Hardware Podcasts

Supergoop!: Holly Thaggard (2020)

How I Built This · 28 Aug 2023 · 1h 11m

What this episode covers

Holly Thaggard, founder of Supergoop, explains how a friend's skin cancer diagnosis led her to pivot from a harpist and teacher to creating a daily-use sunscreen brand. She details the technical challenges of formulating a non-oxybenzone product, the failure of her initial school-distribution model, and the strategic pivot to prestige retail. Thaggard describes securing a critical partnership with Sephora through aggressive PR, a bold investment from her brother, and the eventual scaling of the company to $250 million in sales.

Most relevant to

founders before launch, early-stage companies and companies scaling up

Topics

Mentioned

Companies
Sephora, Nordstrom, Burt's Bees, Barney's, Giggle, FAO Schwarz, MZ Wallace, TSG, Cult Capital, Berman Communications
Products
Supergoop!
Materials
Oxybenzone, Avobenzone
Also
Maria Sharapova, Roxanne Quimby, Nancy Berman, Kim Holt, Amanda Baldwin, John Kenny, Elon Musk

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