Many of us know Jessica for her acting career from being in “Meet the Fockers” and “Fantastic Four.” Why would Jessica want to become a entrepreneur when she has acting? She ran into a problem when she had newborns, she realized that she was having a allergic reaction to most of the baby products that she was using.
Jessica wanted to come up with new products that could be harmless products for newborns. Jessica started writing a book about her experience and that lead her to a environmental scientist names Christopher Gavigan. Christopher was driven to do the same thing that Jessica was so they decided to team up and start the Honest Company. Jessica and Christopher pitched their idea to Brian Lee in 2009 but Lee turned the away saying ” it was not very promising.” Jessica and Christopher did not give up they went back to research and came back to Lee in 2012 when Lee decided to join them and launch Honest Company.
Honest Company would sell baby products that can provide families with five quintessential products of their choice for 35.95 for only a month. These products include bath and body, diapers, vitamins, feeding, gifts, to cleaning, and everything that a baby needs. Honest Companies made first of its 80% of its sales online. Honest Company soon reached deals with target which then distributed their products through chains including Buy Buy Baby, Whole Foods, Nordstrom, and Costco. The Honest Company raised 530 million dollars over seven rounds of funding. Honest Company made 12 million dollars in revenue in 2012 and drew to 150 million in 2014. In 2015 Honest Company hit the 1 billion dollar net value, despite people telling Jessica that her idea does not match her “sexy” image and the business would fail.
Jessica is still making a great deal of money today despite people telling her that she would fail in the business world. Jessica says that acting is easier to do because in the business world you relay on the business to support your life and family.
This is a great example of how bouncing ideas off of another individual can really improve an idea’s success. By partnering up, Jessica was able to give her company an even better chance in the market. Also, this is a great example of how just because the first model doesn’t work, doesn’t mean you should quit. It was interesting to hear how the first pitch failed, and it wasn’t until they adjusted a few things that the Honest Company started to see success.
It is crazy to think about how many other companies might have even based their models and plans around her monthly, new products idea. Look at dollar shave club. While in most cases it isn’t a dollar, but you can get new products every month. It will eventually be a snowball effect.
I like how you highlighted the nature of Alba coming up with the idea: she saw a problem that was specific to her, wondered if it was applicable to others, and built a successful company out of that. I’d be interested to explore some of the controversy recently surrounding her brand, since according to some sources the company isn’t as “honest” as it claims, which raises interesting questions about the duty of an entrepreneur to follow-through on their promises.
This is amazing. My sister actually just had a baby back in March and she found she was allergic to the shampoo Ryder (her son) used. I love that, although Jessica already had a “brand” to her name, she decided to use her passion and advocacy for this topic to create something that would benefit so many parents and children worldwide. Very cool!