 This is Startup Storefront. Growing up in New York City, sisters Mabel and Chayita have been working since they were 14. After years of savings, they decided to go all in on their dreams and start Lunamagic. Their first 18 months were a whirlwind. They landed three major retail accounts and made it on Shark Tank. And what's crazy is that it actually wasn't until the Shark Tank promo aired that their employers found out about their side hustle. They hadn't yet quit their day jobs and their bosses had no idea what was going on behind the scenes. But once they found out, it was nothing but love and support. This isn't a mystery as to why it occurred, as the energy and passion they bring to their endeavors is apparent. By the end of the episode, you'll likely feel the same way. In today's episode, we chat with Chayita and Mabel about how Craigslist is a secret hack for all small businesses, how small businesses can have the upper hand when it comes to negotiations with major retailers and what it takes to become a hero to the kids in their old neighborhood. All right, welcome to the podcast on today's show. We're talking to the lovely sisters of Lunamagic. Thanks for coming. People who don't know your company, what do you do? What do you guys make? A pleasure to be here. We provide high quality cosmetics at great prices, con mucho amor. I love that. Look at that. Rehearsed. Sure did. What made you guys want to start this company? I mean, we saw avoiding the marketplace for authentic cosmetic brand, like, you know, it's not the typical, I hired this celebrity, the Spanish celebrity to launch a brand. It's like, you know, we are the customer. Let's see what we can do. You're the user. Yeah. And what was missing? Was it like the shades that were missing? What was the thing? Or was it just like the founder, the story? Yeah, the shades, the quality for the price point. You know, we believe in, we're in mass retail, so we believe in everyone having quality to great quality cosmetics at approachable prices. And the founder story, the creative, the marketing, the positioning, I think we do an amazing job of bringing all that bilingual flair. The saboteur. The saboteur. La cultura. La cultura. I feel like, you know, people from our neighborhood, Washington Heights, they're like, oh my God, you guys made it. And we're like, yeah, and you can make it too. Yeah. You want to be that example for your neighborhood. Absolutely. That's a real thing. That's a big thing. And so what was the first step in you guys wanting to do this? Like, were you guys always, I'm assuming, obviously, it's weird to ask a woman if she's into makeup. The answer is probably yes. But to like decide to then get into the science of it, or like the manufacturing, what was the like the first step you guys took to do that? I think it was like conversations between us. At the moment, I was living in Boulder. And I just. In Colorado? Yeah, I was living in Boulder, Colorado. Were you lost? No. Actually. She chose. No. Actually coming out of New York City, it was beautiful. It was me funding. It's really nice. Finding myself, you know, living the typical housewife life and she would come and she used to talk to me about her life in corporate America and you know, the void she saw in the retail side of like bringing in like small businesses, cultural businesses into retail, how hard it was. And she used to be, you know, advocating for those brands all the time. So I went to makeup school after my journalism career. And I was like, oh my God, I like makeup, but I knew I didn't want to be a makeup artist. That was not my thing. I wanted like the business side of makeup. And you know, her frustration with my like, oh, let's do something. I think we started from there. What year was that? What year did you guys start this? 2018 was the first time that, you know, because it was kind of like when in the retail market, like she was saying, I was seeing like brands like Fenty Beauty were coming out like this unapologetic diversity, inclusivity stories. And those became the first manifestation for what I was seeing on the trend side. Like finally somebody did it. What's our version of that? But a lot of it started like Saida said, conversations and also inspiration, meaning looking at the women in our family and the power that beauty and makeup plays in our community. I mean, Latina women and we say this, and I say this with so much respect. Somos vanidosas. Literally from birth. We love to look good, to smell good, to feel good. Parents were in the salon. Like it was always like when I would come back from college, my family didn't even ask me about my grades. They were like, why is your hair like that? Like, are you going to have a chance to like hit up the salon? There's a pride in that. Yeah. I remember so growing up, we'd go like Machu Picchu in Peru. And then my mom would be there and it's like a rainforest. And