Top 10 Fashion & Beauty Start-Ups to Watch 2020

Here at TechRound, we are always looking for good startups and promising companies in any field to feature on our site. This time, we wanted to focus on the fashion and beauty industry. So, without further ado, here are 10 fashion and beauty companies we are really excited about and we believe deserve recognition. These are in no particular order and we are excited to have each one of them featuring in our article. For any questions, please email us at: [email protected]

 

1. Prettly

Rhea
Prettly


About the Business

Prettly.com is one of London’s favourite beauty-on-demand businesses. Prettly is revolutionising the fragmented and inefficient £7b+ beauty services market, as a highly customer-centric platform for on-demand beauty services.

Our mission is to make the lives of busy women easier, by providing them with a seamless solution for staying on top of their beauty routine. Users simply go on prettly.com to book trusted & vetted beauty professionals in seconds, for nail, hair, makeup, waxing & many more services consumed in the comfort of their own home/office.

All of the beauty professionals on Prettly.com are vetted and tested, and are among London’s very best! We take great pride in the fact that Prettly has enabled so many professionals to build financially viable careers as independent workers. Our commitment to improving the lives of women on both sides of our marketplace, by making them feel confident and empowered, is of paramount importance to everyone on team Prettly.

Prettly’s Growth Plans

We are very excited about the future and are ready to take the business through a new phase of growth. We plan to grow by expanding to new service verticals, but also by taking Prettly outside of London into new cities. Watch this space!

 

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2. Just Add Beauty

just-add-beauty

About the Business

Just Add Beauty is the first of its kind retail concept founded by Grazia and LOOK former Beauty Editor, Samantha Freedman. The concept allows fashion and lifestyle brands to introduce like-minded beauty brands to their product portfolio. Beauty retailing needed a shakeup, and we believe that buying beauty together with fashion is a no-brainer!

Using Samantha’s beauty expertise she is able to consult with fashion brands to ensure that complementary products are selected using her little black book of contacts. Each beauty edit is refreshed seasonally to give customers constant discovery opportunities on site. As well as making the brand partnerships, Just Add Beauty also initiate cross-marketing initiatives to help promote the new beauty sector. This results in an increase in brand awareness and social followings, as well of course revenue.

Just Add Beauty’s Growth Plans

Since launching at the start of 2018 Just Add Beauty have a beauty brand portfolio of +90 brands. These include larger, more well-known cult classics, as well as small, niche undiscovered startups. Just Add Beauty have brought brands over from the US, Canada and Sweden to exclusively be stocked at their retailers in the UK and have worked on exciting exclusive brand collaborations. Many of the beauty brands have agreed to work on an exclusive sale or return basis, ensuring the transition into beauty for fashion and lifestyle retailers is significantly less costly. They currently have five fashion retailers on board, and aim is to grow their portfolio to ten by the end of the year.

 

3. Nubian Skin

Ade-Nubian

About the Business

Nubian Skin is a lingerie, hosiery and intimates brand for women of colour. Frustrated by the lack of skin-tone options to go with her ever-expanding wardrobe, Ade Hassan decided it was time for ‘A Different Kind of Nude’.

Nubian Skin’s Growth Plans

We plan to continue to grow the business and drive sales through a mix of an intelligent digital strategy and harnessing our significant social media following as well as developing key relationships with retailers.  Right now we have focused a lot of understanding what our customer wants and figuring out the best way to deliver this to them. 

 

4. She Shirts

she-shirt
Ceini (Left), Sally (Right)

About the Business

Founded in February 2018 by two University of Bristol students, Sally Patterson and Ceini Bowen, She Shirts is an ethical and unapologetically feminist fashion range. She Shirts is transformative in that it is committed to fighting inequalities in a practical way, with all profits supporting three inspirational women’s charities: Bloody Good Period, Smart Works and Women’s Aid. The aim is to empower women through the creation, distribution, and then the showcasing of the She Shirts range. Every tee tells a story, focusing on the contemporary challenges faced by women. What’s more, the products are sustainably made and ethically produced.

