Trinny Woodall, founder of Trinny London, discusses the brand's introduction to the US market through a pop-up store in New York. This move is part of the brand’s strategy to combine its direct-to-consumer (d2c) model with physical retail, thereby fostering a deeper connection with its consumers. Woodall emphasizes the need to understand the customer and create a buzz that aids in online consumer replenishment.

Trinny London, although initially recognized for makeup, has seen its skincare line grow to comprise a significant portion of its revenue, surpassing its makeup offerings. Woodall highlights the importance of owning intellectual property through innovative product development, particularly in skincare, which she believes drives customer retention and business value. Her entrepreneurial journey, including a former business setback, taught her valuable lessons on capital efficiency and has fueled the brand's expansion into new markets like the US.

Main takeaways from the video:

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Key Vocabularies and Common Phrases:

1. lucrative [ˈluːkrətɪv] - (adj.) - Producing a great deal of profit. - Synonyms: (profitable, remunerative, rewarding)

Trinny Woodall launched Trinny London in 2017 using savings that she built selling her clothes from a lucrative career in television.

2. pop-up [ˈpɒp ʌp] - (n.) - A temporary shop or store set up in a particular location for a short period. - Synonyms: (temporary shop, short-term shop, flash retail)

Trinny London is now in New York for a brief period with a pop-up and she joins us now to talk about how the business is going.

3. d2c [diː tuː siː] - (adj.) - Direct to Consumer, referring to businesses that sell directly to their consumers without intermediaries. - Synonyms: (direct sales, direct distribution, direct marketing)

Well, we've started selling in the US because we're mainly d2c.

4. marginalized [ˈmɑːdʒɪnəlaɪzd] - (adj.) - Treated as insignificant or peripheral. - Synonyms: (disenfranchised, sidelined, overlooked)

We were really set up to deal with this customer we felt had been marginalized, which was that 35 plus woman.

5. algorithm [ˈælɡəˌrɪðəm] - (n.) - A set of rules for solving a problem in a finite number of steps, used for calculation and data processing. - Synonyms: (procedure, formula, method)

And we did that online of, you know, building an algorithm that understands you as a woman because you're different from your best friend and then growing with you as you go.

6. bootstrap [ˈbuːtstræp] - (v.) - To build up a business using minimal resources or funding. - Synonyms: (self-fund, self-start, self-establish)

So you had a TV wardrobe that you basically sold off to help bootstrap the business

7. intellectual property [ˌɪntəˈlɛktʃuəl ˈprɒpəti] - (n.) - Legal rights over creations of the mind such as inventions, literary and artistic works. - Synonyms: (IP, creations, ideas ownership)

I wanted to own the intellectual property on our skin care because I think the future value of the business, there are many brands that might maybe white label product, and I think it's very important to start your own products yourself, to find innovative ingredients and to own those formulations.

8. ebitda [ɛbəˌtɑː] - (n.) - Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization; a measure of a company's overall financial performance. - Synonyms: (operating income, gross profit, core earnings)

What has driven that good year, I think it's been the year before was really looking at our ebitda and getting that to a good place and then looking at the difference.

9. retention [rɪˈtɛnʃən] - (n.) - The continued possession, use, or control of something. - Synonyms: (preservation, maintaining, keeping)

And so we have a very, very high retention in skincare. And I think, you know, when you look at a balance sheet now, it is about how you get that retention.

10. influencer [ˈɪnfluənsər] - (n.) - A person with the ability to influence potential buyers of a product by promoting or recommending the items on social media. - Synonyms: (persuader, advocate, endorser)

But we used to look at influencers as they should do something for free.

How Trinny Woodall Built Trinny London Into A $74 Million-A-Year Company

Hi, everyone, I'm Maggie McGrath, editor of Forbes Women Reporting here at NASDAQ market site. Trinny Woodall launched Trinny London in 2017 using savings that she built selling her clothes from a lucrative career in television. Trinny London is now in New York for a brief period with a pop up and she joins us now to talk about how the business is going. Trinny, thank you so much for being here. Wonderful to be here. Thank you. Not to be here briefly. To be here permanently. To be here permanently.

Well, it is a pop up, so I didn't want to misimply that it was a launch of a store. But tell us about this pop-up. When did it start and how long is it going to go? Well, we've started selling in the US because we're mainly d2c. We're still 75% d2c. But there's that sense of when you establish a brand in a new territory, you want to show some physicality to the brand because people otherwise feel you just live in an online environment. So in beauty there still is probably buying. First time is about 40% of consumers, whereas replenishment online could be up 60% for beauty. So you want to just show that environment and what you are as a brand.

