From Elle Editor to Fragrance Founder: How Carol Han Pyle Built Nette, a Bootstrapped Sephora Favorite

Natasha Jakubowski: Coming up, in this episode of professional

Carol Han Pyle: jealousy, Sephora DMed us on Instagram. This was like, six months into our brand launch. We had four candles. I had lived my entire adult life in New York City. It was very much nonstop. There wasn't a single moment where I was really in silence. And I think the pandemic really allowed that for me. In silence. That's when the light gets in and that's when the magic happens. No amount of explanation social media marketing is going to help a confusing brand. I didn't know how to use Excel until a year ago.

Natasha Jakubowski: Hi, I'm Natasha Jakubowski, chief innovation officer at Anomaly, a global marketing agency. And this is my podcast, Professional Jealousy, where I am lucky enough to Talk to founders, CEOs and creatives that I'm impressed by and, yes, a little jealous of. Um, so today I'm talking to Carol Han Pyle, uh, the founder of Net, a line of clean luxury candles and fragrances. And we'll be chatting about her career path from fashion to founding a social media agency to fragrance brand, founder, uh, the moment that she decided to launch this luxurious, uh, brand, and how she navigates the crazy world of, uh, beauty. Um, so. Hi, Carol. I should have checked that I was saying your name.

Carol Han Pyle: Right.

Natasha Jakubowski: How are you doing?

Carol Han Pyle: Right, I'm doing so well and I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me.

Natasha Jakubowski: Um, I am so happy to have you as a guest. I actually received some, some freebies, which I have to say, my 13 year old was over the moon. Um, because obviously she loves anything to do with perfume candles. She loves your brand. She loves Sephora. Um, so thank you. Um, for anyone that doesn't know the brand, can you give us the elevator pitch?

Carol Han Pyle: Yeah. So Net is a brand that I founded in 2021. My background is primarily as an editor. So I was at Elle for, um, for four years in their fashion department. And then I left to start a social media agency called Community Atelier. Um, it was you when 2010, that was when Instagram launched. So it was the very beginnings of this world of social media. And a lot of my designer friends had, um, reached out to me wondering what they should do on Instagram or. Back then it was Twitter or Facebook in terms of content. Um, and I was consulting a lot. So it was really easy actually to leave my job and start this agency. I had clients right out of the gate. I worked with amazing brands like Ralph Lauren and Club Monaco. Um, and I did that for 10 years. And then the pandemic hit in 2020. And I ended up losing half of my clients overnight. And it was really such a huge reset for me. It was the first time in my entire adult life that I was not busy and I had half the workload and I wasn't going out to dinners, I wasn't going to workout classes every day. And so I, I had the space to really think about what I wanted to do next. And you know, my mom had been a candle maker in San Francisco when I was little. She had a little candle shop on the water where she would hand dip and hand carve these beautiful colorful pillars. I just, I remember growing up in that shop surrounded by these candle creations of hers and, you know, the gorgeous smells that, uh, were in that shop. And I had always known that I wanted to do something in fragrance. So I spent that entire year incubating what Net could be. And in 2021, we ended up launching, to me, Net is fragrance through this lens of poetry. So the written word is also a huge passion of mine. I was an English major in college and I think someday I will be a published writer. I think that's still in the future for me. Um, but every fragrance begins as a poem that I write that is meant to convey a certain emotion. So, you know, joy, calm, nostalgia, desire. And that poem really becomes the blueprint, the emotional blueprint of the fragrance. I deliver that poem to our perfumer as part of the brief right in the beginning. And then we bring science in. So every fragrance is also scientifically proven to boost certain emotions and moods. And you know, of course we work with the world's leading top perfumers using only the very best ingredients available on the market today. Um, so in that way, I really think of Net as both an art form and, and a tool for emotional well being. You use it to smell beautiful, but also to make you feel something in a way that, that we actually can measure. Sorry, that was the world's longest elevator.