She Shirt’s Growth Plans 

We want to keep spreading the word about She Shirts and reaching new audiences. We’re committed to projecting the voices of the women around us and have just released a really exciting new collaborative collection with some amazing feminist artists. 

The new collection tackles issues of body hair, period poverty, mental health and the censorship of women’s bodies. All proceeds continue to go our three chosen charities and we’d love to keep increasing our donations to these charities as the year progresses!

 

Want to feature your company? Get in touch

 

5. REMY NY

remy-ny

About the Business

REMY NY is the 1st ethical, fair trade, hair company that is changing the way hair is sourced in developing countries by putting the women first. We’re the only company in the world that sources their own hair out in the field everyday and ethically.

REMY NY’s Growth Plan

We hope to expand to other countries and help women living in poverty earn some additional income that hopefully will help them make positive changes to their lives and that of their families.

 

6. ThatchFace

ben-cleaver

About the Business

ThatchFace was in created in 2017 by Ben Cleaver after experimenting with different oils and scents to create a new range of beard oils in the UK using quality ingredients and focusing on a single-minded mantra of subtle scents and lightweight oils.  ThatchFace aim to provide better beard care suitable for all thatched faces.

In 2009 Ben was diagnosed with testicular cancer and underwent surgery to remove the original tumour, followed by chemotherapy to cure remaining cancer that had spread to his groin. He has a simple aim with ThatchFace: to give back to men’s cancer charities by donating 10% of profits from each beard oil to help other men in their own personal battles with this disease.

Ben’s passion for all things beard, paired with his desire to help support men that one day could also suffer from cancer as he did is the driving force behind ThatchFace and the products which we create.

ThatchFace’s Growth Plan

We are working on more charity partnerships and range extension into beard balms and more scents to really expand the offering to our customers.  We’ve gained an incredibly loyal customer base and will continue to work hard to keep them happy with new products whilst also driving awareness around male cancers and the warnings signs to look out for.  We will be looking to create new events focused on bringing men together to talk about their experiences and remove the taboo around male cancers.

 

7. Sewport

sewport

About the Business

Sewport is a FashionTech Marketplace connecting Brands and Manufacturers.  We solve the problem of users by removing the complexity and guiding through the process. The system we built allows for anyone without experience or connections in the industry build products so users can effortlessly.

With Sewport, anyone can turn their ideas into a product and become the next big thing in fashion.  Sewport speeds up and simplifies the way brands and manufacturers interact. 

Our current focus is on the fashion industry as one of the largest creative sectors but we aim to scale to other products such as accessories, furniture & decor, arts & crafts, cosmetics and machinery as we go along in the coming quarters. 

Sewports’ Growth Plans

So far we have a steady growth of satisfied users from both the Brands and Manufacturers, with a total of 3500 users signed up to date and actively engaged. We will look to have at least 10x of that in the next 6 months. 

8. Earth to Earth Organics

Danny and Tenesia

About the Business

Earth to Earth Organics is making a choice to be different in a competitive industry, not only that but make a difference. Earth to Earth is an ecologically and environmentally conscious and chemical-free organic skincare brand.

It was founded by husband and wife, Danny and Tenesia Pascal after Tenesia moved to England from Guyana and noticed the change in climate and change in diet had some serious effects on her skin. No product seemed to do the trick, and this is where the gap in the market was established by the couple.
Earth to Earth Organics pledges to be free of animal testing, which is a wider problem in the cosmetics industry. They are also advocates for fair trade and make sure that all their packaging is recyclable.

Earth to Earth’s Growth Plans

Earth to Earth Organics aims to become a household name in the United Kingdom and are working on making that a reality in 2018. This looks promising as there have been increasing levels of demand for their ecologically friendly products, including their famous ‘magic butter’, which is reflected in the growth in orders.

 

9. Sargossa

nanna-liv-sargossa

About the Business

Sargossa was founded by Nanna Liv who had a mission to eradicate the ‘no pain, no gain’ movement when it comes to shoes. There is no reason why shoes cannot be fashionable, classy and chic and comfortable to wear.

