EP233. From crime journalist to skincare entrepreneur

Imagine having a job that makes you happy every day. Now, I think there are probably quite a lot of people out there who sadly don't have that privilege. And you might feel that way too, although I really hope you don't. But just think about what that would feel like. Imagine opening up the door to your workspace every day and thinking, this is where I'm meant to be. And then imagine selling something that makes other people happy. Now, our graduates at Formula Botanica, they know this feeling really well. They are such inspiring entrepreneurs who often have no background in beauty or skincare or hair care. And they just decide one day that they're going to take that first step and change their life. And then they enroll with us at Formula Botanica. We teach them how to formulate, we show them how to turn their formulations into a brand, into a business, and then they go forth into the world and change other people's lives with their beauty products. But most people don't believe that this is possible for them. They really don't think that they themselves have the ability to do it. And today's podcast is here to show you well, to tell you that you do. And I'm going to prove it to you by sharing the story of Anna Boiardi, founder of Anna B Cosmetics in Rome in Italy, and Formula Botanica graduate. Now, Anna is amazing. And in the interview you're about to hear, she makes it sound effortless and yet she's worked really hard to get where she is. And every step of the way she's felt happy about her choices and happy about her skincare brand. So settle in for the full episode so you can also find out how you can achieve happiness in your work. Welcome to Green Beauty Conversations, in which I challenge the beauty industry to become more sustainable, champion, independent and green beauty, and encourage you to join me in changing the beauty industry for the better. I'm your host, Lorraine Dallmeier. I'm a chartered environmentalist, biologist, and the CEO of award winning online organic cosmetic formulation school, Formula Botanica. We have tens of thousands of students in over 190 countries around the world who study with us to become organic beauty formulators and entrepreneurs, visit our website@formulabotanica.com to try our free online formulation course. And if you want to be the first person to know what's happening in green beauty, make sure you subscribe to this podcast in your favorite podcast app. So in today's episode, I'm joined by Anna Boyardi, whose nickname is and I love this, the alchemist of Italian natural cosmetics. Now Anna is a journalist on the Italian crime TV program Quarto Grado and she is the founder of the indie beauty brand Anna B Cosmetics. The mission behind her brand was clear from the beginning. Anna wanted to search for natural, pure ingredients for her skin as she was dealing with dark spots and an uneven complexion. And she wanted to find formulations that could actually do what they promised. Now secondly, as a journalist covering crime, Anna talks about pain and death on a daily basis. But life is so much more than that. So to compensate, she studied something that she really loved and enjoyed and she found Formula Botanica where she studied our international organic skincare entrepreneur program. Today, Annabie Cosmetics is a fast growing niche company that sells 17 different skincare products and employs three people full time. With lots of exciting plans on the horizon that you're going to hear about in today's podcast. Hi Anna, how are you doing today?

Very good, Lorraine, Very happy to be here with you.

I am so happy that you're here as well. Well, let's do some introductions. Can you please introduce yourself and your brand?

Of course. My name is Anna and I started this business like almost seven years ago. I started with the Formula Botanica because I have another job. I am a journalist in crime. So yeah, it's quite a difficult topic and my life, just to keep it short in my life, I had to cope with a lot of pain and emotions and negativeness, negativity. And so I decided in one point of my life to change something because it felt like it was too much for me in that moment. And I started to study and luckily I came into your school and I started to study and I saw that this was my life. This was a very good thing for me because I didn't stop my work actually, but I could go on matter. So I started to work during the day in journalism. I also have a family, so I had to do also my family things. But in the night, evening and night, I started to study and it was so beautiful. For me, that was not heavy at all. I just studied and studied and just started to formulate very easily in this way.

Yeah, and then what happened? Because then you obviously started a business. So this was seven years ago. Right. And what's your business called? Let's start with that. What's it called?

