Speaker 1: Hi everyone, I'm Rachel Zoe and you're listening to Climbing
Speaker 1: in Heels for your weekly dose of glamour, inspiration and fun. Okay,
Speaker 1: today I'm joined by the incredible friend duo and talented
Speaker 1: women behind the haircare and hair wellness brand Highbrow Hippie.
Speaker 1: After working with some of Hollywood's biggest stars, Katie Lee
Speaker 1: and Micah Harris launched Hibro Hippie as a blog sharing
Speaker 1: beauty and wellness tips, which evolved into an attilie salon
Speaker 1: and now incredible products that support hair loss and hair health.
Speaker 1: These incredible women have such a clear vision for their
Speaker 1: brand and their method of working quietly is fascinating and inspiring.
Speaker 2: So let's get right into it.
Speaker 1: I'm very excited to talk to you. I've known of
Speaker 1: you for many many years. I know many of the
Speaker 1: extraordinary women that you work with. But I first want
Speaker 1: to go back because Climbing in Heels is really about
Speaker 1: celebrating and talking about the journey and also similar to
Speaker 1: a seat at the table dinners, it's about talking about
Speaker 1: how hard it is for us as women in general
Speaker 1: to make it in anything. Let alone have a dream.
Speaker 1: I want to go back a little bit too, like,
Speaker 1: how did you even find each other?
Speaker 2: How are you? How does this even happen?
Speaker 1: Because you know, I think you've probably lived and worked
Speaker 1: long enough to know that, you know, partnerships, especially with friends,
Speaker 1: it doesn't always work right, and this is clearly working.
Speaker 1: So I want to talk a little bit about how
Speaker 1: it started and what happened.
Speaker 3: So we met almost thirty years ago in college, and
Speaker 3: we were both working in fashion at BCBG really and
Speaker 3: where Atlanta, Georgia. We are both students at Spelman College.
Speaker 3: Micah was getting ready to leave for Paris to go
Speaker 3: to Parsons for her grad degree, and I was a freshman,
Speaker 3: and yeah, it was our after school job and it
Speaker 3: was a good one, and I don't know, we just
Speaker 3: kind of fell into lockstep pretty quickly. That was the
Speaker 3: first meeting, and then there were a few years in
Speaker 3: between where I was still in school, Micah was in
Speaker 3: school but at Parses in Paris, and then we both
Speaker 3: ended up in New York City and I was working
Speaker 3: at Frederick FACAI and at that point Micah ironically was
Speaker 3: working for DVF of all people, who was now a
Speaker 3: client wow, and then working for her the world's first
Speaker 3: like trend forecasters.
Speaker 4: Yeah, a beauty futurologist. So I was working with her
Speaker 4: trend forecasting on the beauty front.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So then one day, like two thousand and one, and.
Speaker 4: It would have been two thousand and one because it
Speaker 4: was yeah for nine eleven.
Speaker 1: That's how we'll always know two thousand and one. Yeah, Aaron,
Speaker 1: I was going to Diane's studio And is.
Speaker 3: Not funny like such, you know, passing ships, but it
Speaker 3: was a true New York story where we were both
Speaker 3: on Madison Avenue. We walked right into each other, like
Speaker 3: actually bumped into each other. Yeah. Yeah, actually.
Speaker 4: Looked right into each other, and then discovered that we
Speaker 4: lived around the corner from one another in Brooklyn, and
Speaker 4: we went to like have dinner at our little local
Speaker 4: neighborhood spot, and then that was it. We were just
Speaker 4: kind of off to the races, like in.
Speaker 1: Your twenties, and you were like just happen to be
Speaker 1: really bumped into each other.
Speaker 3: That's so wide And I never walked by the way.
Speaker 3: I was one of those like Uji, like twenty one
Speaker 3: year olds who spent every dime that I made at
Speaker 3: the salon on like car services back to Brooklyn.
Speaker 5: Yeah, of course, yeah, by the way, I love that
Speaker 5: about you. I see you by the way, and I
Speaker 5: was a complete opposite. I'm like on the subway, you know,
Speaker 5: going back to Brooklyn. But it's like our highbrow hippie
Speaker 5: Don't you.
Speaker 2: Feel like Venice is brooklyn Ish?
Speaker 1: Not literally, but just like I feel like people who
Speaker 1: live in Venice, if they moved to New York might
Speaker 1: live in Brooklyn and vice versa.
Speaker 3: I mean, listen, there's definitely through lines, and there's a
Speaker 3: reason why we've both lived here for sure. Yeah, you know,
Speaker 3: it has a bit more of just the freedom to it,
Speaker 3: and even though it's changed a lot in the past
Speaker 3: few years, it still has a very neighborly quality. Venice
Speaker 3: is cool. So you're in Brooklyn, what you come out here?
Speaker 3: When do you come here? Well?
Speaker 2: Probably what happened.
Speaker 3: Between Brooklyn and here, I mean a lot happened. Mica
Speaker 3: got married and moved to Europe. Yeah, got it in
Speaker 3: the system. Yeah, I moved to la about three years
Speaker 3: during the time that you were in Europe. Because I
Speaker 3: will go back and forth. And then once Micah was
Speaker 3: separated and back in Atlanta, we I don't know, we
Speaker 3: just would like talk about what what if we just
Speaker 3: started this like blog and one of Micah's boyfriends used
Speaker 3: to call her a bourgeois bohemian and we were like, well,
Speaker 3: we can't call it that because like Americans will butcher
Speaker 3: the name. Yeah, I love the word highbrow. And then
Speaker 3: Michah just said the word hippie and the alliteration was working,
Speaker 3: and we yeah, that's it, and that's her blog ready
Speaker 3: to go. I love it.