The heels they make and sell have comfort as the priority without compromising on the look of the shoe. The Stilettos are designed with all technical aspects considered in terms of optimal heel height, declaim in a shoe and perfect width at the front of the shoe. Inside the shoe is a super spongy insole to provide the ultimate comfort to the wearer.

Sargossa’s Growth Plans

Sargossa aims to offer women across the world the opportunity to wear delicate designer stilettos without having to compromise on the comfort. They believe that all women’s feet deserve the right to well-crafted footwear made for comfort and the shape of the foot itself. The overall aim is to grow the Sargossa brand globally via our online presence and in co-operation with our stockists, and hopefully with own branded stores in the near future.

 

10. Marlow London

chloe-marlow

About the Business

Marlow London is a British luxury accessories brand bringing a personalised touch to an overly saturated market. Founded in 2016 by Central Saint Martins graduate Chloé Marlow.

Based in London, Marlow London designs beautifully and consciously crafted unique laser-cut leather goods and digitally-printed scarves for the expressive, creative and individual customer. 

Marlow London’s Growth Plans

Over the first two years of business Marlow London ‘popped-up’ in Fenwick of Bond Street and secured its first stockist YoungBritishDesginers.com. For the first time this summer the brand will be showcasing it’s latest SS19 collection to buyers and press in Paris, hoping to build international relationships and secure further stockists and build brand awareness.

Marlow London now plans to take on PR to further the brand’s visibility having already been featured in the Daily Mail and The Sunday Times Style Magazine. 

 

What is a beauty startup?

As the name suggests, a beauty startup is a startup that offers products and/or services that are related to the beauty sector. All of the companies listed above are examples of beauty and fashion startups.

The best beauty startups meet the demands of their target audience, and do this with style. For example, Prettly enables users to sift through a list of beauticians effortlessly, helping to find the services right for them, and doing this through their sleek, easy to use platform.

As technologies evolve, the beauty industry has seen considerable disruption, many startups within the sector making products and services more accessible and better tailored to customers’ unique preferences.

Many new startups in beauty therefore hold a slightly different set of purposes to their predecessors; optimising the world of beauty to best fit it’s customers’ tastes, preferences and shopping experience.

 

Trends from the best beauty startups

Some of trends that can be picked up from this list of beauty startups, and the beauty sector during this time more generally, include the following:

  • Accessibility 
  • Comfort
  • Efficiency

Many startups within the beauty industry now focus on the accessibility of their products, wanting to make their brands more readily available to customers. One of the more overt ways this can be seen is through startups offering online shopping, varying payment methods and home deliveries, meaning customers can get access to their new favourite beauty products from the comfort of their own home, or from anywhere else in the world.

Comfort is another big theme that runs throughout many beauty startups’ products and services. Making products and offering services that provide people with a great user experience is key for both retaining existing customers and attracting new ones in.

With the rise in technology, efficiency has now also become a priority for a range of different industries, including beauty. Many of the best beauty startups today not only focus on delivering excellent quality products and services to customers, but further help to reach this goal as efficiently as possible – e.g. helping to find the best beautician for a specific treatment.

 

How to start a beauty startup

For those wanting to create their very own a beauty startup, as with starting up any business, there are a few things to consider. A key thing in helping to create a beauty startup is having a strong brand that will attract customers in. It’s important to sit down and establish the business’s values (e.g. whether it’s being environmentally conscious, focused on efficiency, or wanting to be inclusive to a variety of different customers).

Another vital part of creating a beauty startup is making sure your products and services are safe for consumers to use, and effective at achieving their purpose. For example, a waterproof mascara that isn’t so great at being waterproof will quickly be noticed and pointed out by customers, damaging your brand’s reputation and decreasing customer base.

Whilst simple, these are all fundamental qualities every founder needs to consider when starting up their own beauty brand, laying a solid foundation upon which a thriving beauty startup can grow.