Natasha Jakubowski: That was a very long elevator pitch. Um, but so much there and, and I do, you know, I mean, there's so much, so many, so many questions, so many questions. Um, like I feel like you, you're, you're, you're very creative and you've had this kind of what many would think is a dream for Elle as an editor, creating your own agency. Like, so it sounds like this was born of like time. You know, everyone else is like in chaos and Covid and you're finding this creative like outlet. Um, but what was the, what was the trigger to actually do it?

Carol Han Pyle: I Think it was silence, being in silence for the first time. You know, I had lived my entire adult life in New York City surround and working in magazines in the 2000s was every bit as brutal as people say. You know, the, um, I was working 15 hour days. I had events to go, um, to for work almost every night. It was very much nonstop. And then running your own social media agency starting when you're in your 20s is also no joke. And there wasn't a single moment where I, I was really in, in silence. And I think the pandemic really allowed that for me. And silence and being alone with your thoughts and that's when the light gets in and that's when the magic happens. Um, so I found that time to be deeply frightening and terrifying, but also really clarifying and illuminating at the same time.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, no. Amazing.

Carol Han Pyle: Ah.

Natasha Jakubowski: Do you think? Um, so the intentional move to create something new and you already entrepreneurial, you already had a company. Um, but like, literally, I know this sounds silly, but like, what, what were the first things that you did to make this real?

Carol Han Pyle: I did have my company and I, and I loved the agency and I still love the agency. I think that I was always executing on someone else's vision. Um, and I did that really well. Um, and I still do. But I think that I've always, I always really missed there was this hole where I felt that I could create something from the ground up of my own. And that was really the motivation of, of trying to start Net. And the first thing I did was really find a branding agency. I used this very young agency called Regular Practice out of London, and they were able to help me develop the visual identity of the brand. And that was, that was really important to me because once we had that down, um, and once we had collaborated on what that looked like and felt like and sounded like, it allowed me to move forward in really fully developing the universe of the brand.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Um, what was your brief to them? Like what. How did you describe the kind of brand that you wanted to bring to life?

Carol Han Pyle: I came up with the name first and that was a really long process. Net is a French word that means clean, impeccable and elegant. And I told them that that was really what I wanted the brand to stand for. How can you be as clean as possible and do things impeccably and do things with elegance? And those are three values that we continue to come back to with every decision that we make around the brand, with every product launch that we do. Um, and that, you know, that was really the Guiding light of how it. How it moved forward.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Um, I love that, you know, part of your creative process is writing the poem. A. Ah, poem. And that becoming the brief for the scent. It's such a romantic. It's such a romantic. You know, um, it's both creative, and I know you bring in some kind of neuroscience. You have these interesting kind of almost like two parts tensions. You've got, you know, creative science answer and science, and then you're clean as well as luxury. Um, like, how did you put this all together? Like, how. How do you think about the brand differently? Like, there is. Obviously you're in a category that is, like, full, and every day there's yet another fragrance, uh, or candle brand coming out. Like, how do you. How do you think about that moat? Because there are lots of elements that feel so kind of. Yeah. So differentiated. But how do you think about that? How do you stay, uh, apart from the kind of clutter?

Carol Han Pyle: Well, my thinking was, why not? Why can't something be both clean and transparent and luxurious and covetable? And why can't something incorporate both art and science and feel very luxurious? So when I was developing our candles. Candles is what we started with. I was trying to get pregnant, and we were not having any success. Um, uh, you know, we ended up going through an IVF process that was quite brutal. Four rounds. And throughout this entire period of my life, all of my practitioners, from my acupuncturist to my GPS and my OB were telling me to just watch what I ate, watch what products I used. And I look, when I took a look at the candles that I was using. Trudon, Diptyque, Byredo, all of these amazing legacy brands that I loved, I couldn't find any information about what they used as their ingredients. It was all a very black box. And then on the other side of the token, there were these, like, $12 spa candles that only had eucalyptus oil in them and were very not well branded. I had no desire to buy them or put them in my home. And that's kind of. That was a little bit of a light bulb moment where I was like, why isn't there a clean candle that's also luxurious? It felt like there was this big white space. Um, and so that's, you know, that's what I decided to base the candles around. Can we give them the best possible vessel? Our vessels are handmade food safe, dishwasher safe, microwave safe. They're based on this $100 handmade ceramic mug I found in Sag Harbor. Um, so they're like drinking mugs first. That's what they're initially designed to be. Um, and my hope is that it's very obvious that you should clean out the candle vessel when you. Once you're done and collect them as cups to use for drinking. Um, ultimately, so that they're beautiful, they're sustainable, they're clean. You don't feel reservations about burning them?

