Amid the talk of beauty entrepreneurs achieving billion-dollar exits, entrepreneurs on the other, far larger end of the spectrum—those operating on passion rather than big paydays and often not compensating themselves at all—get overlooked. Colleen Poe, founder of Apo.Ge, is one of them.
She’s never received a salary from her Manuka honey-infused skincare brand. She’s sustained herself with support from the federal Supplement Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), also known as food stamps, and her husband’s income from photography and marketing consulting. In Oregon, where Poe lives, families of two can earn up to $3,407 per month and be on SNAP. Poe approximates her two-person household receives about $500 per month from the program.
She says, “I don’t think I have ever seen anyone admit sometimes, when you are a business owner, you are broke eating Top Ramen and sometimes you need a little help and the SNAP program can offer that help.”
However, that help could be dwindling soon. The budget legislative package dubbed the Big Beautiful Bill winding its way through the United States Congress contains provisions to slash SNAP, which the federal government spent about $100 billion on in 2024 or 1.5% of its total spending, by an estimated $295 billion over 10 years by reducing federal contributions to states, tightening work requirements, limiting certain classes of immigrants’ access to food assistance and restricting benefit increases.
The Congressional Budget Office projects 2 million people could be thrown off of SNAP if the proposed reductions to the program ultimately pass through the Congress and are signed into law by President Donald Trump. There are about 42 million people on the program now at or below the poverty level. Trump has pushed for the Congress to pass the Big Beautiful Bill by Friday, although its fate is currently uncertain.
Poe believes cutting SNAP is reckless. “Gutting social aid programs to benefit the rich or our military budget is unfair,” she says. “People really rely on their SNAP benefits and any kind of support that they can get to make ends meet and put food on the table.”
To shine a spotlight on the very common financial challenges of entrepreneurs, including those who depend on assistance from programs like SNAP, Poe launched a social media series on Apo.Ge’s accounts about growing her skincare brand to earn her first paycheck after four and a half years. She’s plowed every single dollar she’s earned from the brand—in its biggest sales year, 2023, it generated $125,000 in sales—into the business and had hopes she’d finally pay herself this year.
“You don’t see anyone talking about the money side of the business, particularly the money side before businesses are profitable.”
Poe says, “I felt very vulnerable about sharing because there are expectations that you can start a brand, throw it on social media and be an overnight success, but you don’t see anyone talking about the money side of the business, particularly the money side before businesses are profitable and people are able to pay themselves.”
Poe began the year bullish about her chances to earn a paycheck from Apo.Ge. She initially projected Apo.Ge would reach $200,000 in 2025 sales and cross into the black. The year began promising. In the first quarter, Apo.Ge generated $40,000. Then, on April 2, Trump announced he was raising tariffs on most countries around the world, and the brand’s sales went into a tailspin as consumers grappled with the possible impacts. In the second quarter, it generated about $18,000 in sales.
Poe has recalibrated Apo.Ge’s 2025 sales projection and is optimistic the brand can reach $120,000 this year. If the brand hits that mark, she figures she can pay herself $2,000 monthly. Broken down further, in a video on TikTok that’s garnered 46,500 likes, she discloses that she could pay herself if Apo.Ge generates $400 sales per day for 60 days. Finally receiving a paycheck from the brand would push her above the income threshold for SNAP eligibility.
Poe senses Apo.Ge’s proposition as a natural skincare brand with Manuka Honey as its core is right for the moment. She says, “Manuka honey has definitely had its moment with people taking it internally, but I have yet to see it really have its moment for topical applications, and I think that Manuka honey can be the next tallow boom, but definitely with more data and research behind it than tallow has.”
External forces have been Apo.Ge’s most significant impediments lately. Along with the consumer spending pullback, higher tariffs have had a direct effect on the brand’s upcoming product launch of water-based skin hydrator Vitality Serum. It was going to put in an order of 10,000 units of embossed paper tube packaging to house the serum, but it obtained the paper tubes from China and cancelled the order as soon as Trump hiked tariffs on Chinese imports to 145%. Trump has since reduced the tariff rate on Chinese imports to 30%, although rates vary by product.
Poe scouted suppliers of the paper tubes outside of China and inquired seven manufacturers about them. The quotes they provided were five times the cost of the Chinese manufacturer post-tariffs. One told her it wouldn’t do the embossing. Another recommended she just stick with China. Ultimately, she did stick with China, but reduced the number of units she’s purchased to 3,000. Three months delayed, she anticipates wrapping up production on Vitality Serum in mid-July.
“There are a lot of people that are in the same position as me.”
Poe cobbled together $24,000 from her personal savings to establish Apo.Ge in 2021 with four products. Today, it offers eight products priced from $12 for a lip butter to $60 for a face cream. The pricing hasn’t been finalized for Vitality Serum, but it will be in the high $20 to low $30 range. Understanding the financial pressures consumers are under, Poe is adopting pricing strategies to ease their purchases of the brand’s products by giving different pricing options. She plans to launch products with more active ingredients at higher prices and mix in simpler products at lower prices.
With the assistance of her father, a former financial advisor for Boeing, Poe has carefully budgeted to afford product launches, marketing and advertising. Apo.Ge’s cost of goods is roughly 20% of the selling prices. The brand is setting aside 15% to 20% of its revenues for marketing and advertising. Focused on building its wholesale network, presently accounting for 10% of sales, with the remainder coming from direct-to-consumer distribution, it’s attending spa and salon trade shows this year and dedicating a few thousand dollars to paid ads on Instagram and Facebook.
Apo.Ge launched with CBD in its products and encountered restrictions on social media advertising of CBD that inhibited its growth. It’s phasing out the hemp-derived ingredient and concentrating on merchandise without it in its social media ads. Befitting a cautious mindset, in its ads, the brand is sending the message that people can do more with less by using its products.
“Paid advertising feels like a gamble to me at this point with the size of a brand that we are and the budget that we have,” acknowledges Poe. “Given how quickly these social media platforms have changed to monetize every aspect of engaging on them, it feels like, to be competitive you have to have a huge marketing budget of hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
Poe went into Apo.Ge grasping that she wouldn’t receive a salary straight off. She previously worked in human resources at Sisu Extracts, a cannabis extract company that was acquired in 2020 by cannabis and hemp company Left Coast Ventures, and watched the founders of Sisu Extracts go unpaid as they were building the company. For the first year of Apo.Ge, she held onto a part-time position as a manager at her local farmers’ market.
Reflecting on her decision to publicly discuss her Apo.Ge salary—or lack thereof—Poe concludes that it’s made her stronger as a business owner to become more comfortable diving into uncomfortable topics. And she’s gratified when other business owners are less lonely in their journeys by learning about hers.
“There are a lot of people that are in the same position as me,” she says. “The amount of support and solidarity has been incredible.”
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