So we've chosen somewhere on Prince Street. It's incredibly busy. We had queues outside the store this weekend and we had all these different women. So you get to understand your customer because everything is about understanding your customer. So existing customers from online as well as people discovering it, saying, what is this? And it gets that buzz which then gives you an online replenishing customer and grows your business.

What have you most learned from the customers you've been interacting with on Prince Street? I think the variety of the customer because we were really set up to deal with this customer we felt had been marginalized, which was that 35 plus woman who felt that every model was in her teens or twenties and she was needing that sense of where do I go now? You know, you learn something in beauty as a woman, perhaps from your mother or from nobody. You learn it yourself from your friends and there's times we need to sort of reset.

So we are that brand for saying we're personalized to you. And we did that online of, you know, building an algorithm that understands you as a woman because you're different from your best friend and then growing with you as you go. You know, you become a mum or not, you go into a different career, you change career, you divorce your partner, you meet you know, it's like we have all these moments in our life where we want a little reset. We are the brand that women are drawn to for that reset moment.

Are they drawn to the beauty or the skin care part of the business? Because Trini London has both now. We started as makeup because my career for 15 years was making over women around the world. And it didn't matter their age, their religion, their skin color. It was still that emotional state we are in. And the first thing we're comfortable to look at is a tweak in how our makeup looks, because it enables us then to look at our hair and look at our body.

And everyone has a different relationship with their hair and body. So it starts with that, but underneath it, for me, the most important thing is makeup. So we are in now 51% revenue in skincare, more than makeup, and our skincare is from our own lab. I wanted to own the intellectual property on our skin care because I think the future value of the business, there are many brands that might maybe white label product, and I think it's very important to start your own products yourself, to find innovative ingredients and to own those formulations.

And I think that women appreciate the ingredients in our products. And so we have a very, very high retention in skincare. And I think, you know, when you look at a balance sheet now, it is about how you get that retention. Talk about your balance sheet a little bit. I alluded to it at the beginning of the conversation, but you have been so, so capital efficient.

You launched this business from your kitchen table and you had been on the UK version of what not to wear for years. So you had a TV wardrobe that you basically sold off to help bootstrap the business. I started doing that and I was living in a house that I had overextended. You know, when we buy our dream home, but maybe we can't afford it. And I did. And I realized if I wanted to start the business, I couldn't be drowning in debt. So I ended up actually also selling my home.

And I was 50. So that was a challenge with a daughter who was 11. But I knew I had to push myself. You know, it shouldn't matter the age we are. It's like, what are we prepared to do to get there? So that was probably the harshest, most unknown moment for me because nobody at that stage really believed in the concept of this woman and what she needed. So I did that bootstrapped. And then in, you know, the year before I launched, when I'd spent three years Researching

Then I got my first investment. So I raised two and a half million pounds and then I raised a further 3.6. I raised 7.6 in total. And you launch from the kitchen table, you start d2c makeup and you quickly expand. Australia was one of the early markets that you. It was because we went and I think you, I mean, as a brand grows, you want to start with similar language market because when you're looking at how you're marketing, there's a nuance,

there's a definitely a big difference between a British woman and American woman, Australian woman, but at least the language is the same. So for us, the most natural second market was Australia, Canada and then the U.S. so that's why we're coming to the U.S. now we're about, I think 9%, 10% U.S. revenue and U.S. customer base. And this year is about growing in the us and total revenue for the most recent fiscal year was roughly 74,75 million USD depending on last March.

But we've, we've had a good year. You've had a good year. What has driven that good year, I think it's been the year before was really looking at our ebitda and getting that to a good place and then looking at the difference. I think it's interesting when you're a growth business in looking at your ebitda in a mature market because that shows where you can get to in profitability versus a growth market in the us. So I actually separate out those Ebitdas and look at them differently because you're putting different money into those two territories to look at how you're going to grow them.

So I think for us, growth has come from bringing retail up. We were about 85% d2c and now we're about 75%. So we've doubled retail in the UK and Australia and we've also doubled in the US. What does that tell you about the overall DTC market are people going back to in person? I think that we had all those changes two years ago with Facebook with data. So that did change the ability for conversion. But we're still finding good conversion on d2c.

I think on. On matter it's looking at the fact of how much you spend Brandon Brand awareness versus Dr. A direct response. And it used to be we were 93% Dr. Direct response and now we're building out. We were like two brand awareness. Because a lot of our advertising is a conversation. It's not traditional buy this. Now we're very much a rather emotive brand in how we talk to women. So I think we were sort of subliminally already doing brand. But if matter says brand, this percentage in the funnel, that this year we've been slowly building that brand awareness because it takes you to a bigger audience and then it helps the rest of the funnel behave.