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, no. It's such a, such a nice idea building the, you know, I think people do tend to use the expensive vessels, you know, so. But actually making sure that it's something that can be used for that. Like, I've definitely got a few candles, whether they're the Dipseek or the Birado. And it's like. Yeah, that's not really it. You know, maybe I can put some pencils in there or something. Um, so it's so nice building that in. Um, so I didn't really. I've never been. Yeah.

Carol Han Pyle: Oh, no, I was just going to say I have a friend named Drea who is another entrepreneur. She has this community called by Drea, um, and she. Act Drea Murphy, and she actually uses our vessels as her Matcha mugs. And she posts an Instagram story almost every single day with a picture of her Matcha because it's such a huge part of her ritual and it's in one of our candle vessels. And it just makes me very happy.

Natasha Jakubowski: I know, makes you very happy as a, as a founder of this brand being used in that way. But presumably also that's perfect content as your social media mogul kind of hat. Uh, I'm sure that's, uh, it's like a classic. A classic piece of influencer. Uh, um. Yeah. Content that feels very. Right.

Carol Han Pyle: Yes, exactly. It's perfect.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Um, what do you think in your. You mentioned, uh, the, uh, that your mother had this, uh, candle business. What do you think in your upbringing made you entrepreneurial? I have kids. I'm always thinking about it, like, how do I make sure they're not, you know, spoiled and how do they still have drive and, you know, want to do stuff and make stuff and be ambitious? What do you think in your. Because you. Again, this wasn't your first business. You've already got a, ah, social media agency. Like, what. What do you think helped you become or be, feel entrepreneurial?

Carol Han Pyle: Oh, my gosh. Um, well, my mom is a huge inspiration. She was entrepreneurial, I think, because she didn't have a choice. She was an immigrant who moved here from South, South Korea and she came Here without speaking the language. Um, and so it's really hard for immigrants to get normal jobs when, you know, their college educations that they received in their native countries don't really count here. And, you know, so I think that starting businesses was really just a necessity for her in order to help provide for the family. And then when my parents got divorced and, you know, and they separated and, you know, they were doing their own things, that was really all she knew. I've never known my mom, um, my entire life to not have been running her own business. And sometimes it was harder than others. But there were definitely many years of my life in my childhood where I watched her work incredibly, incredibly hard. Um, she was really that archetype of a single mother superwoman, and so inspiring to me. She's my biggest inspiration.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Amazing. Yeah. I. I have similar. When my mother was definitely like her, her degree meant nothing. When she moved to England, it was. It's so shocking. And, you know, just thinking about how it must be so, you know, so difficult to start everything again and have to create value, you know, it's unimaginable.

Carol Han Pyle: Yeah.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Um. Yeah. How would you, um. How would you try and instill that sense of, you know, entrepreneurialism, knowing that, uh, you know, you. You're not an immigrant coming in? Is that. Do you have any tips? I'll take any tips for bringing up children with. With that drive.

Carol Han Pyle: It's tough, right? Because, you know, I think I have a son. His name's Ozzie. He's three years old, and I work from home most of the time. And so he sees me working and he, uh, he. He understands. Like, now, even at three years old, even at two and a half years old, he'll come up to my desk and he'll be like, I want to work. And I. I'm working and, you know, pounding out the keys on my laptop. And I think that he wants to, um. You know, I think children have this natural instinct to want to emulate their heroes, which are often their parents. So I think just by you being an entrepreneur and me being an entrepreneur and presumably working very hard and them not help, you know, they can't help but witness that, um, I would hope that that is instilling those values into them. And I don't think it's necessarily the worst thing in the world that Ozzy will actually not see me struggling the same way that I saw my mom strug. I am very glad to, you know, kind of evolve from that for him.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, yeah. No, I agree. I Do I, I actually think that the, the doing versus the saying is huge. You know, seeing how your parents behave, seeing them work hard, I think is, is huge. Um, that's what I'm hoping. I think I've, I think my parents, my, uh, yeah, I think my kids have seen that, know that I work hard and there's an ethic that they definitely take away. Yes. Yeah. What was, what has been the hardest thing about being a founder? Uh, about creating, you know, you're suddenly putting your own taste out there. You've gone from being an editor and helping, you know, publicize, uh, and communicate about other people's brands. What's been the hardest thing moving into that kind of product? Uh, founder.

