Interested in starting your own entrepreneurial journey in skincare but unsure what to expect? Then read up on our interview with Robbin Turner, Founder of Violet Botanical Skincare, located in Los Angeles, CA, USA.
What's your business, and who are your customers?
Violet Botanical Skincare encourages plant-based skincare by embracing connections to ancestral African healing herbs. Our customers are people who desire botanical ingredients to help relieve dry skin and/or maintain healthy skin care.
Tell us about yourself
My journey to founding Violet Botanical Skincare began in 2014 while researching natural remedies to relieve my husband's and son's eczema. Slathering themselves in steroid creams filled with toxic petrochemicals and synthetics was not an option.
I reflected on my grandmother's homemade remedies, African remedies passed down from generation to generation. With peace of mind knowing what ingredients are used, I set out to make my own products. Guided by time-honored African formulations and ancestral plant-based ingredients, I handcrafted my first body butter, and Violet Botanical Skincare was born.
What motivates me each day are satisfied customers who've finally found an effective plant-based product that addresses their skincare needs.
What's your biggest accomplishment as a business owner?
My biggest accomplishment as a business owner is positively impacting the lives of others--here and in Africa. I source my ingredients from a supplier in Gaborone, Botswana, who works with women's cooperatives in rural southern Africa to ensure that our ingredients are the purest, most distinctive, and most effective, high-quality natural cosmetic butters and oils. They are ethically and sustainably wild-harvested to support the long-term viability of the harvesters' communities. The harvesters receive consistent and fair wages to provide meaningful income opportunities to help improve the lives of their families.
What's one of the hardest things that comes with being a business owner?
One of the hardest things that come with being an independent business owner is financing. Sustaining, marketing, and growing a business is challenging with limited resources.
What are the top tips you'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today?
The top three tips I'd give to anyone looking to start, run and grow a business today are:
- Start now. Don't wait for the perfect time. It's never perfect.
- Develop a business roadmap. Keep in mind that it's a living document. Things change as your business grows and the industry changes.
- Be a visionary. Don't do things because that's how it's done in your industry. Be different; think differently.
Where can people find you and your business?
Website: https://www.violetbody.net/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/violetbodyme
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/violetbodyme/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/violet-botanical-skincare/
If you like what you've read here and have your own story as a solo or small business entrepreneur that you'd like to share, then please answer these interview questions. We'd love to feature your journey on these pages.
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