So I just think it's always balancing out how matter is this year versus last year and looking at Google too, and looking at SEO and also looking at influencers more as creators. You know, I think it's important because we look to use, you know, I am in a way an influencer of my own brand. But we used to look at influencers as they should do something for free. They are businesses, they compete hugely with traditional press. And if we look at the influence of you and I as women, we are going to follow somebody on Instagram or TikTok or Facebook as much or if not more than we are going to read about something in a law magazine.

It's changed, the market's changed and it doesn't actually matter. I think the age of a woman, you know, I think they are all looking at social as that first port of call to think the instigation of, oh, that looks interesting. And then they want those five reference points. One of them is going to be a friend saying, I love it. One of them might be a traditional magazine couple, will be social. One might be out of home ad and one might be a meta ad.

That's really interesting and I appreciate hearing you yourself call yourself an influencer because people know you from your career in television. And it's interesting that balance between your own marketing of yourself and then building stores, building a retail footprint. Have you felt in recent years that more people are finding you because there are physical stores and less because we're not in the middle of a pandemic and everyone's home online all the time.

I think it's a mix. I think when you're a founder brand and you have your name above the door, like Bobby Brown used to have or Charlotte Tilbury or myself, you have an opportunity, that you're a physical person, you're not just a brand name. So there's a slight advantage. But long term you have to show that you take the DNA of you, of why people follow you and you have to infuse use that in the brand. So you have to feel the principles of why somebody might follow you personally on social are the identity and the emotional relationship of a brand.

So to me, the more emotional a brand is, the more I Am attracted to it because it will speak my language. It's not just speaking generalistically, it's speaking very personally. So there are advantages. And whether that's out of home, whether that's in a store or whether that's online, when I'm looking through a feedback, both are as important as each other.

I want to go back to what you said about the IP and the chemistry process behind your products. Was that an initial investment that felt expensive but is paying off later on? Because you mentioned a lot of entrepreneurs really do white label or they work with outside chemists. How did you make that decision and how do you find it paying off now? I made the decision because I spent many years looking at the back of a beauty, you know, label the Inkey list and looking at those ingredients and over the years learning to interpret those ingredients correctly because you can kind of,

There's certain ingredients that have to come at a certain stage of that. So you can see how much is marketing speak and how much is actually an active ingredient at a more than a sort of a more functional active than a marketing active. I'd put you might sort of say a vitamin C cream, but there's sort of 2% of ascorbic acid as opposed to 20. So, you know, you need to understand what those mean. Now when you white label, which is you take a basic formula from somebody, you might put your smell in it and you might put another ingredient in it, but you're going to be very similar to other products.

And we've been about innovation. I want to be able to talk about mini proteins for our eye treatment and to know that if I want to go into the eye care element of beauty, I need to have something that is truly innovative. It was just voted the best eye cream in the uk and that's because nobody was using mini proteins. So we found an innovative ingredients maker in Switzerland who was creating mini proteins and I thought, let's use them in the eye cream.

And so the ability to create from scratch is phenomenal. To have your own lab, it's fantastic. It's like the most exciting thing. And then it does pay off long term because you stand out. Somebody try. You've got to get them to try it. That's your biggest challenge. But once they try, you know they're going to convert because, you know they'll feel the difference.

You segued elegantly there to something I was going to ask, which is new products. Yeah, Skincare makeup are very crowded markets, but you are continuing to put out products what has been new and most successful for you in 2024? Two things. One, I mean, what's really interesting in skincare is you either want to go into a very crowded market like a moisturizer and think, how do I make it different? How do I talk about it in a different way and what ingredients I put in.

So our best selling product still on moisturiser because that is about 18%, 16 to 8% of the overall category of skincare. But we did something called the elevator earlier in the year and this is for the neck. And it's really challenging to think, how can I change my neck just by a cream? There's lots of treatments. People can say, is it Botox or this lifting thing or whatever? So. So you need to do clinical trials. So we found some ingredients which we clinically trialed for six months and we had some feedback from the clinical trials of lifting of a sagging jawline, which is nearly impossible to get from a skin care product.

But that to me then changed the market because it was not a crowded area. We brought it in. We made women feel pay as much attention here as you do here because it's still on show and there can be suddenly a disparity and we don't want a fear monger. We're not never an anti aging thing, but we want you to feel, let me look after it. And this has sold out three times. I mean, I manufactured in our lab enough for a year and we sold it in two months.

And I, you know, we cannot keep up. So that for me is a very interesting thing of thinking. What is an area where it's really undervalued concept? And so we're going more into that. We've got a few more things in that category. And with the eye treatment, which is our category called take back time, it's not turn back time because that's derogatory to a woman. I don't want to turn back time. I'm really happy with who I am today, but I want to feel, I look in the mirror and I feel full of energy every day so I can take back time for myself.

