Turning an Ancient Japanese Beauty Practice into a $500 Million Dollar Beauty Brand with Vicky Tsai, Founder of Tatcha

Vicky Tsai, founder of Japanese beauty brand Tatcha, had a
nontraditional path to eventually founding one of the top
skincare companies today. About 10 years ago, Vicky decided to
leave her thriving career and travel the world in search of
happiness and meaning in her life. 


In her travels, when visiting Kyoto, Japan, Vicky had a
life-changing meeting with a Geisha. She learned some of their
natural skincare secrets which healed her skin & soul in the
truest sense and she wanted to bring the same experience back
with her to the US. 


However, when launching Tatcha, there were many barriers she
faced: Asian skincare wasn’t popular, direct-to-consumer
businesses weren’t common, and consumers weren’t interested in
clean products. Fast forward to today, Tatcha is available in
Sephora & QVC and is the second fastest growing women-led
company on the Inc 5000 list. And last year, Unilever acquired
Tatcha for a reported $500 million dollars. 


Vicky is passionate about giving back. Since inception, they have
partnered with Room to Read in their mission to educate girls
globally and have sponsored over 3 million days of school.


In this episode, we’ll talk to Vicky about: 


* How 9/11 impacted Vicky’s perspective on life’s meaning and
purpose [4:00]


* Vicky shares how she used business school to do introspective
work on herself [6:28]


* Vicky discusses her career trajectory and why Howard Shultz,
CEO of Starbucks, played a big role in her leaving her corporate
career [10:57]


* Vicky shares how she thinks about social entrepreneurship and
using business as a vehicle for social change [15:52]


* Vicky describes why Kyoto, Japan made such a big impact in her
life & truly healed her from the inside out [18:02]


* How Vicky thinks about money, risk & success and key tips
she shares with entrepreneurs when starting a business [20:28]


* How Vicky sold her engagement ring to buy 10,000 blotting
papers and bring Tatcha to life [24:32]


* Why Vicky decided to not raise money from investors early-on
& the personal sacrifices she made to keep the business
afloat [26:54]


* What Tatcha looked like in the early days and how she
eventually got the product in Sephora & QVC [33:45]


* Vicky shares her advice on raising money with institutional
investors [44:37]


* Vicky describes how she felt when stepping down as CEO and the
immense growth the Company saw when she stopped caring about what
others think [45:48]


* Vicky shares what it was like to sell her company for $500
million dollars and the legacy she wants to leave behind [53:20]


Follow Tatcha:


* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/tatcha 


* Website: https://www.tatcha.com/


Follow Yasmin:


* Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/yasminknouri/


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