so it's like, I mean, it's going to rain at some point every like hour or so. And so we're there and it's a bunch of Peruvians and we're just like in a pack of them, we're all walking up and all the women are like doing their makeup. Absolutely. It's a ritual. Hilarious to think about it's going to start raining in a second. And I don't know, I'll never forget that. Because all the men were like, of course, like the Peruvians, you know, it's like that's what they do. Yeah, yeah, they're a prideful woman. And so any time you're going to take a photo, they're going to look or try to look proper. Correct. Yeah, yeah. And so OK, so then you guys, what was the first thing you did? What was like the first product you guys made? We always thought about it as a collection. I always I remember telling Saida curation is everything. It's because the smaller you can curate and be intentional with every product, the better you can tell the story. So we started with five products and we focus on color names. Salud, Dinero y Amor, Gostosa, Amor, Mamacita and Reggaeton. Like Salud, Dinero y Amor. Like we were just really created with putting like the culture in the product. So we started with five products and that actually got us. What were the five? An eyeshadow palette. We call it the Uno Collection. Uno, number one, first. Kind of like Apple was like, you know, Apple one, two, three. We were like, let's do it like in that fashion. So the Uno Collection, Uno. So we had an eyeshadow palette, two lashes and two lipsticks, a red one and a pink one. And they were both for they look good on both my skin tone and Saida skin tone. And then we went to town. We launched the site and in four months, we got our first yes from Walmart, our first retailer. Yeah, because the thing with being curated is you can tell the story. The retailers didn't feel overwhelmed by, oh, my God, you guys have two hundred skews, right? They're like, OK, there's not a lot of risk in launching five things. Why don't we try with these five things? So I think that was the best strategy we came up with. Yeah, less is more. I mean, if you look at the retail space, everything is cluttered. And, you know, I was on the other side of the table. So I was thinking like a merchant, right? Merchants, your job is to bring in, look at skew productivity, cut things if they don't work out. So I come in with that training, I understood how to like position it to minimize the risk for them and us, but also focus on telling the story and the opportunity that our brand had for the for the long term game. And what markets did you guys start in? Like, what was it where Walmart felt comfortable to say, OK, we're going to start in these regions? That's funny. You say that because we also came with data. We came with our own data to say, hey, we were regional strategy. Yeah, we were very intentional. We went down to zip codes, zip codes. We're like, we want to be in this zip code and this zip code because we know our people are there. Exactly. Where is Lauda being played on TV? Exactly. I downloaded census data here. This is a nerd. Census data and we clustered the data. So we started in regional markets, obviously New York for Target, the second retailer, but New York, California, Texas and Florida. Yeah. So we're deeply. And then there's great markets, massive. Massive markets. So it's super helpful. Yeah, but then we learned with the retailers that there's random markets in the middle of America, where they're 50% Latino population, like one store in Walmart store in Wisconsin. And we were like, we didn't know that. So we start learning from them, too, about where these customers clusters are located because they have access to that information. Yeah. The one thing I learned recently by doing this podcast is like, if you're a brand and you can and you can partner with a retailer on a problem they're trying to solve, it's the best way to do it. And I never considered that. And I think at least the way I was thinking about just as an interviewer, it's more of like, if you if you if you think mindset wise that you're the entrepreneur, there's a there's a part of you that's going to feel really small when when talking to like a Walmart or a Target. But if you can partner with them on like a strategy, correct, all of a sudden it's like it's bigger and they respect you more and they're going to look out for you and then probably like ensure success because of this alignment. That is exactly what we learned. Obviously the first year we were super scared. We're like, oh, my God, what do they want? But then we realized that these merchants have so many accounts. So it's up to us to come to them with information. Hey, why don't we do this? And why don't we do that? And they love that from us. They're like, oh, my God, thank you for telling me. Thank you for telling me. And then we started building that relationship. And what was the