Carol Han Pyle: My gosh. What hasn't been hard about it? I think that before I started this brand I had run my agency for 10 years and I thought this is going to be easy. I've been, I've already been doing this for 10 years. I've, I've got this. I could not have imagined how much harder running a product based business would be. Um, one of my investor friends once said software is easy and hardware is really hard. Um, and that's why she only invests in software brands because she understands what, how many things can go wrong in a product based brand. But you real, I really had to learn everything from the ground up and everything from, I mean I was just like in deep Google holes at two in the morning trying to figure out who manufactures candles in the US and you know, who I can go to to design my perfume bottle. Um, um, everything had to be learned. So, and it had to be learned while I was building it. Um, um, so lots of mistakes, you know, that, that kind of results in a lot of mistakes that you have to really bounce back from and get up really quickly from and recover from

Natasha Jakubowski: any key mistakes that uh, that you think are worth mentioning, um, in terms of absolutely terrible, but bounce back and everyone loves mistakes.

Carol Han Pyle: Oh my gosh. Well, you know I, I remember in 2023, or, sorry, 2024, we launched our Pear Jam perfume and it was the first time that we had launched a single perfume at a time. And we had no idea really how it was going to go. The last, you know, the last time we had launched fragrance was when we had launched the category that was very different because we launched five fragrances at once. And so we ordered our quantity and it sold out in two weeks. Um, and it was a spring launch. It was called Para Jam, a very springy fragrance. And we couldn't get Back in stock for six months. So by the time we got back into stock, the buzz had sort of done its thing and died, um, as buzz tends to do. So I think that that was a really big missed opportunity. We learned from it. But it was six months of missed revenue.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah.

Carol Han Pyle: And it was devastating. I think, you know, when people say, that's so cool that you sold out, it's not fun on the inside.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, yeah, Infuriating. I feel like, um, you actually got into Sephora incredibly fast. Is that through your contacts or how did that happen? And how on earth did you, you know, manage to take such a new business into Sephora? Like, I know a lot of companies that. That's basically broken them.

Carol Han Pyle: Yeah. So Sephora DMed us on Instagram. One of the merchants had ordered our candles and they sent us a DM and they were like, we'd love to get on a call and talk. So this was like six months into our brand launch. It was, you know, when we had nothing, but we had four candles. And so we got on the phone with the Sephora team. I was so new to the industry and I wasn't even in beauty. I was. I only had candles. I don't even think it registered to me what big deal Sephora was. At the time. I only knew Sephora as a consumer. And so I got, I got on the call with them and I was like, oh, this team seems so sweet. They're so nice. And, you know, we, um, you know, they were interested in bringing candles in, but in talking with them, I had let them know that I had plans to launch into Fine Fragrance. And they were like, let's wait for that. Will you launch Fine Fragrance exclusively with us for a little bit? So that's how that relationship started and it's been really great. The Sephora team is truly best in class and so involved in our brand, um, really in everything from product development to the marketing rollouts. Extremely detail oriented and very involved like no other retail team I've seen.

Natasha Jakubowski: Amazing. So actually helped kind of with the brand launch and not just how to do it in the store, but something that was helpful generally. That's interesting.

Carol Han Pyle: Very helpful. They were like an extension of our very, very, very small team at that point. Um, and I have to say we launched at Sephora completely bootstrapped. We're still completely bootstrapped. We haven't raised any money. And that, I would say never. And that, I would say is probably the hardest part about launching at a retailer like Sephora that I would caution against if I had to do it again. I would probably have raised money, um, before, before endeavoring to launch um, into a retailer like that. And you know, we've made it work. But I think that it, the road could have been much smoother if we had, um, if we had some cash behind us.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, yeah. That's amazing because what, what sort of size was that first order, like how many candles, how many stores? That seems like a hell of a lot to, to front yourself.