Speaker 1: So you just started blogging and that was what like
Speaker 1: two thousand and h twelve, eleven twelve where it was
Speaker 1: where it was called a blog.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, we have blog. We have this list that
Speaker 3: we made and I looked at it the other day,
Speaker 3: a manifesting list and what hybrow hippie could be, and
Speaker 3: it was like, one day we're going to have a
Speaker 3: brick and mortar. Then we're going to have a coffee
Speaker 3: table book, then we're going to have a product line.
Speaker 3: I mean, we literally wrote every single thing down before
Speaker 3: we even launch the blog, and a lot of those
Speaker 3: things today are true.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 1: Wow, isn't not wild, like because you don't even remember
Speaker 1: doing that sometimes, you know. And two other female founders
Speaker 1: that have a clothing line told me when I met
Speaker 1: her in COVID because we were both in Malibu and
Speaker 1: she said, I manifested you, and I said, what do
Speaker 1: you mean? She's like fashion obsessed and she used to
Speaker 1: write this list of people that she knew were going
Speaker 1: to be in her life at some point.
Speaker 2: And I never believed in that.
Speaker 1: And I not that I didn't believe in it, but
Speaker 1: like I'm a little I'm scared to put those things
Speaker 1: down because if you don't achieve them, then I feel
Speaker 1: like a failure. Right So so, but it's interesting with
Speaker 1: you guys, because it's almost like everything kept bringing you
Speaker 1: back right together. And then I feel like the fact
Speaker 1: that you had the same shared dreams, the fact that
Speaker 1: you kind of lived your separate lives and then together
Speaker 1: lives right Because you guys, don't seem the type to
Speaker 1: me from the little I know you to put yourselves
Speaker 1: out there in a very public manner, a very loud manner,
Speaker 1: or a very soliciting manner.
Speaker 3: I find you to be quite the opposite.
Speaker 1: So clearly it's your talent that actually got you where
Speaker 1: you are because you do touch and style obviously hundreds
Speaker 1: and maybe thousands of peads and hair and people, but
Speaker 1: like you and arguably do some of the biggest names
Speaker 1: in the world and who have access to anyone in
Speaker 1: the business. So despite how nice, despite how professional, despite
Speaker 1: how whatever, you're clearly both extremely talent, and so I
Speaker 1: want to sort of talk about that, because it's very
Speaker 1: hard to launch a brand and product and brick and
Speaker 1: mortar and all the things while still maintaining the integrity
Speaker 1: of the brand.
Speaker 2: Right, So I talk about that.
Speaker 1: The talent is obviously what's speaking over over everything else.
Speaker 1: So I want to talk like how you sort of
Speaker 1: balance the still touching the peop and doing what you
Speaker 1: do to still keep the other parts of it going strong,
Speaker 1: because it's the other parts of it that is the
Speaker 1: actual tangible business, right And coming up as a stylist.
Speaker 2: And then launching a brand and product.
Speaker 1: I know how hard it is, I know how scary
Speaker 1: it is, but I do know you get to that
Speaker 1: inflection point where you're like, what I do is providing
Speaker 1: a service. What I do is dictated by how hard
Speaker 1: I work, Right, Like every minute I work.
Speaker 2: Is how much I make more or less.
Speaker 1: And at some point you say, what happens if you
Speaker 1: need to have something that can live on beyond.
Speaker 2: You or outside of you?
Speaker 1: Right, So at what point did you guys decide to say, Okay,
Speaker 1: let's do some of these things that we've dreamed about,
Speaker 1: talked about because it's scary.
Speaker 3: It is. I'm going to say something really quickly, Micah.
Speaker 3: Then I want you to build on it because you
Speaker 3: asked a few questions. One point that you made is
Speaker 3: that we do work really hard, and we work in
Speaker 3: silence and we've never felt which is rare.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's like we laugh because we feel as though,
Speaker 4: you know, people are like, whoa surprise sometimes when we
Speaker 4: do things and it's like.
Speaker 3: We've been here, We've been here here, We've.
Speaker 1: Been doing this and keep going overnight success of twenty
Speaker 1: years of work.
Speaker 3: Exactly, you know, like we are two very grown women.
Speaker 3: But so so you first touch on the service point
Speaker 3: and as you know, like you cannot maintain a career
Speaker 3: of twenty five years in this industry with the clients
Speaker 3: that I've a mass being a colorist by not being excellent.
Speaker 3: And there are a few things that always drive that,
Speaker 3: Like you know, Mike and I have never been one
Speaker 3: to kind of bat around a subject. And the bottom
Speaker 3: line is, as a black woman in the beauty industry,
Speaker 3: I did not have a choice but to be excellent
Speaker 3: did I couldn't fall back on anything. It wasn't about
Speaker 3: my like winning personality, although you know, catch me on
Speaker 3: the right day, I could be pretty funny. But like
Speaker 3: usually it's it all comes down to am I doing
Speaker 3: good work? So while I was focused on really just
Speaker 3: being really excellent at my and I'm always known as
Speaker 3: the hardest worker. I will outwork anyone. I love it.
Speaker 3: You know, I'm a Leo and I'm a Jamaican immigrant,
Speaker 3: so like it's like put any stereotype on me with
Speaker 3: that and like I'm going to do it. What you
Speaker 3: sound like, Oh, we both have virgo tendencies. Actually you
Speaker 3: should see the level of attention. I feel it like
Speaker 3: Mark's paper is not in the stack. Were very meticulous.
