Most cosmetics startups consider landing on Sephora shelves as a benchmark of success. For Laguna Beach-based Ilia Beauty Inc., the nod came from Colette, an influential Parisian boutique frequented by Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld and other fashion gurus.
“They say you are able to get more big breaks if you’re naive,” said Sasha Plavsic, who founded the makeup brand in 2011. “I literally just wrote them a note, put the product in, and put it in the mail … They just closed their door after 20 years, but if you got in there, eyes were on you for the rest of the retailers.”
Ilia, named after the founder’s great-grandfather, bloomed out of a need Plavsic said she saw in the marketplace for more cosmetics with few, if any, chemicals. She blended her background in branding and design—she studied typography in London—to launch the company in her native Vancouver.
Plavsic started the brand with six tinted lip conditioners. It now makes lipsticks, mascara, eyeliners, foundation and eye shadow palettes. She moved three years ago to Laguna Beach to be closer to her lab in Los Angeles, and grew the collection to about 40 products sold at Anthropologie, Sephora and Net-a-Porter, among others.
Colette was likely intrigued by Ilia’s somewhat novel push for “clean” products made with “organic bioactive botanicals” and natural pigments rather than chemicals. While a similar trend is sweeping through the skincare industry, “color hasn’t really had its big moment in that,” Plavsic said, adding that the expectation for makeup’s performance often complicates the process.
Color Challenge
“Skincare is a much easier product to make clean—it’s not as visible,” she said. “But when you put color on, there’s a lot more things [to consider]—the glide, the slip, the feel, the color performance, the wear.”
Plavsic works with a chemist on Ilia’s formulas, an ongoing process that includes “a lot of trial and error to figure out what the right mix is and to get everything ready.”
“I have a full line right now, but I’m going to be discontinuing handfuls of it over the next couple years, because it really resonates with the green beauty customer, but it may not resonate with the Sephora customer,” she said. “I tried to be only organic and only natural for the first five years, and in some product categories you can get really far and it works. And then other product categories, you need certain synthetics to enhance the formula to get it to a level of performance, and those synthetics are safe.”
Ilia’s new serum foundation, for example, contains silicone that blocks the skin from fully absorbing the product.
“I really believe that in order for a foundation to work, you must have a barrier on the skin,” she said, “because it’s makeup. People don’t want to reapply four hours later.”
Plavsic also avoids using fragrance, except for the “lip products you can taste. You need something there, and if you don’t smell anything, it’s usually a chemical that’s masking it, and that’s a little bit more toxic” than a fragrance additive.
Expertise Tapped
Ilia’s attempt to appease the Sephora customer also led to change in the company’s management structure. Plavsic said that during an initial meeting with the retailer in 2016, she felt overwhelmed and asked for help.
“There were a lot of people in the room, and it’s a very different world than the boutique world, which I’m much more familiar with. One of the main color buyers was sitting next to me, and I just was really open with her and said, ‘Hey, I don’t really know what I’m doing past this point, and to work with you guys I think requires a lot more than where my knowledge is, and do you know anybody?’”
The buyer introduced her to former president of Too Faced Cosmetics in Irvine, Lynda Berkowitz—during Berkowitz’ five-year tenure, the brand “almost tripled” revenue. She’s also served as senior vice president at Perricone MD and vice president of sales at Bobbi Brown Cosmetics.
Like Colette, Berkowitz was drawn to Ilia’s vision of clean cosmetics, but also to its potential. She signed on as chief executive in exchange for a small stake in the company.
“I love the entrepreneurial spirit that these crazy little indie brands have,” she said. “When I first went to work for Too Faced, they were very much in that spirit—although I dare say they still are. There is something really inspiring about a founder who develops a brand, and it’s in a high-growth stage.”
Zachary Plavsic, Sasha’s younger brother and a former Canadian Olympic athlete, came on board in 2013 and now serves as chief operating officer and a minority equity partner.
Ilia, which employs 10, has been able to stave off buyers, and plans to grow “a little bit further before we have” to take on an investor.
“[Berkowitz] brings a certain strategy and organization for forecasting and planning that a lot of smaller companies will struggle with,” Plavsic said. “I do think that at some point we are going to need to bring on an investor, especially if we’re going to grow a lot quicker. But we’re trying to find ways to keep going how we can for now.”
She declined to disclose Ilia’s revenue and instead said she sees it sold “in a mix of some big key retailers” in the near future, “providing great products that people can trust and believe in.”