pricing at the beginning? Like, how did you guys nail that down? That's funny, because at the beginning, to be honest, when we launched this site, we were thinking like 30 the price went between 25 and 40. But then we started studying the market and realizing, OK, where are our customers? I found this report that said where Latina customers are shopping, and they ranked in 1 to 10. Walmart is at the top of the list. Target, CVS, yadda, yadda, yadda. So then we looked at our pricing. Obviously Walmart is, you know, everyday savings. So then we re-looked at our pricing. But to be honest, when we re-looked at our pricing, we understood that mass means volume in a different way versus selling 38 to a specific segment of customers. It's about reaching as many people as possible. So you lowered it. Yeah, we lowered it. But it didn't matter because it's like we weren't anywhere nobody knew, but we did at the beginning. Like, we look at pricing to make sure it made sense. And for me personally, and we had this conversation multiple times, I am the high, low shopper. Like, I can buy the highest of the high. And then I'm like, oh my god, this is cute. This is $10. I go and I buy it. And I think in our culture, we think that way. We're like, OK, we're driving this Mercedes Benz, but we're living at home with mom. We like to dabble into the highs and the lows. So I just went to my sister and I'm like, you know, we all know we want this to be $32. But I'm thinking as a buyer, as this girl who's in college who's getting minimum wage, what is she willing to pay for this product? So then that's how we started. We're like, OK, let's be realistic to reach the mass. Yeah, that and like we say something that we said in our Shark Tank page. Bueno bonito barato, when our parents used to take us shopping. My grandma used to say that all the time. Exactly. It had to satisfy those three things. It had to be bueno, like good quality, bonito. It had to look beautiful and barato. It had to be, I hate using the word cheap. Inexpensive. Inexpensive. Inexpensive, just right. Affordable. Just the price, yeah. It has to make sense. In affordable luxury. Affordable luxury. And the beauty of that, of having that Latino cultural insight, is that we know that we have a large propensity to be unlawful shoppers. Once we find a brand that we like, like for example, Roscanilla, like there's certain things that I grew up in that I know I should buy probably like the more nicer version of it. But because that rice has so much significance to my family food culture, it's a loyalty there. It's highly unlikely that I'll ever trade up. You know what I mean? But that's the Latino customer that once we find something we love, we're deeply loyal. And so when you rolled out, how did it go? Like were you right about your assumptions? Or who did you find out your buyer was? How old were they? So the good news is, so we got, everyone is always asking, introduced and we, our buyer just understood it and it happened because to what you were saying earlier, they knew that they had a void with this customer base. So by the time we came with our Nielsen data and our regional strategy and our marketing and our packaging, it was, they were waiting for that. They've been wanting that. So that's why it almost always feels like a marriage. It was synergies. And you know, other Latina brands did go to these retailers but they couldn't maintain inside the retailer. And that's the biggest thing, maintaining. It's not getting in, getting in, it's great. Staying in. It's just staying in. And because they had the higher price point, they couldn't stay in retail. It didn't get sticky. And how are you guys going about marketing this? Was it Instagram? Social media, social media. And I think our first big push was Shark Tank. Like people don't realize that when we did Shark Tank, I still had a full-time job, okay? That I went back to and we're like, oh my God, I think everyone's gonna know that I'm doing this little magic thing on the side. But it was social media, press relationships. I brought in a lot of my industry contacts into the, and low key, I was slowly building those internal relationships without telling them that I was working on Luna Magic. In a nice way, I was like, what do you think about this idea? What do you think about that idea? But everyone was all excited and ready to push us. Everyone, but I think why we were so lucky is that everyone believed it wasn't hard to sell. Right, they got it. As soon as you explained it, they got it. Yeah, like even when you think about like the consultants, everybody just, there was something. Understood, which we. They were like, finally, yeah, that makes sense. I don't wanna say that the process was easy because it was not. I don't wanna say that. But I think there was a synergy where, you know, how we were selling it. There was a synergy going on of the atmosphere. You