Carol Han Pyle: Opening orders for any retailer are large and you know, you have to make sure that you have enough. I mean, inventory issues we still struggle with to this day. Um, it kind of seems like, you know, the brand has momentum. We're growing by double digits year over year. And I always say to myself, you know, this is the year we're going to get our orders correct and you know, and we always under order, no matter like how much we increase year over year, our numbers, it always feels like there's a shortage at some point in the year of a very important skew. Um, so that's something that we are still working through.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, but so no investment. Uh, so would you have used, if you'd gone back and taken some money, would that have been for marketing or for. What would you have used it for?

Carol Han Pyle: Yeah, I think it would have been for marketing. I know that most Sephora brands dedicate an enormous part of, for example, their paid media budget to driving traffic to sephora.com, um, you know, five, six figure monthly budgets just to drive to Sephora. And as a bootstrap brand, you just don't have those resources. So you're really going up against competitors that are just not on the same playing field as you are.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. How much has, presumably one of the kind of, uh, you know, secret advantages that you have is the fact that you've got this social media expertise, uh, the agency. How much has that been integrated into the kind of launch and scaling of Net?

Carol Han Pyle: It's been incredibly helpful. Having done social media for fashion, beauty, hotel brands, lifestyle brands for 10 years, I can't imagine having launched a brand without that background and expertise. I have been trained, uh, for the first few years of my career to look at everything through an editorial lens and then through 10 years, look at everything through a marketing lens. So when it came to Launch Net, a lot of those elements came very naturally to me. Um, and that is now a client of Community Ateliers, um, which is an advantage because I am the founder of Community M Atelier and I have team members on that team that have been with me for up to 13 years, um, who know me and the way I work like the back of my hand, who are very, very loyal to me and to the vision of both Community Atelier and Sydney. So having a built in team like that, that you already have so much history is so crucial. I wouldn't say crucial. It's very helpful.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, it's a little bit uh, like Elon Musk bringing the companies together, um, being mutually helpful. I'm joking but you know, uh, for, for all those out there that you know, I, I speak to lots of people who haven't um, necessarily come from the kind of social media or marketing, uh, kind of discipline. Um, what are your key tips and learnings and thoughts on using social media and marketing? Like how should a new brand go to market? What are some of the things that you've learned or uh, understood from your experience?

Carol Han Pyle: I think from a wider perspective brand clarity is everything. And if you have brand clarity, everything else is easier. One piece of advice I would say is that no amount of expert social media marketing is going to help a confusing brand. So I think if you have like a very clear message and a clear point of view, then social media becomes so much easier because you know exactly what you're trying to communicate. You know exactly, um, you know, what photography, what videography is in line with the brand and it's not a struggle. And I don't say that from a perspective of like we had it figured out from day one. We definitely didn't. Um, it was my, it was my first time launching a brand. So we've definitely gone through iterations and you know, we do constant brand building exercises of you know, let's get more clear, let's get more clear, let's get more clear of trying to whittle down our brand message to its true essence.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. What do you think that I see on the box? You've got Take Good Care trademarked. Um, and obviously you do have the, you know, you've got the clean message, you've got the poems and the creativity, you've got the neuroscience. Like what is your one thing, what is your essence?

Carol Han Pyle: I would say the essence is really fragrance through the lens of poetry, um, bringing that art in, into the world of fragrance and um, you know, and making the art and science of it all work together to improve people's lives.

Natasha Jakubowski: Okay, um, any advice for all of those? I work with? I actually, I work with, you know, startups, but I also work with a lot of massive corporations who are desperately trying to learn from, um, you know, disruptive, interesting, smaller brands. Um, what advice would you have for big established brands looking to connect to, you know, modern consumers in, in modern ways? Like, yeah, what are they doing wrong? What should they be thinking about?