So that category of what's it mean to be able to take back time for yourself? Has a few other things in the lab that are going to join it.

And I'm sure you can't tell us about. Can you tell us about the ring that you're wearing? The ring is I have, first of all, footballers hands, which because I have very big hands and so I need big rings and a girlfriend of mine for my birthday, who makes rings, gave me this. And I always usually have inside a new shape, so I can't necessarily show you the shade, but I.

It's very easy and people always ask if they we will make this one day. We will make it. But. But it's your personalized lip gloss. Yeah. It has in a lip and a cheek. Yeah. That is so innovative and really efficient and you'll never lose it. We like functionality, practicality and innovation all in one go. It's great. I appreciate that too.

Now, I referred to your television career, but you had a business before Trini London, correct? I did. I had a business at the beginning, in 99, at the beginning, before E Com actually. And I had somehow come across something which was showing that online was going to be a thing. And this is when I was just, you know, finishing one career of being a journalist. And I thought, I want to do something there. And I went to cable and wireless and we said, we want to do this thing.

I had a two pager. They gave us a million dollars within two weeks because there was such a. We have to learn about this area. And I want to do a portal for women called Ready to. And it would be ready to cook, ready to eat, ready to do your beauty and everything. And we started the business. I raised seven and a half million dollars in three months from JH Whitney and Atlas Ventures. And within two years I had to close a business.

And it was the most challenging thing probably I've done. But also it taught me so much when I started Trini London because I really bootstrapped. Sometimes when you get too much money too quickly, you don't spend it well, whatever age you are as an entrepreneur. So I hired in slowly. I hired passion over traditional experience within the industry I was going into. I wanted innovative young minds who were really, you know, just going to invigorate and bring their intelligence and we would learn together.

And then after a year, we started to then hire in that expertise of a good cpu, CMO and a good cfo. But we need, you know, it just. It was waiting for the business to grow into itself as opposed to let me get the experience in quickly because you think of maybe what you don't know. And then as an entrepreneur, you might hire in too quickly and somebody might change the direction of your business. And it's about relying on that difference between your intuition of why you started something, why investors invested in you because you had a good idea and.

And really leaning into your intuitive sense of what is this gap in the market and how am I filling it? As opposed to people coming from a traditional background saying maybe we should do this because they did it before and it's that balance is really challenging. Would Trini London exist and or be a roughly $75 million business had you not had that prior entrepreneurial experience? A really good question and I'm not sure because I might not have stuck so tightly to my belief in what I felt it should be and not let anyone deter me from that belief.

Now, I appreciate your take on let's take back time versus turn back time and anti aging. You were of course on the Forbes 50 over 50 list for Europe, Middle East, Africa this year, which is a list all about showing how women can defy age and gender norms by stepping into their greatest professional over the age of 50. So I'm curious, Trini, have you felt that age has been an advantage or a disadvantage in growing Trini London? It's irrelevant. It's irrelevant. It is irrelevant.

Your age is the least relevant thing. It's about your passion when you get up in the morning. It's about the energy you bring into the room. It's about the conviction you have about what you're doing. And whether you're 30 or 50, it doesn't matter. But I think to celebrate, I mean, I was so flattered to be on 5050 though that did matter to me because I felt that I meet so many women who think is it too late for me to do something? So that is when it's relevant.

It's to say to them it's never ever too late. If you have an idea and you're passionate and you have a belief and you know you're filling a gap in the market, do it. Nothing is stopping you. Do it. Nothing is stopping you.

Which brings us back to where we started, which is you have a pop up, but you're eyeing a long term presence in the US what will it take to open that long term permanent store here in the U.S what it would take is literally extending the lease because I am, you know, I am so determined to stay in that location. It's a perfect location, but for me it's strategically how we grow in the US and there are businesses that might go on a commercial wholesale way as a quick turnkey system, but I am learning so much by setting up a store, meeting the customer, understanding the American woman versus the English, Australian or the 180 other territories that we ship to.

But it helps you to meet that person in real time and then the idea of going back to this one to one service, this personalized service is still scalable because it is about scale. So do I see within three years, we would have quite a few of these in different locations in the U.S. absolutely. I usually ask entrepreneurs, if we were to speak a year from now, what would you want to be able to report to me about what has changed about your business in the ensuing year?

So, Trinity, if we were to meet back here at this desk in a year, what would you hope to be able to report to me? Double US Growth. Double US Growth. All right. You heard it here at NASDAQ Marketsite. Trini Woodall, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.

ENTREPRENEURSHIP, BUSINESS, INNOVATION, WOMEN IN BUSINESS, SKINCARE, BEAUTY INDUSTRY, FORBES