know, this was pre-BLM. It was organic. So at what point during your journey, did Shark Tank reach out to you, or do you guys? We reached out to Shark Tank, so it was funny. A Sunday, I was like, you know what? Let me put in an application, how to get into Shark Tank. And then I found the application on abc.com. Then I called my sister, I sort of got in and I fill it out. And I'm like, this is a lot of questions, but whatever, enter, who cares? Then someone emails us in 48 hours. And I said, Sharra, you're not gonna believe this. They got back to us. She's like, what? I was like, I swear to God, I'm not making this up. And then the rest is history. And what I love about that story is, I think people think that entrepreneurship is just like, it is difficult, but it's just like this hard thing. But a lot of the internet, there's access to all these things. There's LinkedIn, there's abc.com, it's all available. You just gotta shoot your shot. It's funny, when we had a Matt Higgins on who was a guest shark, he was like, you guys should focus on Shark Tank on the podcast for a little while and see how it goes. And I was like, all right, cool, we'll do that. And then I went to chat GPT, and I just input LA, so top Shark Tank companies based in LA. And it gave us a list of 20. And then we just reached out to the 20 on Instagram. There you go. But it was an interesting thing to think about of using GPT that way, which is a total hack, but it worked out. So before you guys go on to Shark Tank, what is going, are you stocking up? Are you going crazy? What is happening? Yes and no, yes and no. What a lot of people don't realize is that Shark Tank, we went to sell the dream. We didn't have a warehouse. We didn't have a lot of things. That's how it goes, by the way. That's how it goes. We were like, I, because I had worked in startups before. You had a dream and you had your mindset. Yes. That's it. One thing that I learned in startups is MVP. Prove the concept in a small way before you invest all this energy, time and effort, creating something that nobody actually wants, right? So we were like, okay, two of us, we look cute. We can sell this thing. Let's focus on our pitch. Let's focus on our visual identity. Let's focus on understanding the questions that we think they're going to ask us. Let's focus on getting a full set of samples of products that we intend to create should we get all these things and then let's go with these Walmart POs and let's see what happens. So it's just so funny to us. Now that I look at it, I'm like, how dare we think? We were standing there with no warehouse. Exactly. Everything, everything was in my garage. That's the best though. Everything was in my garage. We were like, what the hell? Now that I think about it, I'm like, what the hell were we thinking? We were so, I say this in the nicest, graceful way. We were so naive. That's the best though. Exactly. We were so naive. That's honestly the best. But you know, the good news is when we did the experience, which that's a whole nother conversation about the out-of-body experience that we both shared from that, is they asked us these questions, but again, we got information. They were like, you need a warehouse that or not. Then the next week, we were like, Craigslist, warehouse manager. Oh, we gotta go find it. You know, it actually gave us information to know how to take the next step. Because you listen to the questions. Exactly. We went there to learn. You learned a lot. We went there to learn. They're like, you need a warehouse. Lori said. Put your faces on the packaging. Lori said, put your faces on the packaging. Barbara said, it's you guys, selling the vision. You can sell stocks for all I care. And we were like, wait, what? People believe in you. And it gave us confidence to know that the founder's story is what's probably gonna drive this brand. Did you know Alex Rodriguez would be there? No, no, no, no. He was a guest shark. They didn't tell us anything. What was that like? I was not surprised. Yeah, we were like, mm, okay. But we shout out to Alex. He helped. I feel like somebody like him helped us. People know who he is from baseball, right? Everybody knows Alex. That man's a businessman. Yeah. But he's a businessman, right? Like he's like a mainstream Dominican. Like everybody. So I think it helped create that cultural connection. Yes, he helped. He understood. He literally helped tell the cultural meaning of what it is to be Dominican. He was like, he helped us with the shark. And we had a Spanish moment, which I think it was cool to show on national television like us straddling between speaking to these American business sharks and then this Dominican American businessman. And Mr. Wonderful, he kind of went into you. He kind of went in, but I think he had a good day. He's such a teddy bear. He had a good day that day. He had a good day. He was actually, yes, he was tough, but