Okay, it's the brand is called Annabie Cosmetics because it's very much me, it is my life. And also possibly many people experience that at the beginning you just formulate for yourself or your family or friends or people that you have around. So when you start formulating, you think about what's your problem? What would you like to have on your face that you cannot find in the market, for example? So I had a problem with my skin with very dark spots and also wrinkles. And also my skin was very dry. And so I started to formulate thinking about myself and my spots and my dryness and also for friends, because around people saw the difference on my face and they asked, like, there was a friend who had same problem as me, like, skin very dull, and she wanted something like this. So I formulated for her my toner, which is mostly is called Redifiori. Each product has a name which is a specific name. Redifeury is like king of flowers in Italian, but the names are Italian, but very easy. So everybody can understand that, also from abroad. And this Redifiori just was born for her. And it was quite difficult, you know. So in Italy, because the toners are not very popular in Italian.

Interesting.

So you had to explain to people the difference from a toner and what they used many years ago. That was like some waters with alcohol in it that just kept your skin very dry, drier and drier. And so people stopped to use that and they didn't understand the new idea of toner, which is a very beautiful one that you teach in the first formula.

Yes.

Small joke. Just when you start. I used to do some of that for friends and, you know, the business started. Actually, it's quite a nice story because one day I met a friend, Flaminia, who was with a dog at the park with me, and she said, oh, many years I don't see you. Because she used to see me when I had very little kids. She sold dresses for little kids and say, oh, but you can change. What happened? You used to have dark spots. You don't have any more. What happened? Did you do something like Chirurgic or something like that? And I said, oh, no, it's just I am formulating my own skincare.

Wow.

Oh, no way. I have to try. And she tried. She came back to me after, like, one month, and she said, anna, this kind of cosmetics, you have to do it. Because I never experienced something like this. And I want you to produce that for all your life. For me, for all my life. So please start this business together, because I want you to produce that for as long as you can.

That's amazing. I love that story so much. And that obviously got you started then thinking, I have to sell my products. Yes.

I started to produce that you know, of course, you know that at the beginning I was producing here in my lab, but then everything started to become a little more complicated, but also with more rules, so cleaner and more precise in a way. So I had to find a producer, which come to maybe difficult part for indie beauty, because everything that is indie, at least in Italy, it's very difficult. You have to find somebody who produce in small quantities, because we, at the beginning we want small quantities, but also now, because one of the points of my philosophy is always fresh. So I. I produce like hundred pieces at a time. So I want it to be like on demand.

Yeah, I totally understand. Well, let's. Let's talk about manufacturing in a minute. First of all, you obviously mentioned. Tell me about the other products that you make. What do you make and sell at Annabie Cosmetics?

At the Moment we have 17 different products.

17.

Wow, 17. Yes. It's quite a complete line. You will find online everything. And also with the inkiness, very clear. Because I wanted to be clear and direct. Maybe I can talk to you about another very important cream for me, which was La Felicita ice cream. La Felicita was born for a friend who had a problem in that moment. So she was unhappy, very unhappy. So I wanted to produce something for her that creates happiness for her. That's the name for the story is like, everybody will see. La Felicita says, okay, that's very easy marketing, because you want to give Felicita to everybody. And of course you want to buy Felicita everywhere. But that was not the story of this cream. La Felicita was born for this friend. And unlike all the other products that I make, it just came like this, you know, the formulation process is very creative sometimes. And it took me the last line, which is a menopause line, Alchemy bronze line is more complicated. And I studied it a lot and a lot. It took me two years to be satisfied with this formulation. Instead, Felicita just came. Just came like this. Probably I changed one oil in the all 8 or 9 that I have inside. But then it came like this. And still in these days, it's our bestseller.

Wow.

It's a cold cream that is made with Supra gel. We of course know, because now we experience Supragel a lot. I was very happy with it. Also about the aromatherapy which I started, which I studied with you. And I studied thanks to you, also with Terceran Institute. I have four degrees, also with Tyceran Institute. And the aromatherapy is not easy. Let's say so like happiness because it has some smells like Tonka Tonka which is in Tonka butter and Tonka absolute and Ylang Ylang together, which inspire, pushes you to work, which is not easy. Tonka helps you to take up everything that you have inside that you want to keep inside, like very old memories that you have inside. And Ylang Ylang asks you to bring this all together and in our. So as you can see, it's quite a difficult aromatherapy. So sometimes, and it's very interesting also this and of course everybody has experienced that because if we do natural, we do aromatherapy like naturally you experience people that like smell it and say, oh, it's strange, I don't know, it reminds me of. And they tell all the different stories. Like somebody told me, it reminds me of the nun that grow me when I was a kid.