Speaker 3: They don't see what we see, you know. I mean
Speaker 3: we serve every single beverage at Hybrid Hippie with a press, linen, napkin.
Speaker 3: It's it's to the next level. It's it's kind of
Speaker 3: disturbing sometimes. But going back to how it happened, you know,
Speaker 3: while I was busy building very slowly, you know, Micah
Speaker 3: was also in Atlanta owning a company in the beauty space.
Speaker 3: She owned like Atlanta's first natural waxing and nail studio,
Speaker 3: so she had some experience on the back end of
Speaker 3: back running a business and running it well. I knew
Speaker 3: a obviously, everything changed when Julia Roberts became my client.
Speaker 3: It she put a level of trust in me that
Speaker 3: really took my confidence to the next level. And once
Speaker 3: that happened, and we knew that we could create a
Speaker 3: space where women who were discerning and who really craved
Speaker 3: peace and privacy could go, we knew that we could
Speaker 3: put our heads together not only create a physical space
Speaker 3: that was like everything we ever dreamed of, but we
Speaker 3: could also translate that into a product that people could
Speaker 3: take home as well. It's hard.
Speaker 1: By the way, Julia's unbeliever. I think it's like she's magic.
Speaker 3: She's actual magic and starting human beings. Ever, you know,
Speaker 3: both her and Serge Vermont, who's my mentor. I love him,
Speaker 3: I mean, I mean I love that man. I love him.
Speaker 2: I love him like when I see him, it is.
Speaker 3: Like it's love of a love, a warmth.
Speaker 1: He is one of the greatest of all time as
Speaker 1: not just talent, but just as a life, yeah, a
Speaker 1: human And it makes sense all of it that Julia chooses.
Speaker 2: All of you.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I'm like the most junior person kind
Speaker 3: of in the long term squad, and I've been around
Speaker 3: for over fifteen years with her, so she really she
Speaker 3: chooses her family. We choose her right back. Serge and
Speaker 3: Julia have been such big supporters of Micah and I.
Speaker 3: She was the very first person to ever step into
Speaker 3: hybrid hybie the physical space. Yeah.
Speaker 1: By the way, if you're going to dream a dream
Speaker 1: of who's ever going to walk into your space, I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure Julia Roberts is number one.
Speaker 3: Yeah. And is there any more iconic hair that exists
Speaker 3: her style?
Speaker 2: By the way, I was going to say, it's the hair, it's.
Speaker 3: Smile, it's her, it's all the things.
Speaker 2: And she chose you.
Speaker 1: That's the thing. That's my point. It's like your success
Speaker 1: is for a reason. And I always say the people
Speaker 1: that stand out you can get somewhere. You can have
Speaker 1: an introduction, you can have help, you can have all
Speaker 1: the things, but the talent ultimately is the only thing that.
Speaker 2: Will keep you there.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you get there, you can get there.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 4: One thing I wanted to add in terms of building
Speaker 4: this sustainable brand, I think that one thing that has
Speaker 4: always worked for us, and it's kind of overused, but
Speaker 4: this idea of being authentic, like everything that we're doing,
Speaker 4: that we're putting out, that we're discussing, that we are
Speaker 4: trying to share with our clients and our community is
Speaker 4: authentically what we would want for ourselves, you know, and
Speaker 4: so we're viewing it through that lens often, like, you know,
Speaker 4: if we were on the other side of this, what
Speaker 4: would work for us? And sometimes, you know, we're doing
Speaker 4: things and people are like, oh, I don't really know
Speaker 4: about that, but eventually it catches up, you know, like
Speaker 4: what we might be seen is doing something that's slightly.
Speaker 3: Against the grain. You know. Katie kind of touched on
Speaker 3: this earlier. It's like she didn't really have a choice.
Speaker 4: You know. It's like you're this black woman, You're showing
Speaker 4: up in this way, and so you have to have
Speaker 4: the hard conversation. You have to acknowledge certain things. So
Speaker 4: we've always been like very outspoken around politics and things
Speaker 4: that were happening in our world as a startup brand,
Speaker 4: you know, because it was very authentic to us. And
Speaker 4: now of course everyone's you know, discusses this idea of
Speaker 4: you know, who are you as a brand, like authentically,
Speaker 4: are you expressing yourself? And you know we've always done
Speaker 4: that and we'll continue to be that way.
Speaker 1: I think that the consumer or client, I think they
Speaker 1: see authenticity, they know it that I think they're given
Speaker 1: credit for.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, love for you to talk about sort of what
Speaker 1: is most exciting to you, like in terms of what
Speaker 1: you're doing now, like in terms of product, in terms
Speaker 1: of the space, are you planning on opening more?
Speaker 3: Oh god? So all right? So the best thing and
Speaker 3: the hardest and always like where we are. We love
Speaker 3: a small team, We love a small space. About who
Speaker 3: is their right mind would take on more real estate
Speaker 3: right now? You know it's not worth it. But I
Speaker 3: will say what sometimes brands that launch a product, what
Speaker 3: they do is they launched a product and then they
Speaker 3: try to find the community afterwards around that product. I
Speaker 3: think what really is working for us and has always worked,
Speaker 3: is that we had the community first, and then we
Speaker 3: leaned on them before we launched one product, before we
Speaker 3: designed any packaging. Mica had this idea, We did this
Speaker 3: huge survey, and we really took the downtime that we
Speaker 3: had during COVID like seriously and while we were scrambling
Speaker 3: to make sure that the attiliate could even stay open.