he was actually really kind. I think everything he said was true. Yeah, that's true. But again, we don't listen. He's like, oh, you're gonna get him. It's the way he's, his delivery, maybe. The, what did he say? The ocean is gonna. It's like you both went out fishing. You went out fishing and you caught a whale. Caught a whale and you're just trying to get a whale. The wind is gonna eat you alive. And then we were like, okay, let's just keep going. Oh man, that's pretty funny. Did you guys go in there wanting a specific shark? We kind of knew who made sense. Yes. And who did in your sense. We were open, we were open. And probably Lori. Yeah, we thought Lori. We thought Lori would come in. Because of QDC and her setup like that, right? Yeah, we thought she would come in, but to be honest, like Barbara made the most sense. It was like a New York city energy. That's right, yeah, that's right. And she likes investing in pairs. She told us she likes twos. Yeah. Like two co-founders? Yes, if you look at her history, she's always investing in co-founders, siblings or cousins or family. The lobster boys, she loves those guys, yeah. And then we found out that her makeup artist was Dominican. So then she kind of understood that she had access, yeah. That's actually really good information. And then you guys made the deal on TV. Correct. Did it then work out after? No, we chose not to close. We both mutually decided that what we needed out of, from the, for the business, it wasn't, there wasn't a synergies, but it was very amicable. Yeah, she wanted 30%. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Kind of massive. Yeah, yeah. But she's a shark, right? Yeah. I mean, we're a killer, I don't know. But she gave us great advice. She gave us great advice around, and if anything, we walked away very inspired because she believed in us. She was like, regardless of what happens, like just you guys are like, you guys are magical. Like she gave us the best advice. We were like, okay, where do we start? And she said, why don't you start on Craigslist? And I'm like, huh, finding employees on Craigslist? It's a thing. Yeah. And she said, yes. We didn't know how scrappy she actually was. That's a pro tip for anyone listening. Correct, it is. Go to Craigslist. I would have never thought of that either. Our number one employee who's been with us for two years and our most loyal, it came from Craigslist. Jose, shout out to Jose. Craigslist. Exactly. Craigslist. No, it's true. Yeah, that's crazy. Yeah. That's amazing. And so then what happens when you guys go off to the show airs? I imagine, I can only imagine what happens on the sales side. That goes crazy. Yes, spike in traffic. Well, first of all, the promo went up and somebody at my job saw me. Is that you? And I'm like, who? Where? And I was like, oh, I think I need to quit. I think this is- You were exposed. I was like, ah! Oh my God. But on the sales side, you know- Did you quit? Did you- No, I did. So I had a conversation with my boss and I said, hey, I think I need to work on some kind of flexible agreement here. Okay. And she goes- Just take all your time. It's your side project. I was like, yeah, it's kind of like taking off but I'm not really sure. And then she goes, okay, so what's the deal? And I said, well, you know, we're gonna be on Shark Tank. She's like, what? And then I go, yeah. And we're rolling out at Walmart 1500 store. She goes, girl, you don't have time to be here. You need to go run that business. So on the premiere night, when the episode aired, my team from my former company, we did a viewing party. And it was, everybody was just excited for us. And that's a beautiful thing to be able to transition with peace and optimism instead of like, you know, quitting and everybody thinks somebody's dying. Yeah, that's hard to do. We didn't negotiate that. That's tough. And at least she was supportive. It could have went the other way. No, she was- No, we actually learned how people thought we were brave Yes. By being entrepreneurs. And on Shark Tank, like that night, phone calls from former bosses, interns, exes, like people- Oh my God, oh my God. What works easy? LinkedIn, phone, email. It was crazy. People from like high school, people from like mentors. It was like, oh my God, it's crazy. Yeah, but it was a shared win. Everybody was like, wow, like we're not surprised, but also we're so happy for you guys. Yeah. And that was nice. Did you guys raise capital after that? Or did you need to raise capital? No, no, no, we're so family funded. Okay. And so the sales are enough where you guys are in good shape. Yeah, we're very profitable. We were very- That's great. You know, we launched, now in hindsight, three retailers in 18 months. Walmart, then we fast followed with Target and then CVS. It was very aggressive growth. That's a lot you're saying, yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But that's, you