Oh my goodness.

It was very strange for me because Tonka is also a little aphrodisiac. So indeed not it.

So you've. You've created this range with 17 products and obviously poured your love into it. And some of them you took a really long time to create and others came like a. Like a bolt of lightning out of the sky. With Felicita, tell me a little bit about the transformation that you've gone through as well. Like was it, was it scary in the beginning to put yourself out there and how did you get over that?

Actually not scary. Not scary for me because when I started I immediately understood that it was my path, it was my way to go. And I was so happy when I started, when I first started to study with you, but also practical lab with you, I was so happy that I had no doubt that it was the right. But then of course you experience some time problems. Like I still have my job, my first job as a journalist on television. So it's very complicated sometimes to have a beauty business with three people working for me at the moment and also the other job. But even though if you get organized and the entrepreneur program for that, it was very useful if you get organized and you just like plan a little your time and you still keep this emotion of being happy of what you do. And any day, any moment when I spend time here in my lab, I am happy.

Oh, that is amazing.

Quite easy.

That is a wonderful thing to hear and I love that for you so much. So, so let's paint a picture of where your brand is today. You already said you have three people working for you, so presumably do you sell over Italy or do you sell internationally as well, what's the company looking like right now?

Actually, I'm selling mostly in Italy at the moment because also because I sell online and I do some events where I do a table and everybody can try everything. And I explain a little, what's my philosophy and what's the brand like, and I do it almost in Italy at the moment, but we can sell worldwide, so we can ship anywhere in the world. We want to expand, and at the moment we have many plans. We have new products coming. The beginning of the summer, I launched a new product which was Activo body oil, which was great, great deal because everybody loved it. It's a blue one with spirulina. Blue spirulina. And it's active. Like you have to shake it. Like spirulina is not soluble in oil, so you have to shake it. And it was very effective in lipasis, which nucleocication and lipolysis in general. So anybody was like coming to me saying, oh, wow, it worked. And I say, of course it has to work. If you do some products, they have to work. So I plan some new launches in the future, but I also plan to expand a little. We want to do a project which is very. Since a lot of time in my heart, I want to have a place, a site where I can sell also my raw materials. Because I search a lot. I make a lot of researches on ingredients and my ingredients are quite special. They come from. I do the. From farm to face that you inspire. I search for small producers that have their stories and have also the highest product that I can find on the market. When I buy, I can buy sometimes in small quantities, sometimes I have to buy in bigger quantities. And I want, I thought, to make this platform where we can share these ingredients. Like I can sell to somebody else in the same quantities that I needed to. Yeah. At the beginning and still maybe I need now. So I thought it was a good idea to this to do this row. So Anna Beer row will be online soon and maybe for Formula Botanic, I also can.

Who knows? I think it's a very good idea. Absolutely. Why not? So obviously the business is grown a lot. You're selling all across Italy. Are you working with retailers as well?

I'm working with little retailers, yes. Not really shops at the moment because I prefer to have retailers that work with the creams. So sometimes they are facialists. Mostly facialists. We are starting to work retailers too, but I wanted to keep prices fair. So as you know very well, retailers and fair prices are not really working together. So Sometimes I need to sell directly.

Yeah, absolutely. And I know most beauty brands do both of those things obviously extremely well. I think it's amazing what you've achieved in such a short period of time. So you've got three people working for you as well. What do they do?

Actually, everything. Everybody's doing everything, but especially Lorena. She is working with shipping and orders and all these kind of things. Shipping mostly because we wanted to at the beginning we started. Maybe it's useful for who starts at the beginning. We started to with somebody outside the company who shipped for us. But then I understood that it was very important also to have this thing inside. So I organized to have the shipping directly from my medicine for my space. And then Solorina is taking care of this. And then Laura, which is my marketing everything. She's my everything. She's working with me every day, like pushing me, for example, when I do formulation, she's marketing. So she's saying, is it ready? I know, is it ready? I think it's ready. I think it's ready. No, no, I'm not sure. I'm not. I think it's ready. So she pushes me in the right way, correct way for commerce also, because we also have to sell, of course.