Carol Han Pyle: I would say the biggest thing about these huge corporate brands is that they really need to make sure that their consumer can still feel the warmth of the campfire. Um, I think like when it becomes this like kind of cold, faceless organization where you don't feel that community and you don't feel like the people that are there and the warmth that they emanate, I think that that's what makes it really hard. What's so special about founder led brands and new brands that are, you know, that have these like really rich stories to tell about how they got started and all of the day to day struggles that they, that they encounter is that it's very fascinating storytelling for the consumer and the consumer really can see that there is a person behind the brand who cares deeply about the product and the product experience. And I think that makes a huge difference. So finding a way to emulate that experience, um, I think makes such a huge difference if the brand is huge and corporate.

Natasha Jakubowski: Have you enjoyed being the founder, being as a, as the kind of, uh, the way to kind of tell the story, being in the spotlight? Is that something that you've enjoyed as part of the kind of growth of that just out of. I'm just curious.

Carol Han Pyle: I do enjoy it when I get to do it. I think that um, if I, if I had a little bit more time and bandwidth, I would enjoy it a lot more. I, I do feel a lot of pressure to um, to be on social media, to, to be on TikTok, to post every single day, to be on Substack and Instagram and you know there's a lot, there are a lot of channels and you know, and I see founders on these channels every single day. Um, but I think when you are, you know, a two, three person team, it's harder to show up like that on a consistent basis. So yes, I do enjoy that aspect of it and I really want to do it more.

Natasha Jakubowski: That's good. Yeah, I mean it's. Every time I see, you know, there are some amazing families just. Yeah, they're spending so much on that aspect, which is amazing. And I think you're right, people do love seeing it, but it does, it seems, it seems like a lot of work. Um, so I was just curious, um, anything that um, do you. I am always, I think that is Such a kind of. Especially now, actually such a kind of fascination, uh, with founders, um, and it probably looks a hell of a lot more glamorous than the day to day. Probably feels like. What are some of the misconceptions you think, uh, there are about the kind of founder life, um, especially in something like Beauty? I was talking to, um, Annie, the founder of Credo, and she was like, yeah, this isn't as glamorous as it looks.

Carol Han Pyle: No, not at all. Not even close. I would say the biggest misconception of founder life is that successes happen overnight. I think that that is such a hugely small percentage of the brand stories that exist in the. Every time I. You know, sometimes I will be having a conversation with someone and they'll. And they'll bring up a brand, and I'll be like, oh, my gosh, yes, I just heard about that brand. It seems like they're doing so well. And then I'll find out that they've launched 15 years ago, and they're just now coming into this collective consciousness and, you know, trending. And it takes time. It takes resilience. It takes, like, you know, these huge moments that you see on social media. They're like, the exception, and they're definitely the highlight reel. And it's. It's wonderful and it's super exciting. Um, but it's much more about getting up every single day, you know, overcoming obstacles, setting goals, reaching those goals, setting new goals, reaching those goals, and it's a slow and steady climb.

Natasha Jakubowski: I. Yeah, I. I'm always amazed. Some of these. Some of the great brands. Yeah, they've been around. They've been at it for a lot longer than. Than most people realize. How. So you're a few years in. Um, what are your goals coming up, like, in the near term and long term? I mean, it's the kind of brand, I know you started in candles, going to fragrances. You know, it's definitely a proposition that could go into broader beauty. Like, how are you thinking about the brand? Uh, in the near term and long term? What are your ambitions?

Carol Han Pyle: Ultimately, I want to become a household name, legacy brand that has the potential to be around for 100 years. I want to have owned stores that can really convey the brand universe and the brand experience in the way that we envision it to be. Um, I think in the short term, I want to start taking steps towards that by launching into other categories while simultaneously solidifying our presence and the fine fragrance in home spaces.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. So more home than beauty, potentially.

