Written by Valentina DiDonato, CNN
Bobbi Brown, the makeup mogul who pioneered the “no makeup” look in the early ’90s, is back with a new adventure.
Based on the belief that the world “doesn’t need more beauty products, it just needs better beauty products,” its new brand, Jones Road, which it launched during the pandemic, offers a relatively small range of “clean” products, formulated to remove potentially harmful ingredients like parabens, phthalates, and sulfates. And, in keeping with him’s less-is-more approach, many items in his new range are multifunctional, such as a balm that can be applied to cheeks, lips and eyelids.
Jones Road comes decades after Brown sold her namesake label and years after she left the company.
building a brand
Brown first entered the beauty world in the 1980s as a makeup artist when the overly made-up look was all the rage. “It was Studio 54, Liza Minnelli, Jerry Hall,” Ella Brown recalled during an interview with CNN. “I tried to do that and it didn’t work. So I thought, ‘Let me make people look more natural,'” she said.
Going against the trend, he went with consumers who wanted a more natural look and launched Bobbi Brown in 1991, building a business that was so successful that Estée Lauder knocked on his door just a few years later. According to Brown, then-CEO Leonard Lauder called her to say that she was beating the cosmetics giant in every department store. He invited Brown and her husband to dinner and asked if she could buy the brand. “We’re not for sale,” she told him at the time, but eventually Lauder made an offer he couldn’t refuse.
“When Leonard said to me, ‘what if I can promise you that we can grow your business and you can do what you love,’ and this came back to me, ‘you keep doing all the creative stuff, we do all the rest? and you can be a really good mother and having your family and not spending your life traveling,’ I said that was fine. He was the right partner at the right time,” Brown said.
She stayed with the brand for more than two decades after the reported $74.5 million sale, but ultimately backed out of a non-compete agreement she had signed, which would bar her from launching new beauty brands for 25 years. “I’ve always put my name only on things I believe in. It’s one of the reasons I left the last mark,” she said. “At the end of my term, I was forced to pass things that I never had a chance to pass. I refused. I never put my name on something I don’t believe in.”
But there were still four years left on the non-compete agreement and he finally had the luxury of time to figure out what he wanted to do next.
‘Empower people’
In her second act, Brown went back to school to get certified as a health coach. “I didn’t go back to school with a purpose. I went because it was the first time in my life that I had time to think about what I wanted to do,” she said. “I’ve always been a health freak and foodie, so going back to school I discovered healthier ways to eat the foods I love.” During that time, she said that she began to wear even less makeup.
“Honestly, I stopped using it after leaving the brand. I was getting healthier, less stressed and looking better,” she said.
Brown said he could see what was happening on social media with the many emerging direct-to-consumer beauty brands, but he saw a gap in the market for the company he was quietly beginning to imagine, that it was “somewhere between the old Celine, when Phoebe Philo was there, and Supreme”.
He launched the brand on October 26, 2020, the day his non-competition ended.
Brown joined Tiktok in January of this year and posted videos with direct advice, including tips for people over 50. , “why would you want to contour your nose?” as she explains how she learned to embrace her natural traits. 
Brown is now taking the opportunity to speak directly to consumers. Credit: jones road beauty
Brown has also used the platform to address critics. One of the brand’s foundations had received negative feedback from users online: some didn’t like that the oil-based foundation separated in its container, others felt the coverage wasn’t enough. She responded with a series of videos defending the product and explaining how to mix it properly and how to apply it.
A lot has changed since Brown launched her first brand, but she appears to be seizing the opportunity to speak directly to consumers and share positive beauty messages.
“I believe in life, you have to use what you have and stop fighting for who you are,” he said, “I really believe in empowering people to be the best versions of themselves.”
Bobbi’s Top 5 Beauty Tips:
1. Smile a lot, you look so much better when you do it.
2. Stay hydrated, it doesn’t matter if it’s water or herbal tea, it makes a big difference in how you feel.
3. How you feel is tied to how you look, so instead of rushing to get the job done, ask yourself “why don’t I feel good?” and make some lifestyle changes
4. Wear sunscreen and wear a seat belt
5. Optimize your regimen: Find some beauty products that take just minutes to apply and make you feel good no matter what, where and when
Update: This article has been updated to clarify that Jones Road was first released in October 2020.
Source: www.cnn.com