FlutterHabit Has Become A Multimillion-Dollar Company By Replicating The Look Of Lash Extensions With At-Home Products

After Kasey Jackson tried professional eyelash extensions in January 2018, the idea of futzing with mascara to lengthen her lashes seemed nonsensical. She loved that she could achieve natural-looking full lashes and not have to deal with makeup. What she didn’t love was the price—professional lash extension services can run anywhere from $100 to $500—and the inconvenience of having to visit a salon to have the extensions done.

“I wanted to figure out how to get that natural, effortless look at home where you don’t even need makeup. I searched the market looking for a solution and couldn’t find anything, and saw that there was a pretty large gap in the market and started setting out to bridge that gap and create a solution,” she says. “I figured that, if I was having this problem, then other people would have this problem.”

Through the bulk of 2018, Jackson, a stay-at-home mom at the time, experimented with every fake lash and glue she could find, but they didn’t provide the long wear or natural look she was seeking. Eventually, she roped in her husband Tim, who formerly worked in business analytics and insurance, to contact manufacturers and secure prototypes. After several rounds of product edits, they landed on an offering called The Original, faux mink lashes with a doll-eye shape priced at $29.99 on a one-off basis or $25 on subscription, 90% below a $250 lash extension service.

“The concept is that they have to be applied underneath the lashes. In order to do that, they have to be super light and segmented into four pieces,” explains Tim. “We sold them in boxes of three and, right before we launched, we decided to put them in six packs at five days of wear per, which is a month’s worth. We were thinking of a consumable product that you could wear every day or almost every day.”

The Jacksons spent around $12,000 on inventory to launch their faux lash brand FlutterHabit in June 2019. In 48 hours, the brand’s sales covered their investment. FlutterHabit is profitable on each order. In less than a year, it surpassed $1 million in sales. Last year, the brand was on track to register a 300% to 400% sales increase. FlutterHabit was catapulted by people within the Jacksons’ network that had a few thousand social media followers sharing their experiences with it.

“That was where we got our first 500 customers, creating an initial groundswell of people who were into lashes. We primarily relied on Instagram for a lot of our company growth,” says Tim. Kasey chimes in, “For our first year, demand was always more than what we had. It created almost a FOMO effect…It almost made it have an exclusive club-type feel. Get subscribed because they’re going to sell out.” FlutterHabit guaranteed subscribers would receive lashes.

Pandemic-related supply chain disruption has been a central player in FlutterHabit’s out-of-stock issues. Early on in the pandemic, the Chinese factory it relied on was closed for some two months. Just as the brand was confronting the closure, an influencer with currently north of 1 million followers spotlighted it, sparking a crescendo of interest it couldn’t immediately satisfy. “There were so many people that wanted to buy our product and couldn’t for such a long time. That was hard,” says Tim. “We even got accused of doing it intentionally to create FOMO, and we were like, ‘No, no, no, we are not doing it on purpose.’”

“I could probably count on one hand the customers I know that have gone back to professional extensions after trying our product.”

Although supply chain hiccups could plague FlutterHabit going forward, the brand nabbed a line of credit from a bank about a year ago to help alleviate the inventory pressure on it. “When you are first starting, they will not touch you. We had to build up our profitability. Then, we could spend with a little more confidence into our supply chain,” says Tim. “We haven’t used the line of credit, but, once we got that confidence of, ‘Hey, I can still make payroll and not spend every dollar I have if sales dry up next week,’ now, I’m at the point where I have months and months of inventory of our product. When the supply chain really started to get crippled, I had prepared with inventory.”

Roughly 40% of FlutterHabit’s business is driven by subscribers. A goal for the next 12 months is to double down on subscriptions. A strategy for swelling the subscriber base is to remedy any concerns customers have had with its products, including adhesive. In summer of last year, it introduced Made For This Adhesive to assist with quick and easy application. The product has lowered FlutterHabit’s churn rate.

Overall, the brand has a dozen or so products in its assortment. The Original is a perennial bestseller, but the newer The Sweetheart style is a hit as well. While not as lengthy as FlutterHabit’s previous styles, Kasey says The Sweetheart brings “a little bit of volume and drama.” To expand FlutterHabit’s assortment, limited-edition or seasonal styles are planned, and the brand expects to release specialized removers and possibly an eyelash serum.

FlutterHabit has entered the chain Beauty Brands. Both the brand and the retailer are headquartered in the Kansas City area. Target and Sephora are on the Jacksons’ retail wish list, and the duo also expect to spread FlutterHabit at salons, where it has begun to gain a foothold. Kasey emphasizes the brand attracts a surprisingly broad range of customers online and at retail.

“You would think it would be people who are really into makeup, but it’s not. It tends to be people that want a simple beauty routine that they don’t have to fuss too much with,” she says. “We really resonate with busy moms and professionals that don’t have a whole lot of time.”

FlutterHabit has risen along with an explosion of at-home do-it-yourself beauty merchandise amid the pandemic as salons shuttered or people were uncomfortable patronizing them. The prospect of the pandemic subsiding in the future, however, doesn’t frighten the Jacksons.

“I could probably count on one hand the customers I know that have gone back to professional extensions after trying our product,” says Kasey. “The way that the pandemic normalized people wearing sweatpants all the time—sweatpants have become chic—our product has a similar draw as people started putting them on at home, and they started doing their own lashes. There is no going back after that.”