
Courtney Adeleye On Selling The Mane Choice And Launching New Brand Watch & Sea At Target
When Courtney Adeleye sold her brand The Mane Choice, which reached $100 million in sales and 60,000 retail doors in six years, to MAV Beauty Brands in 2019 for $61.5 million, she was in her late 30s, young enough to trek down the entrepreneur path again. She told herself, “I’ll take a step back now and see if I want to do something in the future. If I do, and I have my health and strength, I’ll do it again.”
Adeleye, a former nurse, first reappeared as an entrepreneur in 2022 with beauty and wellness platform Olbali, which reached $2.5 million in sales by 2024, according to information she provided publication Women’s Wear Daily. It encompassed several brands, including coffee and tea brand Cool Coffee Clique, women’s health essentials brand Foolproof Body and skincare brand Wait & Sea. Last year, Adeleye shuttered Olbali to focus on another brand, Watch & Sea.
Watch & Sea launched last month with haircare, skincare and body care available in direct-to-consumer distribution. Now, the brand’s Flourishing Collection with 10 haircare products priced from $16.99 to $32.99 is entering 200 Target locations on Feb. 2 and extending to end-caps in March. Flourishing Collection’s lineup features The Original Hair Flourishing Capsules, The Original Hair Flourishing Gummies, Sea This Hold Maximum & Shimmery Slickback Glaze, Sea This Hydration Refresh & Revive Rehydration Spray and Sea This Perfection Twist & Braid Out Soufflé.
Adeleye attributes Watch & Sea securing Target distribution early in its life to the relationship she established with the chain at The Mane Choice. She says, “While we’re still a new brand, for a place like Target to trust us enough to say, we’re going to bring you on an end cap for your second month, that’s really a big deal in the beauty space.”
Ahead, we chat with the serial brand founder about how she got started, her decision to sell The Mane Choice and what she’s doing differently with Watch & Sea.
Where does your love of beauty come from?
My love for beauty has always has been there. I’m from Michigan and Detroit is known as the hair capital amongst cities. It went deeper as I started to further my education in science knowing, OK, that plays a role in our hair. What do we eat, the vitamins and nutrients? What are we excreting? I went on YouTube and found there was a whole world of people who had the same interests as I did. That’s where I started building the community of haircare well before I decided to open a haircare brand. My platform was talking about our struggles, talking about things we go through with our hair.
At the time, I decided to actually get rid of my relaxer. I’ve had a relaxer ever since I was 10. So, as an adult, this was my first time experiencing my natural hair. When I started to take care of it, I noticed there was nothing on the market I felt catered to people who wanted to take care of their natural hair. We didn’t want anything harsh, we wanted something that was more natural.
What were you posting on YouTube?
I started posting products I liked, and it transitioned to mixing my own products. At that time of mixing my products, I still did not have a desire to start a haircare brand. It was more or less there’s nothing on the market that I want to use on my hair, so I’m going to start making it myself, and I would document it. YouTube was a digital journal. I wasn’t trying to have a following. I literally just wanted to use the videos to start tracking my journey and that journey brought me to my community.
At what point did you decide to start a brand?
Around 2008 or 2009 is when I started mixing products, and 2013 was when I came out with The Mane Choice. Because I was using the products myself for years, people were writing in saying, “I’ve been seeing you use some products, and I’m seeing your hair grow year after year, we really want to buy those products that you’re using.” At the time, I was still in nursing school, and I’m like, “No, I don’t really sell products.”

How much money did it take to launch The Mane Choice?
I started my company with $500 and that money was the bottles, labels, ingredients. I launched with deep conditioner. I never had to take any type of funding. It was, I’m going to make five of these and put these out on social media. Those five sold and then I was able to, say, have 10, then those 10 sold. I used the grow-as-you-go method.
I definitely didn’t have a business plan. I didn’t even treat it as a real business for years. It took a minute for it to sink in that people are buying the products because they’re good. That first year was one product and, by the end of the year, I came out with hair butter and then supplements and that took the company to a whole other level.
The supplements are what made the brand take off?
That’s what really built the company. When I did a pre-sale for the supplements, I ordered 500 and said, OK, well I’ll just see if anybody wants these supplements. I’ll never forget, on Black Friday, I wound up doing a special promotion on social media and gave out 50% to 90% off codes. The person at the time who was helping me with my website, she gave 50% off to everybody. I sold over $30,000 and didn’t even have $30,000 worth of products coming in. I only had the 500. That really gave me what I needed to start the company and take it to the next level.
I had to email each and every one of those people and let them know, “This was a glitch, I really apologize. You got two options: I can refund you your money today or I can ship this for free once I get the products back, which is probably going to take a few months.” I think 98% of the people were like, “Courtney, I know you’re new, take all the time that you need.”