know, we've been, we were actually running a profitable business. So that's nice to build a business. Usually startups don't make any money for a really long time. Yeah, especially, well, I guess maybe in the makeup game, things can be a little bit more high-market. Yes. Which is kind of nice. That's why we like to call ourselves Mastige. What's that mean? Mastige. It's that we're targeting the masses, but it's like at a price that it's more elevated. So we're like- The quality of the products. The quality of the products. Our products quality is like a $30 quality for like eight bucks. Beauty lovers are into quality. They know when they're getting a deal. Exactly. Like we stand for values. For example, our lash facts. That's one of our highest repeat purchase because A, you need them all the time, but like they know like, wow, we can't believe that we're getting this quality product at this price. Yeah. How many stores are you guys at now? 2,500. Okay. Same retailers? No, across all three retailers. Are you targeting anyone else? Is there like- Oh, yeah. They are targeting us. Who's on your list? We've had to, to be honest, because it's been 18 months of like, you know, of these three retailers, we've had to pause- And COVID. Yeah. And COVID. Yeah, growing a team. We've had to pause other retailers because we're like, oh my God. You're catching up. We're catching up. Yeah. This is the year of catching up. Yeah. Cause also we have to build a team, build a culture. We also had to move. We outgrew our first warehouse in nine months and we had to move the warehouse. So it's like the growth has been like, it's not just like the retailer side. It takes so much work to even do business with these retailers. And what a lot of people don't realize is that we're an indie brand, but the process is still made for the big boys. Sure. So we're jumping, we're like growing into like, operating like the big boys. It's a big commercial operation. When you think about the future for your business, what does it look like in terms of like, do you guys want to sell this eventually? Do you want to expand into other things? Maybe fashion? Like what's the curiosity? For us it's to be really open. And I say that because the natural trajectory of beauty is acquisition, but I think that the Luna Magic brand is starting to be A lifestyle brand. A lifestyle brand. So it could be different categories. It could be interesting experiential opportunities. Like we're actually in that space of like saying, we did an exercise of like, if money wasn't an issue, and we could partner with any brand in the world. Dream collab. Across beauty, fashion, food. You know we- Let's do it. Let's do it. Who is it? Tell me who it is. Who is like the dream collab? So for other beauties, it could be us having a narrative story with a legacy brand. I think that could be interesting. Like old beauty and new beauty, and how do we could tell a cool updated story. I think Nike could be interesting. If we look at beauty through the lens of performance, like for example, like now athletes are wearing lashes on the court. Right. Like female athletes are looking. The intersection of like athleticism and sexiness. I think Nike could help us to, hey Nike, exactly. It could help us tell that story. Obviously your fashion brands could be, could we be the official beauty sponsor of Oscar de la Renta? New York Fashion Week. Like why not stretch ourselves to anything? But what about what do you think? Other verticals, haircare, fashion, clothing. We just, so many things. Skies of limit. Yeah, I think that's so fun. I think about also sometimes these brands that like when they're so mission driven like you guys where you're trying to like do it for your community or be the example entrepreneur to people like you or that look like you even. It's like you can become a movement. Yes. And then that takes on a different life. You start thinking different, right? So it's not a business anymore. It's you're past it. Now it's about the movement. Yeah, that's what we learned after Shark Tank. All these emails about, oh my God, you inspire us. You inspire us. We're like, okay, this became a hobby. This was a hobby. This was fun. And now we're like, okay, we have this community that is looking up at us to like inspire them. So we have a like a huge responsibility to like to keep going and giving them the resources. And that's why we started Mentor Magic. Because instead of us like answering one email at a time, we're like, no, let's just do this properly. Let's do this annually where we, you know, open it up for our community, answer any questions that they have, give them the resources. Because you know, there's a lot of companies that say follow your dreams. But what does that mean? And we're like, okay, what does that mean? What comes after follow your dreams? No. What are the steps? Exactly, what are the steps that you need to