Absolutely.

And the third one is Giuseppe. Giuseppe is working with the side, with our online, also helping us with everything that is online.

So very amazing. So you have the dream team working there, which means that you're still doing your day job, which is something that you love, love by the sounds of things. And you don't want to stop so you can do both things at the same time. How has Annabelle Cosmetics changed your life?

Actually, every in everything I can say first of all, maybe it's very easy to understand at the beginning, when I started, we have. I started at house, at home, and I used to formulate between the kitchen and the living room. In the living room, I lab was like in the living room with books under books. There was everything that I used, I studied and I went to the kitchen formulating. Of course, I had to clean everything and sew, but it was like formulation for formulating, for learning to formulate. So I didn't have to keep everything straight as we do now. But then my living room started to become a monster over my family and my kids couldn't study because there was like butters around, oils around. And so my husband like said, okay, Yana, either you find a lab outside the house or we move. I couldn't find a lab outside the house because I was working in the night. So I didn't want to go out in the night. And I used any time that I had during the day to work. And so we moved. We have another house now where I have my lab separated from the rest of the house. And this one was the first big change in everyday life. And then, of course, my skin changed. Also my time, I think also my happiness changed because I'm much more relieved now. I know that what I do, I do because I love to do it. Anytime I do some meetings with other clients or people or I work for Anami Cosmetics, my face, like, change. Everybody says that you're, like, enlightened when you talk about your cosmetic line and when you do that. So I think it changed a lot.

It changed everything. By the sounds of things. That's amazing. Were there ever. What was your biggest worry when you started? What were you most scared of in starting your own business?

Probably the fact that I thought, maybe I can do it, because also my first job is very complicated, and sometimes you have to run, and sometimes you have to be away for days. And so at the beginning, I said, okay, I cannot do. I cannot do. I cannot do. I have two children. So also the family was complicated. But then I just relaxed and say, okay, I'll do what I can do. Nobody's running behind me. So maybe somebody takes, like, one year to. From launching to be. To have good selling. It took me a little longer. Maybe I made mistakes because you make mistakes like, you start and you start.

We all do.

Yes. But I took it easily. I don't have to reach this kind of thing in one year. I didn't have, like, a point to reach in this very moment, and I just let it flow and it grew.

I love this. So you didn't put any pressure on yourself. You decided, I want to do this because it makes me happy, and I'm just going to let it go and see how it works out without having any really fixed targets. And now look at you now. I mean, we're seven years later. You have three people working for you. You're selling all over Italy. You're having people come to you going, my skin has changed. Your own skin has changed. I mean, what a success story. Congratulations, Emma. That's absolutely amazing. You should be so proud. Well, you're the one who's done all the hard work, and I absolutely love this for you. So what advice would you have for other people who want to start their own skincare brand?

Well, first of all, you have to do it because you like it. Not because you want to not tolerant it. I mean, because you want to earn money. Of course it comes. It can come if you do a good job. But you have to like it because when you like it, everything changes. And also your attitude towards what you do, the way you do your products and the way you sell your products changes everything. I didn't want, during the time I. During this seven years, I didn't want to change anything because I was approached by people telling me how to do my business. Also lately they told me, why don't you do the same base for every product? And then you just little things much, much cheaper and you reach much more people and is functional for economy. And I was just laughing. Why? No, never. I was lucky not to be pushed to do something that was against what I wanted to do. I wanted to have my line exactly the way it is and I didn't want to change any ingredients because it was too expensive. And I didn't want to have plastic instead of glass because it's cheaper. I just wanted it to be exactly how it is today. I was lucky to be allowed to do so.

Well, you're the one who did it and I love that because you had the vision, you knew what you wanted to achieve and this is your passion and that comes across very strongly in everything you're talking about. And I'm so, so happy for you that you've managed to create this beautiful brand that's entirely yours, exactly the way you want it. So what's next for Annabie Cosmetics?

The next steps will be rebranding. Oh, wow. Yeah.

That'S a fairly big thing. What are you changing about the brand?