Speaker 3: We got this survey up and running, and we asked
Speaker 3: our clients everything about their beauty closet. What are you
Speaker 3: buying right now? Commus are you spending? What are your
Speaker 3: top three items, what are your top five items, what
Speaker 3: are your top ten items? And we took that information
Speaker 3: and took their concerns and that was our starting point
Speaker 3: for developing our product line. So we have this community
Speaker 3: of women that it's like the best secret, you know
Speaker 3: that they are the most discerning. They want us to succeed,
Speaker 3: but they also want us to make things that they
Speaker 3: can use.
Speaker 2: Sure, and how big is the range now of products.
Speaker 3: We just launched with two two more coming out in
Speaker 3: a few months.
Speaker 2: I think you roll out son, study.
Speaker 3: Slow and study, but we by the end end of
Speaker 3: next year will have about eight in.
Speaker 1: The art I love and it's and it's always neat
Speaker 1: what kind of affects you and what doesn't like? What
Speaker 1: gives you? What makes it hard to go to sleep?
Speaker 1: Are you do you have fears about doing this? It's
Speaker 1: because just being an entrepreneur is very different than being
Speaker 1: an artist.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean everybody has fears I certainly do. And
Speaker 3: you know, I'm in the throes of perimenopause.
Speaker 2: Mike is, so it's so fun.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So anxiety and lack of sleep and worry at
Speaker 3: night is just part of the game. But I mean,
Speaker 3: of course you have fears that listen, I worry, are
Speaker 3: we late? You know? But then if we're late, just
Speaker 3: do it better. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe I don't
Speaker 3: have fears. I feel like we have this army of
Speaker 3: women behind us that, like always, I look to them
Speaker 3: and I just know it's going to be okay. I
Speaker 3: know that one thing that Mike and I and I
Speaker 3: feel like I'm talking too much. I'm gonna shut up
Speaker 3: real soon, Mica.
Speaker 1: But one thing that her and I something tells me,
Speaker 1: you guys would cut each other off if you needed to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we would.
Speaker 3: Yeah. But one thing that I think is important that
Speaker 3: a lot of people don't talk about as entrepreneurs is
Speaker 3: that we've always had the same endgame, and we always
Speaker 3: knew that in a few years. You know, we do
Speaker 3: want to sell the company, we want to exit, We
Speaker 3: want to do different things with our lives. We want
Speaker 3: to have different chapters in our lives. And I think
Speaker 3: once you know where you're going. It's easy to just
Speaker 3: be in the present because then you know what you're
Speaker 3: working towards. Like one person said to us, like, I mean,
Speaker 3: how could you be thinking ahead? Like don't you want
Speaker 3: to hold on to it forever? And we're both like, no,
Speaker 3: we sure don't.
Speaker 4: It's like we want to build something great, you know,
Speaker 4: and pass it off to someone else, because I think
Speaker 4: that's the fun. I mean, for me, the fun is
Speaker 4: in the building, right, Like having this thing that.
Speaker 3: You build, you create, and then you iterate and you.
Speaker 4: Build something else, you create that and at some point,
Speaker 4: you know, you hand it off to somebody else.
Speaker 3: To continue continue doing that. Are they going to do
Speaker 3: it the way that you would do it? No, But
Speaker 3: at that point who cares? Who cares? That's okay because
Speaker 3: it's different.
Speaker 1: I'm a huge believer in eight Not for everybody, but
Speaker 1: I'm a huge believer in building something to the point
Speaker 1: where you have maxed out what you can do for it,
Speaker 1: and then it's time for it to fly with somebody else,
Speaker 1: you know, spread the way, move and move on, you know.
Speaker 1: And I think that's you know, at least for me,
Speaker 1: I think that's just a great It's like it's kind of.
Speaker 3: Making peace with like exactly what you said.
Speaker 1: It's like creating something and growing it and then at
Speaker 1: some point you wake up and go, it's like time to.
Speaker 2: Fly with somebody else now, you know.
Speaker 1: And it doesn't always happen, and it's not necessarily the
Speaker 1: dream for it for everybody.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 1: I've had amazing founders on the pod that are just like, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I have no egxit plan. That's never my thing. And
Speaker 1: then people are like, I'm exiting it in two years
Speaker 1: from now. I'm like, Jesus, yeah, you guys, I'm so
Speaker 1: impressed with you. I think surrounding yourself with people like
Speaker 1: the Emigreeds of the world, even though there's only one
Speaker 1: Emmigreed by the way, and like Diane from First and Burn,
Speaker 1: I think these are women that I think we need
Speaker 1: to get inspired by women like this regularly and surround
Speaker 1: ourselves with women like who do quite frankly.
Speaker 2: Give you a you know, have you.
Speaker 1: Guys ever had any challenges like working together? Because as
Speaker 1: I said of the best friend thing, the partner thing,
Speaker 1: it doesn't always work, but when it does, it's like
Speaker 1: the perfect magic, right, And so what do you think
Speaker 1: makes it work so well with you guys. And have
Speaker 1: you ever had a moment where you felt like you
Speaker 1: couldn't agree on where you wanted to take something?
Speaker 2: Or are you always so InSync?
Speaker 3: Oh? No, no, no, we're human, of course we're too.
Speaker 2: Very I think it's great. I think it's healthy.
