CBD remains top of mind for beauty editors.
Winged CBD took home two out of three possible editor prizes at Deskside Domination, a media pitch competition that closed out the two-day entrepreneurial education conference BeautyX Demand Generation on Tuesday at the Sheraton Grand Los Angeles. NewBeauty executive editor Liz Ritter and Beauty Independent editor in chief Rachel Brown selected the female-focused cannabis wellness and beauty specialist as the winner of the contest. Well+Good editor Erin Magner chose Kegelbell, a pelvic floor training system that also scored the audience prize. The winners receive coverage in the publication of the editor that picked them within the next 12 months.
The three founders involved in the live learning competition, Winged CBD’s Jessica Mulligan, Kegelbell’s Stephanie Schull and NHCO Botanical’s Nicole Hawthorne had five minutes each to pitch their brands to the panel of editors. After the pitches concluded, the editors were allotted five minutes to questions the founders. The founders, all of which lead brands less than 2 years old, were assigned veteran public relations professionals that acted as advisors to prepare them for the competition. Mulligan worked with Charmed PR founder Robin Tolkan-Doyle, Schull with Six One CEO Kilee Hughes and Hawthorne with Erin Kelly, founder of Erin Kelly PR.
The Deskside Domination competition gives participants and BeautyX Summit Demand Generation attendees a rare opportunity to hear post-pitch evaluations straight from editors. “The feedback was amazing,” says Mulligan. “You usually don’t get that kind of feedback when you’re doing a real deskside, [the editors] are like, ‘Yup, OK, bye.’” On why she picked Winged CBD as her winner, Brown says, “I thought all the brands were great. A lot of times our decisions come down to news at the moment, and you have a lot going on getting into all these stores, launching in Anthropologie. You’re on-trend and seem to be gaining momentum in a field that’s super crowded. We want to know the brands that are really going to win in this area. Who is the next Lord Jones?”
Schull entered the competition fresh off Kegelbell’s double win in the 2019 Best In Show awards. Judged by beauty industry experts, the awards were doled out to brands that exhibited at Indie Beauty Expo trade shows last year. The Vagina Gym captured BIS accolades for Best Personal Intimate Care and Best Sexual Wellness Product. Discussing Deskside Domination, Well+Good’s Magner says, “The reason why I went with Kegelbell is you said it was the first FDA-registered device to do this. First to market is always a big thing to us. I thought it would make a really fun first-person ‘I tried it’ story. It’s easier to do that with a product that’s different from what’s typically out there.”
The Deskside Domination contestants had a presence at IBE LA, a platform for indie beauty and wellness brands that was held on Wednesday and Thursday at The Reef in the city’s downtown area. Live learning competitions are parts of the various BeautyX Summit events, including BeautyX Retail and BeautyX Capital. Beauty X Retail is coming to Dallas in May, and BeautyX Capital will occur in New York in August.
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