Carol Han Pyle: I think it's. I Think it's lifestyle. So, yes. I mean, you know, home through candles and room sprays is definitely going to be a big anchor for us. Fine fragrance, I think, you know, is becoming a huge category for us. It surpassed candles last year. Um, and then, you know, subsequent categories that I have a lot of exciting ideas about will round out, you know, our sort of position and more of a lifestyle brand space. I think of Diptyque as a lifestyle brand even. Even though, um, their main core product base is. Is their fragrance.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, I was looking. I was talking to, um, I was talking to, um, the melon and gets founders and it's amazing. Some of the numbers that Diptyque and actually Byredo have managed to get to, uh, pretty impressive. Yeah, that's a whole other conversation, but yeah. Um, how do you decide? Do you do consumer research? You say that you, you know, Sephora gets involved because I'm sure they understand, uh, having worked with Sephora, they understand what sells and what gaps they have. How do you figure out what your pipeline is or how do you test stuff or. It's more informal, so instinctual.

Carol Han Pyle: I really develop products based on what I feel like making. And that is one of the beautiful things about being actually bootstrapped still and being fully an independent brand. I can really move, um, quickly and I can move from instinct and a true love for what I'm making.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Amazing. Um, gosh, I feel like I have so many more questions that, uh, I wanted to ask, but I'm running out of time, so, uh, I'm going to move over to the kind of more Quick Fire. Ah. Um, Quick Fire questions. Um, and the first one is meant to be Quick Fire, but there is a little bit of a lead in. So I remember. And obviously, uh, you know, fragrances have such, you know, smell has such a huge, you know, memory linkage. Um, and so my first question is slightly, slightly funny, um, in that one of my best friends growing up used to wear CK1 and it. I literally. She was my best friend and I literally. It made me feel nauseous and I'd be constantly driving in a car with her. Do you have any, any perfumes out there that you just think are absolutely terrible?

Carol Han Pyle: Oh my gosh. No specific, no specific perfumes. But I will say the fragrances that are overly sweet, which I think we've seen a lot of in the market lately, those kind of like sickly sweet gourmands that are very artificial in nature, are ones that I tend to stay away from.

Natasha Jakubowski: I have as a. I think I Mentioned I've got like a 13 year old daughter who she definitely likes some of the sweeter. Uh, the sweeter. I don't think I can even walk into a, uh, Bath and Body Works. Like, thank God she's graduated. She's much more expensive. Taste already, but yeah, it's insane. Best career advice. Worst career advice,

Carol Han Pyle: that's my advice is to surround yourself with talented people. I feel like that's something that everyone has heard before, but it's so important to fill, uh, in the knowledge gaps that you have with the most brilliant people that you can find. We recently brought on a strategic, um, partner who acted as the president of Byredo at one point in his career during their exit. And it's been transformational just working with this person and seeing how fast he moves and how decisive he is and, you know, the level of expertise he brings to the table that I couldn't even imagine was out there. So I think if you can find these amazing people and hold them close, that is the best advice that I can think of.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, amazing. Uh, worst career advice that you've had.

Carol Han Pyle: Be careful. I think, I think that the worst thing that you can do is not start right. And be too cautious about things and feel like you need to have a perfect 50 page business plan before you even execute anything. I think that, um, yeah, I think be careful is dangerous.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, I love that. Um, what are your favorite beauty brands? Uh, around.

Carol Han Pyle: Oh, wow. That's such a good question. I really love Sarah Creel. I think that she's doing amazing things. She was the product developer for Victoria Beckham before starting her own brand. And every single one of her formulas is just so top notch. I really like Cassandra Gray, um, and what she's doing with Madame Gray in the world of candles and fragrance. Uh, and I really like Farah, um, Hamidi. I think that her products just feel like little luxuries. So special.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Amazing. Um, what is, uh, what do you think your superpower is that's helped you, you know, be successful?

Carol Han Pyle: I think resilience. I'm really good at getting up when I've fallen down and I'm, I'm. I almost forget. I have this weird memory thing where I don't remember how hard it was to give birth and I don't remember how hard it was to make that mistake and have to live through it. It literally just becomes like a thing of the past and I move forward with like almost no trauma from these hard.

Natasha Jakubowski: Oh, my God.

Carol Han Pyle: That is so.

Natasha Jakubowski: That is the superpower. Amazing. Um, yeah. No. That's amazing. Do you, do you have any mentors?