Speaker 3: Yeah, very different individuals, you know, And I think because
Speaker 3: we have the same end goal, we're always going to
Speaker 3: be on the same page. And you know, like that
Speaker 3: thing where someone if someone else talks about your family,
Speaker 3: you're fighting them, but like you know, you all could
Speaker 3: fight like internally, like nobody can come for Mica, nobody
Speaker 3: can come for Katie. But when it comes two of us,
Speaker 3: we're both LEO women. It is gnarly sometimes, I don't know,
Speaker 3: even when you know, I'm sure I drive her nuts
Speaker 3: and even when she's driving me nuts, it's just kind
Speaker 3: of like we retreat to our corners and you just
Speaker 3: keep it moving, you know, because the world is against
Speaker 3: black women enough. At the end of the day, we're
Speaker 3: never going to throw each other under the bus. Like
Speaker 3: we have different strengths, we try to go back to
Speaker 3: highlight those strengths. But you know, we're not as close
Speaker 3: as friends anymore. But I don't think that is necessarily
Speaker 3: a bad thing. I think it makes us better like
Speaker 3: business partners. I think she needs different things out of friendships.
Speaker 3: You know, she's a mom and I'm not, and I
Speaker 3: need different things out of friendships like that support like
Speaker 3: my phase in life. I don't know. I think like
Speaker 3: having the shared history helps because there's trust there, like
Speaker 3: I'm not going to let somebody else come in and
Speaker 3: you know, know half the things about my life that
Speaker 3: Mica does and vice versa, but just very different people
Speaker 3: to go.
Speaker 1: One thing I want to touch on is you mentioned perimenopause,
Speaker 1: and I feel like menopause is this thing where like
Speaker 1: it's the weirdest thing because no one talked about it
Speaker 1: for like one hundred years, and now I feel like
Speaker 1: there isn't like a room you walk into where women
Speaker 1: aren't talking about it. And thankfully, I think, you know,
Speaker 1: very big public women are talking about it, writing books
Speaker 1: about it, and from Halle Berry, Naomi Watts goes on
Speaker 1: Gwyneth like you know everyone, And I think I want
Speaker 1: to talk about that because I think something that I
Speaker 1: imagine is a huge conversation in your in your salon
Speaker 1: is hair loss because I feel like that's I mean,
Speaker 1: I must hear a friend or a dinner or an
Speaker 1: event or literally anything there's someone I know or don't
Speaker 1: know that's, oh my god, my hair's flying out from
Speaker 1: the age of thirty.
Speaker 2: Eight to fifty five.
Speaker 1: Like it's just like, oh my god, my hair used
Speaker 1: to be this or I know that that's some of
Speaker 1: the focus of the product, But like, tell me how
Speaker 1: that impacts you and how often you hear this in
Speaker 1: the room, because I imagine it's daily.
Speaker 3: I mean it's it's hourly, hourly. Yeah, So what interest
Speaker 3: come being is that you know, I'm in my twenty
Speaker 3: fifth year of being a hair colorist, and a lot
Speaker 3: of the clients that I started with when I was
Speaker 3: in my twenties are now going through the same phase
Speaker 3: of life that Mike and I are. If they're not
Speaker 3: going through perimenopause, they're going through postpartum, and if going
Speaker 3: through that, then they're dealing with maybe an illness or
Speaker 3: some sort of chronic condition. And again, going back to
Speaker 3: that survey that we took, there was not one person
Speaker 3: that did not want help with their hair health and
Speaker 3: their hair loss, and so we knew that there was
Speaker 3: absolutely no freaking way we were going to launch with
Speaker 3: a shampoo and conditioner R. Nobody talk about saturated, nobody
Speaker 3: wants it, nobody needs it, and nobody cares. Nobody cares lass.
Speaker 1: It's literally putting liquid gold on your head to grow
Speaker 1: your hair.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the only way it's going to stand out
Speaker 2: at there.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So our poor kevist and formulators, I mean we
Speaker 3: were like, Okay, that's great, what else? What else? And
Speaker 3: we would just push it and like listen, before it
Speaker 3: also became trendy, Micah was taking all sorts of herbs
Speaker 3: and things. I mean, it became clear that, like a supplement,
Speaker 3: it was going to be one of the first go tos,
Speaker 3: but we had to It also was clear that we
Speaker 3: had to have some sort of through line with the
Speaker 3: internal and the external because they both were affecting hair
Speaker 3: health and hair loss. That's where our strength also came in.
Speaker 3: Micah really took the lead with the supplement. I took
Speaker 3: the lead with the serum. We got to both kind
Speaker 3: of put it together, and that's where our next two
Speaker 3: releases are both both topical and internal as well. Tea
Speaker 3: that has some of the same properties as the supplement
Speaker 3: out with one of probably the best hair mask I've
Speaker 3: ever used in my whole career. And that is saying
Speaker 3: a lot. So again, having our clients lead the charge
Speaker 3: and what are the most important things that they're needing
Speaker 3: right now. So yeah, I just think no one's really
Speaker 3: approaching it the way that we are, Like we're not,
Speaker 3: you know, pick a brand like you know where it's
Speaker 3: not shampoo, conditioner, hair spray, like sure, Like that doesn't
Speaker 3: even make sense to us. It's not how we run
Speaker 3: the business on a day to day basis. People come
Speaker 3: in there really a obviously for excellent color and styling,
Speaker 3: but really to have like we're kind of known to
Speaker 3: like be the fixers, and you know that's how God,
Speaker 3: that's how I got Emma and going off and DVF
Speaker 3: and all of these women. And we look at these
Speaker 3: women walking through our doors who cannot be any more
Speaker 3: picky and there that's my point.
Speaker 1: Yeah, trust you guys are doing something very right over there.