take in order to get there? That's where we are. So you guys help them with that? Yeah, yeah, like through Mentor Magic, we provide like community events where we kind of host a Shark Tank style or like we're intimate. Tell us what your problems are. We'll give it to you 100% real. We'll tell you like the behind the scenes of what retailers won't tell you. Like I keep it real with all my entrepreneurs, but we keep it in a very safe space. So it's not gossip. It's more like there aren't that many people like us that even had this chance. And if you look at the new brand entry rate, let's say a Walmart, they only allow 2% of new brands every year. So how do we level the playing field to our community now that we've made it, sharing with them, think about it this way, right? Having that information that can help change somebody's life. And is there a success story in there yet? Or we have a couple brewing? Yes, so I have two success stories, I think. I advise a brand called Okua Beauty. They're two Dominican sisters in the haircare space and they're ramping up to launch in their first retailer soon. And then Bonita Fierce Candle, a woman that came to our Mentor Magic event in New York City. And she's being presented with some interesting opportunities for next year from a major retailer. So it's just, to us, it's like to me that's how you know you're moving the needle. Like as we learn something, don't make the same mistakes. Or don't, you know what I mean? And in the same way that we've actually benefited from mentorship ourselves. Like we have people telling us, don't go, you know? And thankfully our company has resources that we are surrounded by amazing quality experts. That's why people don't realize in the background we're being guided. So how can we pay that forward to people who are a little bit early on? And you're listening. Yeah, we're listening. Which is the whole secret. I think that's the thing. Some people don't listen to good advice. And understanding that there's a piece of the pie for everybody. Like I feel like sometimes we have this mentality. It's like, okay, if you guys have it, I don't wanna share the resources. I don't wanna share my secrets. Like no, let's just be open and let's all make it together. And what I tell my sister is like a selfish thing. I said, you know, you always hear these stories of people who made it, but they're lonely at the top. I wanna drink nice champagne with a bunch of us. So I don't feel alone when we exit or whatever the end goal of this, you know? Like to have a community of people who I call, like we started from the bottom. Now we're here and like-minded and also mission driven forward that wanna pay it back. I think that ecosystem to me is what gets me up every day. That's actually one of the reasons on all our real estate deals, we'll have investors because it's like, if it hits, everybody wins. Correct. Everybody has to win. And then you're not the guy paying for everyone. Right? You hear those stories. Like there's one person and then everyone doesn't know how to add value. But if you train and you give people tools and you hold them accountable little by little, everybody can feel that they're part of that win. Have you given the startup bug to anybody in your family? My brother keeps telling me now. Now he's who I was to her like five years ago. My brother was like, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? You know, I think everybody's startup idea has to be unique to them. Yeah. Totally true. It's such a personal thing that an old me would be like, I think you can be the next Bill Gates. Now I'm learning to listen to what they're telling me. All the therapy is working. This is so good. Yes, I have a therapist, a coach. Now I listen to what they want and I make sure that I ask questions around making sure that it's their dream and not mine. I think entrepreneurship is so personal. It is pretty. And it's almost like a mirror. It is a mirror. And so what the world sees is sort of how you see yourself. Yeah. That's the thing. And I think at the beginning it's like, we try to like guide people, you can do better. You can do better. And then we learn, no, if they're okay going to this level, happy content. At their pace. At their pace, let's just guide them to that level. And it's okay, they're happy, we're happy and let's go with it. Everybody's happy. That took me a long time to figure out. I know you got frustrated, right? You can do more, you can do, no, you gotta let people, and they get there on their own. They get inspired. Like I spoke to somebody yesterday who said the words, I could tell that he was in a runt and then he like figured it out. And then we reconnected and he said, and I said, how are you doing? It seems like you have all these wins. He goes, I'm inspired. So that's how I know when somebody's like on the path when you could figure out how to create things that make you