Carol Han Pyle: I would say this strategic advisor that we brought on has been a very, um, powerful mentor to me. You know, I think that I need to do a better job at getting mentors. Um, you know, I have, I have other founder friends that I really admire and that I go to for advice all the time. Um, and so in a way, those friends are really mentors to me at various different points in time. But I wouldn't say that I have like a single mentor that I can, that I can point to.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, no, I'm always curious. I don't, I don't really have mentors. I always feel like I should have had or should find some. I don't know, um, anything that you wish you'd learned earlier in your career?

Carol Han Pyle: That's such a good question. Um, anything that I wish I would have learned earlier in my career. Excel. I didn't know how to use Excel until a year ago.

Natasha Jakubowski: That's amazing. I mean. Yeah, that's terrifying. You write poems and then you have to deal with the, uh, any daily habit that grounds, uh, you, that you, that you try and do to feel, to feel more, you know, okay, getting

Carol Han Pyle: outside in the first hour of the day that I'm awake, um, no matter what the weather, I will always go outside. I take my two dogs out for an hour long walk, um, at like 7am and it really starts the day off well.

Natasha Jakubowski: Okay. Um, Any belief about business that you've changed your mind on?

Carol Han Pyle: Um, I think that I've realized in the past couple of years how important it is to be equally operationally excellent as it is to be creatively excellent. I used to be under this impression, this vague impression that operations was just admin, um, and creativity and creative was king. I think that the two of them really have to work and sing together. Because even if you have the best brand, the best product, the best ideas, if you can't up, you know, if you can't execute against them in an excellent way, then everything falls apart and it doesn't even matter.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Hence the Excel. Um, Hence the Excel. Yeah. It's funny, I come up with ideas for big companies all the time. So I definitely realize, like, ideas are easy. Actually making them happen, that's a lot harder. There are a lot of people out there with ideas. Um, last ish question. So, um, what, uh, is there anything that you are trying to get better at?

Carol Han Pyle: Patience. I'm naturally a really impatient person and I want things to happen yesterday. Uh, and I want Growth to happen, you know, 10 times as fast as it's happening. And I think, um, I think having patience is a learned skill for me that I have to constantly remind myself of. And I think that along with having patience, that's very tied to being able to move a little bit slowly. I'm a very fast mover. I make decisions like that, which I think lends itself well to being a founder in many ways. But I think it's also not. It's really good for mental health to be able to slow down and actually, like, maybe do nothing for an hour. Like, pick up a book and read it and not always feel this pool to be productive.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah. Interesting. What's your favorite scent in your line? It's funny, I'm sitting here with, uh, I just happened to have opened the sundae, uh, chest. I think I can smell it. It's like I'm sitting here and I can. I'm really conscious of it. Like, what's your favorite scent in your line? If someone was to buy their first thing, what should they buy?

Carol Han Pyle: I think Taverny. It's our Vanilla Matcha perfume. Um, and it is a very, very sophisticated, salty tea, like Gourmand.

Natasha Jakubowski: Love that. Okay, I'm going to check that one out. Um, last question. Um, can you tell me who could be a what? I guess, but who are you professionally jealous of?

Carol Han Pyle: Um, I've been kind of thinking about this ever since you warned me about this question at the beginning of the episode. And I would say that I, you know, I think that the founder of Patagonia is incredible because he had. He built a brand that was actually category defining, and that's the ultimate dream. Right? Like, I want nut to be able to define the fragrance category. And he's done that within this, you know, this kind of outdoor apparel category, and he's done it alongside really good values and doing good and being, you know, Earth first and that. That's really incredible to me.

Natasha Jakubowski: Yeah, that's a good one. Um, Carol, thank you so much. Uh, it was so great to talk to you, and I feel like I just ran out of time. Like, it was crazy. Um, thank you. Oh, my gosh. Okay, well, thank you for listening. Please, like, subscribe. Take a look at some of the other episodes we have. You can find them all in the usual places. Spotify, YouTube, Apple Podcasts, or on professionaljealousy.com. uh, get in touch. Send me an email if you have any feedback or importantly, anyone that you particularly want to see featured. Thank you. To shimmy my producer. Thank you to everyone that has supported me. I'll see you next time.