Speaker 2: Taking hormones out of it.
Speaker 1: I know that's a bold statement because you can't really
Speaker 1: take hormones out of anything.
Speaker 2: So I don't really mean it that way.
Speaker 1: I just mean hair one oh one, you know, as
Speaker 1: someone who is not adventurous with hair. I mean I
Speaker 1: literally am like sharing the seventies right now, like my hair.
Speaker 2: I don't cut it.
Speaker 1: I don't like it's my secure bank, it right, So
Speaker 1: and I think for many women it is and had
Speaker 1: I've had Unfortunately many friends go through cancer, and it's
Speaker 1: obviously I would say the thing that hurts most is
Speaker 1: when they lose hair, and because they don't feel like
Speaker 1: women anymore, they feel that they look in the mirror
Speaker 1: at that point and go, now, I have cancer, right,
Speaker 1: And I went through this with one of my very
Speaker 1: best friends.
Speaker 2: And it's like hard. I get emotional, and I say.
Speaker 1: I think hair is one of the most important things
Speaker 1: to us as women, and I think that when we
Speaker 1: talk about how do we preserve that, how do we
Speaker 1: why is everyone losing their hair?
Speaker 2: Like meaning, I know it's hormonal.
Speaker 1: I know it's all the shifts and all the things, right,
Speaker 1: but I also know one of my best friend's moms
Speaker 1: is seventy five with the most gorgeous, full head of
Speaker 1: hair you've ever seen, and it's like Rapunzel. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's gorgeous. So I do want to understand. I guess
Speaker 1: from where you are, is it the color?
Speaker 2: Is it bad? Colorists.
Speaker 1: Is it just like, what is it that is killing
Speaker 1: the hair or is it all of it? I know
Speaker 1: that's a very loaded question, but I think for my listeners,
Speaker 1: I want to share what young people and then just
Speaker 1: going all the way up can do to sort of
Speaker 1: preserve the health of their hair.
Speaker 3: Start with the external stuff that I'm going to have
Speaker 3: Mica takeover on one some of the other factors that
Speaker 3: are contributing listen from the beginning. I've never been the
Speaker 3: colorists that wanted to like fry anybody's hair, like you
Speaker 3: cannot reverse some of that. And my kind of signature
Speaker 3: is like, how can we make this color the best
Speaker 3: version of what your hair really wants to do. And
Speaker 3: obviously there are some exceptions to the rule, like I
Speaker 3: have to take Julia from blonde to red to you know,
Speaker 3: all the things for her different roles. But for the
Speaker 3: most part, people have always come to us to correct
Speaker 3: bad color, to get them on like a healthy tre
Speaker 3: with a good relationship with hair color. And it seems
Speaker 3: counter you know, productive, because you know, you want people
Speaker 3: coming back often so you can have their money, but like,
Speaker 3: really do you because if your hair is healthy and
Speaker 3: then they're stuck with you for like decades instead of
Speaker 3: then leaving you after a couple of years because you've
Speaker 3: damaged it. You're making more return that way. So I've
Speaker 3: always put my I've always banked my career on that
Speaker 3: and been very happy with it. It may kind of
Speaker 3: pigeonhole me as maybe the boring one, but I can
Speaker 3: tell you I can fix anything because and then once
Speaker 3: it's fixed, they never want to leave, you know.
Speaker 1: Will you say no if someone says I'm I want
Speaker 1: to go platinum, right and you look at their hair
Speaker 1: and you go.
Speaker 3: That's a bad idea. That's a bad idea. Your hair
Speaker 3: is also a very different animal when you're in your twenties, thirties,
Speaker 3: forties on nons and everything. Yeah, exactly. So I'll tell
Speaker 3: them like, Okay, you really want to try it. The
Speaker 3: hair age is just like we do. So if you
Speaker 3: really want to try it, and I think the hair
Speaker 3: can handle it, and they're good with doing a good
Speaker 3: shop afterwards. As far as the other factors of hair loss,
Speaker 3: I'll have Micah speak to that. Well.
Speaker 4: When you were talking about it, I was thinking about
Speaker 4: one of the major contributors to this is stress too.
Speaker 4: Like I mean, think about the society and the culture
Speaker 4: that we're living in, Like we're constantly engaged, We're constantly
Speaker 4: being fed horrific news of things that are happening not
Speaker 4: only in our backyard but around the world, and social media,
Speaker 4: we're ingesting all of these things and comparing ourselves to
Speaker 4: other people all the time.
Speaker 2: So I think a big part.
Speaker 4: Of it is the stress, you know, and what that
Speaker 4: stress does throughout our body. You know, it creates inflammation.
Speaker 4: It throws your adrenals into overdrive, and that has a
Speaker 4: compounding effect on the rest of your body, and it
Speaker 4: shows up in your hair, primarily hair.
Speaker 2: And again, so it's a big contributor.
Speaker 3: And when we started our research, we found out that
Speaker 3: over seventy five percent of women will experience hair loss
Speaker 3: in their lifetime.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is mental.
Speaker 3: It's so mental.
Speaker 2: It's mental, and that needs to be said louder.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because my first experience was after my first son,
Speaker 1: and then it got really, really thick, and then after
Speaker 1: my second son.
Speaker 3: It just was different. Yeah, it just was different. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And I just I'm like, God, you guys really take everything,
Speaker 3: don't you. But our hearts, our hair. They don't talk
Speaker 3: about us loud enough. And one thing that we've never
Speaker 3: had a problem with is talking. You know, we'll talk
Speaker 3: about anything and everything. We'll chat about it. If it's taboo,
Speaker 3: even better, we're like, let's talk about it more, you know.