feel good and inspired. Cause if you're coming from a place of inspiration. It's easy. Yeah. So what's next for you guys? I know your bigger warehouse. You mentioned that. World domination. World domination is number two. Just growing the team. I feel like. How big is the team now? How many people do you guys have? 16. What I call my hustlers. I mean, everybody in there. So if you're listening and you're looking for a job. Lunamagic.com. Lunamagic.com. We're hiring. We're actually hiring. We're looking for people. What kind of roles are you hiring? Operations, mostly supply chain. Okay. Account management and marketing. Okay. Any marketing guru, social media. But you must love Instagram. Like it's your life. You have to be a bloodline. You gotta be a pro. Yeah, exactly. We don't care about the age. We care about the passion. All right. So you're hiring, new warehouse. What else? Dreaming big. Now we're like looking at the vision. We're looking at like financial forecasting and how big we think this can be. Talking to different types of companies around. I'm going to shoot my shot right now in case somebody's watching. I have this vision, or we have this vision of putting a Lunamagic lip balm in a first class flight. I don't know if it's Delta, JetBlue. Oh yeah, do that. One of those airlines. So thinking like, and we spoke to somebody and they're like, that's possible. We did something that, that, that, that. That's totally possible. Exactly. So those are the kind of ideas that we're kind of getting excited by. Like where's our customer? What is she doing or they're doing outside of coming into retail? Where are they shopping? Is it Forever 21? Are they on a plane? Are they at Coachella? Would you ever do your own retail? Like your own location or pop-up even? She wanted that at the beginning. You know what I think is possible? A beauty salon experience. Oh, that's fun. Right, like where there aren't that many, like dry bar is an end to end experience. But imagine a dry bar with a culture. So this, as you were talking about this earlier, I don't know why I thought this, but I was like, I thought that, but then I thought about it at a sports stadium. Ooh. Because women, if you think about it. It's true, they're bored. They're kind of like, hmm. Not all women, but some women, right? And it's mostly like a dude's thing. And so in this scenario, you almost change it up a little bit. I also thought about it like a sales pitch. Like you can convince somebody to try this pretty simply. You know what, it's a funny why you say that because we went to ComplexCon, which is a mostly boy thing. And all the women that followed their boyfriends to support them. But it was interesting that the guys came to the makeup section. Oh, my girlfriend would like this. My girlfriend would like this. I'm buying this for my girlfriend. So that sparked my interest to your point. Like men are actually also looking for cool things to give their girls. Yeah. So the sports. Maybe a pop-up. I don't know why I thought about it, but I was like, this would be dope. That sounds cool. I think the Yankee Stadium. That would be dope. Yeah, the Yankee Stadium, I think. Right for the top. Right for the top. Alex, this is where you would come in. You had that complex. Of interest then, but y'all are together no more. It's the week. That's true. We're so shady. What else should we know? Where can people find you? Where can people shop? Find us on lunamagic.com. We have a store locator page. We're distributed in CVS, Walmart, and Target. Hit us in the DMs, mabel.friasexo. Saida is. Saida.frias. And Lunamagic Beauty. We want to hear from our community, from anyone, anybody that's inspired by this podcast and maybe thinks something that we didn't think about. We're always open to hearing new ideas. And our next mentor, Magic. We're giving out a $10,000 check. Oh, wow. That's huge. Yeah, that's amazing. For you, yes. For your business. We're having an event in September, partnered with a hair care company that we'll announce later. But that to us is how we want to grow with our business and our community. The first step was providing advisory services and being real and intimate spaces. And next step is capital. A check to match the advice. And then the question is to those who are watching, how do we turn a $10,000 check to a $50,000 check to a, right? And how do we put more people of color in more favorable entrepreneurial spaces? I love it. I think that's gonna be cool. Thanks for coming on the podcast, guys. That's great. Of course, we had a blast. Un gusto. Thank you. Muchas gracias. Thank you so much for the support and making it to the end of the episode. If you haven't already, please do review and show the episode with your friends. If you never want to miss a beat on all things entrepreneurship, make sure to follow us on socials for daily content. See you next Tuesday for another great episode.