Supplements were the foundation of my company. They were the bestselling product. No one in my space was selling supplements at the time. We made history with Walmart and Target bringing supplements in the haircare aisle. They’d never done that before.
When did you decide to sell The Mane Choice?
After six years is when I decided to go through with the acquisition and exit. To be honest, when I went for an assessment, I didn’t go in saying it’s time for me to sell this company. At that point, it was over $100 million in sales year-over-year. I wanted to see, was the company valuable? Have I been doing things right? My background is in science, not in business, so are my margins worth anything?
The difference between myself and a lot of brands is I was 100% the owner. I had no private equity. I didn’t have to wait to grow this company to a $300 million valuation in order to come out OK. So, I said, you know what? Maybe it is that time.
Looking at The Mane Choice, it would have been a challenge because we were so hair-focused, hence the name, to be able to shift the core identity. I wanted to go into skincare. I wanted to do body care. From a business perspective, that is something that I would not do again. I wouldn’t put the category in the name of the product.
“We made history with Walmart and Target bringing supplements in the haircare aisle. They’d never done that before.”
Why did you want to jump back into haircare now?
One of the main drivers for me is looking at the evolution of the category. I feel it has taken a few steps back in regards to the offerings. There’s nothing exciting. You have some companies that say, OK, textured hair is popular, so let’s get into this category. Well, that doesn’t necessarily mean that you’re coming in with the right intentions. Are you using ingredients that we shouldn’t be using in our hair? Are you relatable to the consumer?
Right now, with any of the popular brands, a lot of attention is on the brand itself. I put my attention on my consumer, and that’s when people feel celebrated. That’s when people say it’s fun and it’s all about us.
What went into the debut collection of Watch & Sea?
This was one of the most comprehensive launches that we’ve done. Normally, you probably see a set that’s like four products, five products, but we started with eight. It was important for me to say, let me give you a collection from start to finish. The No. 1 thing I get is, “Courtney, oh my god, I love your hair, how do you do it?” Well, these are the steps you need.
I also wanted to highlight ingredients I felt were beneficial. Over the last few years, I had the ability to research sea kelp, marine water and say, OK, can we go outside of the typical oils? What else is out there that’s beneficial to the hair? Watch & Sea is taking more of a marine element stance. That’s making this brand different. It’s not just in the haircare, we’re using it in the skincare and body care.
What’s Watch & Sea’s marketing approach?
For me, it’s never a marketing approach, but from the outside looking in. If you build a community, then the community is going to do the heavy lifting. When we went to retail the first time, the retailers knew who I was before I got there because of the community. It’s literally about turning the camera around, taking it off me and putting it on my consumer.
What has the best return on investment is when you give it back to the consumer. I’ve been doing pay my bills ever since I started The Mane Choice. Every week, we’ll pick a new person to pay a bill. It may look like it’s marketing, but actually it’s something that comes out personally. I just want to show my appreciation and say, you guys grew the brand, I couldn’t do this thing without you. I’m not the one that’s buying the products off the shelf, so this is just my way of saying thank you.

How have you funded Watch & Sea?
I can’t say I started this one with $500. That would’ve been great. I knew my likelihood of going into retail would be higher this time. So, instead of taking a grow-as-you-go approach, we prepped this time. The crazy thing is I didn’t have the placement when I started to go into production. It really wasn’t supposed to even be a thought until 2026. But I’m a person of faith, and timing is everything. We were able to pull the trigger and say we’re ready.
Why is Target a good partner?
Target always gave us opportunities. We have an understanding, when it comes to retail, they’re not going to do the heavy lifting for you. Now it’s even more challenging getting in retail than it was because you have the Amazons, TikToks, there’s a lot of competition. They’re more selective in regards to who they work with. We were just fortunate to be one of those brands. Target allowing us a chance to come in and grow with them, we’re super thankful.
You mentioned a lesson you learned from The Mane Choice was not to limit a brand by putting its category in the name. What are other lessons you bring to Watch & Sea?
I did things by myself for the longest with The Mane Choice, even the exit. While there were benefits to that, I’m more open this time to bringing on people to get the business to where I want it to go.
When we create a brand in the United States and make it popular, other countries want those products. I’m more open to getting help on making that happen. Before the acquisition, I wanted to take The Mane Choice international, but I didn’t get a chance to do that. This time, I’m more open to looking at different ways of growing versus being a one-man show.
What long-term goals do you have for Watch & Sea?
Being everywhere once again, going into any and every store that sells haircare products. Accessibility is everything. It’s going to be tricky because we still want to be on social media, we still want to be in the TikTok space. It creates challenges, but it doesn’t create a barrier. I want to be that brand that’s just as popular on social as it is in the store, and that means we have a little extra work to do.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
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