Speaker 3: And hair loss is one of those things. And our
Speaker 3: clients seeing that we actually were really working towards the solution,
Speaker 3: they were like, we'll trust you guys. You know, you
Speaker 3: haven't led us wrong so far. So, like Micah was saying,
Speaker 3: this constant bombardment of connection with so much technology as well,
Speaker 3: I mean he I haven't seen a person that is
Speaker 3: as technology challenge is like she will use her phone
Speaker 3: on purpose.
Speaker 4: I lost my phone on Saturday. I still don't have
Speaker 4: a new phone yet. I lost it at the Ballue
Speaker 4: Museum downtown and somebody's like, aren't you freaking out? And
Speaker 4: I'm like, well, not really, because I can text from
Speaker 4: my computer and I've been working in front of my computer.
Speaker 2: So I think this afternoon I'll go get a new one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And then like social media's wild. I'm on the
Speaker 3: Hybro hippie account, but I don't have a personal one
Speaker 3: because like I don't need anymore, you know.
Speaker 2: I didn't have to have it for my brand. I
Speaker 2: don't think I would.
Speaker 3: Have it at all. Yeah, you know much.
Speaker 1: There's there's a way that your brain can relax when
Speaker 1: you don't feel that you.
Speaker 3: Have to be.
Speaker 1: Something out in responsive or if they know, but in
Speaker 1: business with a brand, as you know, you have to
Speaker 1: be right. You have to just figure out how you
Speaker 1: want to play the game. You don't have to play
Speaker 1: it the same as everyone else, but you do have
Speaker 1: to be in it.
Speaker 4: I think we've worked recently and over the years, we've
Speaker 4: had a lot of ups and downs with our business.
Speaker 4: And we opened eight months to the day before COVID
Speaker 4: and had to shut down. We were one of the
Speaker 4: first ones that had to close and the last businesses
Speaker 4: that were allowed to open. So we've done a lot
Speaker 4: of this and we didn't even touch on prior to this,
Speaker 4: things like our relationship with an old investor that went south.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's a whole nother episode.
Speaker 3: But I've been there.
Speaker 1: We've all been there, and I can tell you right
Speaker 1: now every single woman at that table at Emma's house
Speaker 1: has been there.
Speaker 3: Yeah, at least months. It was devastating, and we wasted
Speaker 3: about seven years trying to get like hiro hippie. The
Speaker 3: first iteration of it off the ground and we had
Speaker 3: to start over from scratch.
Speaker 1: Okay, I want to talk about that for a second.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to let you stay. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to let you pass over that, because the whole intention
Speaker 1: of Climbing and Heels is talking about that. And every
Speaker 1: woman that I've had on here, every single one has
Speaker 1: said the same thing. It's like, you know this brand
Speaker 1: because this is the brand that's winning. But there was
Speaker 1: so many fails before this that you never heard about.
Speaker 1: That I cried in my kitchen, that I cried in
Speaker 1: my closet, that I lost everything that I you know,
Speaker 1: and the stories are endless and they're always going to
Speaker 1: be and I think at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: what goes public typically is the win, right. You know,
Speaker 1: some people fall harder than others, some people that hurts
Speaker 1: more than others.
Speaker 2: Seven years is a lot is a lot.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a lot, and you're never going to
Speaker 1: forget it, and you learned from it. But it's also
Speaker 1: why you are where you are now. And so I
Speaker 1: think it's sort of like in those moments, you just
Speaker 1: have to I think trust the universe has some plan
Speaker 1: that you just may not know about yet.
Speaker 3: And the way things worked out is that we were
Speaker 3: able to gain one hundred percent control of the company.
Speaker 3: So that means for a much more handsome exit when
Speaker 3: we're ready to do so, and when it was time
Speaker 3: to rebuild, the fact that we still had our same
Speaker 3: mission and we just kept at it, that's when I
Speaker 3: knew we were going to be okay. You know, we
Speaker 3: both didn't falter. We were like, okay, we have to
Speaker 3: do it in a different way. We did it in
Speaker 3: a smaller footprint. It ended up being better, less overhead, Like,
Speaker 3: we did it in a smaller space, but it was
Speaker 3: one that we could really control. And then if we
Speaker 3: had opened up the original footprint that we planned on
Speaker 3: then getting shut down with COVID, we would have been
Speaker 3: dead in the water, Yeah, because our overhead would have
Speaker 3: been so high. I still think of the day we
Speaker 3: found out that that deal went south, and I get
Speaker 3: a feeling, a pit in my stomach that to this
Speaker 3: day stops me in my tracks. I do know that feeling,
Speaker 3: and more people know that feeling than you know. Yeah,
Speaker 3: And I did want to say, because we've you know,
Speaker 3: touched on the Emma's and the Julia's and Gwynnis and
Speaker 3: all the people that you know are well known that
Speaker 3: are in our corner. You know, my very first client
Speaker 3: was this woman named Suzanne Nora Johnson and she's still
Speaker 3: my client today. And Suzanne Nora was the first female
Speaker 3: managing director of Goldman Sachs. And I used to shampoo
Speaker 3: her hair as an assistant at Frederick Fakai. And she said,
Speaker 3: when you get promoted, I'm going to become your client.
Speaker 3: She said, I just like your hustle, I like the
Speaker 3: way you work. Suzanne Nora Johnson has been there for
Speaker 3: Mike and I in ways that are just it could
Speaker 3: literally make me cry. She was just always there for us.