Actually, I am thinking about a mission of a brand that would be changing a little from skin to rain, would be cold. And it has a lot to do with aromatherapy and all the neuroscience that are behind. I studied a lot and I also have some medical backwards now that can sustain what I am saying about neurocosmetics. And so there will be this rebranding which is mostly like explaining better what we are doing at the moment that we did since the beginning of La Felicita came. And then this roll which is very into my heart because I want to share all the study I made with ingredients, with a community, a community that experience, I'm sure that is going to experience the same problem that I experienced in my life. So the 12,000 pieces at a time that you cannot afford, or 10 kilos, 20 kilos that you cannot afford.

The minimum order quantities can be quite a challenge in the beginning, yes.

Which is also extremely. Maybe you can afford, but then you have to throw it away, which is. I don't like it all.

Well, the main, the main thing of course is you can find ingredients but you can't always find exactly what you want and you have to hunt around. It's part of being an entrepreneur of course as well. And you know this. So I love the fact that you're opening the, the door for even more entrepreneurs in the future.

And so we are going to do that and then maybe in the future. But this is quite a future future. My own lab. I want to create my own lab, grow somebody, some people who produces inside this lab.

So exciting, lots of exciting times ahead for Annabie Cosmetics. Anna, it's been such a pleasure talking to you today. Thank you so much for joining me on the podcast. Where can people find out more about you and your products? Where can they come and buy from you?

Actually there's a site which is annabcosmetics.com you can find everything in there. You can also find the ingredients. So if somebody from La Botanica maybe find some ingredients that cannot find anywhere else, just write to me info anna amazing@anabicosmetics.com and maybe we can share these ingredients. Also, before the rose made, of course, I also have a special promo code for Formula Botanica.

Incredible.

Formula Botanica 20. Very special promo because I don't, I eventually don't do this kind of promos but Formula Botanica is my family. So I'm very happy to share with you anything that's possible because I all this was born because of you. So I'm so grateful.

Well, thank you so much. I'm very grateful for you coming on the podcast today and thank you so much for sharing that code. We will put all of those links and the code in the show notes. So go and buy some Annabelle cosmetics and go and experience for yourself how well they work on the skin. And I wish you all, all the very best with your company moving forward. I can't wait to see everything you do. Thank you so much for joining me today.

Thank you and hope to host you also in Rome.

Oh, that would be amazing. We will do that. See you soon.

Bye bye. See you soon.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this episode. Has Anna inspired you to think about how you can find happiness in your work every day? And have you followed Anna B Cosmetics online yet? Leave us a comment on our social channels as both the Formula Botanica team and I love hearing from you and don't forget that Anna is offering a very special discount code for listeners if they use the code formula botanica20 at the checkout and Anna told me afterwards that she's happy to ship pretty much everywhere in the world. So make sure you reach out if you're not in Italy. And if you want to hear more about some of the topics that we talked about today, please do delve back into the podcast archives as well. So go and listen to episode 179 in which I interviewed Formula Botanica graduate Leslie Reitgeld, who runs her awesomely successful brand Bella Botanicals in Wisconsin, USA and mainly sells it in her local community. She's a powerhouse. You need to hear this episode. Or go and check out episode 157 in which I interviewed Formula Botanica graduate Roshan Dorsett, who's the founder of the glossary and she told me all about how she built her award winning superfood beauty brand with just 2,000 British pounds in her back. Pocke. Such an inspiration. Or go and listen to episode 127 in which I interviewed Naz Bashir, founder of Solo Skin London, who told me how she went from suffering with skin struggles to putting herself out there, selling out her product ranges and bringing in an additional income for her family. And she's gone even way beyond that since we did that podcast episode. So go and listen to these inspiring stories. There's a wealth of information in our old episodes and I do really encourage you to go back and listen to them. So thank you for joining Anna and I for this latest episode of Green Beauty Conversations. I hope you enjoyed it. If you did, please do leave us a five star review so that other people can enjoy these conversations too. And make sure you subscribe to the podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, whatever your favorite podcast app is. And stay tuned for the next episode. Follow Formula Botanica Formula Botanica on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, Twitter, Pinterest LinkedIn we're everywhere and coming. Give me a follow at Lorraine Dhlmeier on Instagram and LinkedIn. Visit our website@formulabotanica.com and sign up for our free online formulation course today.