now?

I don't know. You know, I will say this. I think probably in the next three to five years, just because of my age and also my own personal desires, things that I want for my life, maybe I'll take on like a minority investor. Yeah. And then by that time, I'll be able to have a better idea of, you know, what the future looks like if I would, you know, do a full transaction or, you know, do I, you know, do I. Do one of my kids want a part of it? I really don't know yet. I mean, it's kind of amazing to think about the arc of your life, right?

Like, you had serious relationships with two very successful, wealthy men, you know, the Saudi son of a Saudi, you know. Dye, you only know of a couple. There's more there. I know a couple, right? And Eric Dickerson, who I still think was, you know, I still remember fondly as a great. great running back. And no knock on those guys, but like you kind of, you kind of like left him the dust. Like you, you really built a massive career on your own. And how much of this do you attribute to just the grind and how hard you worked? And what, if any, percentage would you

attribute to luck? Just the luck of the circumstances of meeting Catherine and, you know, some other breaks you got. What do you think it's really about the grind and the work or or do you think there was luck too? I think there's both. And by the way, I'm not, I've been with, I have a wonderful man in my life. His name is Rory Nick. And he's been, we've been together for almost 28 years now, but we're not married. And we have our son together. But luck is, what did they say about luck? It's preparation, meeting timing or something. There's some, basically saying there's no such thing as luck. It's all movement and preparation.

But I do believe in luck and I believe in God. You know, I believe that, not to sound too woozy, woozy, but, you know, I went through a lot of things in my life that were kind of unfair. And I just hustled and worked hard. I didn't dwell on it too much. I just worked hard. and I feel like it's, it kind of comes full circle, you know. So I attribute a lot to the grind. I mean, it is, you know, we're often pitched on this show.

And I understand founders who are like 25 of businesses or, you know, and that's fine. I mean, and it's a great, great, often great stories. But we generally prefer to talk to founders, you know, in their 40s, 50s and beyond because not because they're better or smarter, just because they're. they've lived lifelonger. And so there's more for them to kind of reflect on and offer up to the people who listen to this show. And one of the reasons why I thought your story was so compelling is because you really, you started this business when you were like in your 40s. 39. Yeah. I mean, you were, you had a career behind you. But but in order to have made this successful, you had to have had that career. You could not have done this if you didn't have 10 plus years as a makeup artist. 20. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Yeah, no, I'm 60 and, you know, I have, my father has passed away. My mother is 86. You know, I'm watching her and how vibrant she is, but, you know, the reality of our mortality definitely is in my mind, you know. And I think, like, what do I want for my future? How much do I want to do that I'm not doing? doing now. The problem for me, guys, that I love this business. Yeah. You know, I'm still enjoying this. There's never a day for me that I'm like, oh, I got it better work. No, I get up every morning, like, you know, ready to play this game. Like, I want to win. That's Rianne Silva,

founder of Beauty Blender. By the way, the company says you should never have to throw away any of its sponges. After you've used them for a few months, they'll recycle them for you, and they also have tips on what else you can do with a used one. You can clean your shoes with it, you can use it as a stress ball, or a pin cushion, or you can also

tie it to a piece of thread, and voila! Instant Cat toy! Hey, thanks so much for listening to the show this week. If you enjoyed it, please help us spread the word. Tell someone about how I built this or post about it on social media, and thank you. If you want to

Contact the team, our email address is H-I-B-T at ID.Wondry.com. If you want to follow us on Twitter, our account is at How I Built This, and mine is at Guy Raz. And on Instagram, I'm at guy.org. This episode was produced by Liz Metzger with music composed by Rumtina Arablui. It was edited by Neva Grant with research help from Sam Paulson. Our audio engineer was Maggie Luthor. Our production staff includes Casey Herman, J.C. Howard, Carrie Thompson, Alex Chung, Elaine Coates, John Isabella, Chris Messini, and Carla Estevez. Our intern is Susanna Brown.

I'm Guy Raz, and you've been listening to How I Built This.