Speaker 3: She's a woman that you know, few people may know
Speaker 3: her name, but like she she's now the current chair
Speaker 3: of the board at USC. She took over for Rick
Speaker 3: Ruso Cash's but she's just this legend who she's always
Speaker 3: treated us. It didn't matter if we were twenty two
Speaker 3: or now in our late forties. Suzanne has always treated
Speaker 3: us as smart, capable women. Whenever we really needed like
Speaker 3: just the real deal, she would give it to us.
Speaker 3: And she is now, you know, one of our investors,
Speaker 3: as are many of our longtime clients. Those women and
Speaker 3: there are many women like Suzanne. Our lead investor is
Speaker 3: a client of mine who have had for twenty three years,
Speaker 3: who nobody would know, and she is not rich or famous,
Speaker 3: but she gave us a quarter of a million dollars
Speaker 3: on the spot.
Speaker 1: You have to think about that because as someone who
Speaker 1: is an investor, you know, there are moments where I
Speaker 1: meet women that are so impressive in these moments and
Speaker 1: I'm like, are you doo race, Like, are you because
Speaker 1: you want to be part of yeah?
Speaker 2: Their orbit?
Speaker 3: Yeah, because you are a believer. And to me, I.
Speaker 1: Think especially I do think that's a little bit how
Speaker 1: women invest. It's kind of like the same way we
Speaker 1: approach anything in life right with our heart.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: It's sort of like you feel it, you're connected to it,
Speaker 1: you believe in it, because otherwise you can't do it.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Right. One of your biggest fans are a mutual friend,
Speaker 3: Cleo Wade. She love you know, Cleo. I've only been
Speaker 3: friends with her for a few years. Cleo blog multiple
Speaker 3: investors to the table that ended up accounting for a
Speaker 3: huge part of our raise herself. We've just had these
Speaker 3: people show up for us in big ways, and not
Speaker 3: all of them are big names, and I think it's
Speaker 3: important for they don't need to make it, they don't
Speaker 3: need to be they don't.
Speaker 1: Need to you know, anonymous. Yeah, it's just having that support.
Speaker 1: It's just having that support. And I'll tell you this,
Speaker 1: you know. And I think it's part of why Emma
Speaker 1: started fifteen percent with a roar and started doing a
Speaker 1: Seat at the Table dinners with Stephanie from Google, because
Speaker 1: these are champions of women. But what I will say
Speaker 1: is women don't just support and write checks to be cool.
Speaker 1: And it doesn't matter how much money they have or
Speaker 1: don't have. They invest. If they're believers, they invest if
Speaker 1: they connect with it. And I've seen that over and
Speaker 1: over because I've seen I've also seen women not be
Speaker 1: able to get a check from a woman, you know.
Speaker 2: So I see that a lot.
Speaker 1: So it's not because you're a woman, it's not you know,
Speaker 1: it's not for any of those reasons. It's because the
Speaker 1: talent is there, because they're experiencing it, because they're living it,
Speaker 1: and because they believe in it.
Speaker 2: And I am so excited to watch you guys grow.
Speaker 1: And timing is everything, guys, and everything happens for a reason.
Speaker 3: I believe that I've lived it, trust me, lived it.
Speaker 1: And there are those moments where you like sit in
Speaker 1: your closet just crying by yourself and you're like, I can't,
Speaker 1: I can't, I can't.
Speaker 2: I'm done. Like this is like I'm I'm exiting stage left.
Speaker 3: I can do.
Speaker 2: And then you know, and then you.
Speaker 1: Get that light and you get that client, and you
Speaker 1: get that woman who's like, yeah, you're doing this and
Speaker 1: this is how and this is why and these are
Speaker 1: the people that are going to come join the room
Speaker 1: and you know, and you get that and you don't
Speaker 1: forget that, and you don't forget that, you know. So
Speaker 1: I'm here for the ride. I'm here to watch you guys.
Speaker 1: I'm going to come in and have you guys, you know,
Speaker 1: transform me.
Speaker 2: I adore you both. You're so impressive.
Speaker 1: I'm so obsessed with Hybro Hippy and so is everybody,
Speaker 1: and you know, I think we're really excited to for
Speaker 1: everyone to be able to get a piece of Hybro Hippy.
Speaker 2: Now, thanks for being on.
Speaker 3: Thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much to Katie and Micah for coming
Speaker 1: on the pod today. I have mad respect and admiration
Speaker 1: for what they've built and what they have planned for
Speaker 1: the future. The women famous and not known, just brilliant
Speaker 1: women that continue to support them and help them grow
Speaker 1: and live their brand just is a testament to the
Speaker 1: talent and the authenticity of their brand. I mean you, guys,
Speaker 1: Julia Roberts. It's like, I don't even there's another fifty
Speaker 1: names that are the most famous in the world. But
Speaker 1: let's just start and end with Julia and I just
Speaker 1: want to say I learned a lot today. I got
Speaker 1: very inspired today. I also love keeping it real. I
Speaker 1: also love talking about the what feels like a failure
Speaker 1: in the moment in order to move forward and be
Speaker 1: exactly where you're meant to be. So thank you so
Speaker 1: much for listening to Climbing and Heels. If you haven't already,
Speaker 1: please subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, the iheartapp,
Speaker 1: or wherever you get your podcasts. You don't miss a
Speaker 1: single episode this season, and be sure to follow me
Speaker 1: on Instagram at at Rachel Zoe and the show at
Speaker 1: Climbing Inhales pod for the latest episodes and updates.
Speaker 2: I will talk to you soon.