Editorial
How Challenger Brands Turn Fragrance Into Consumer Permission And Exit Value
In part one of this two-part series on fragrance, I argued that the consumer industry’s sudden enthusiasm for fragrance benefits challengers more than incumbents. The reason: consumer permission. Large brands can build fragrance capabilities, but they cannot...
Why Incumbents Can’t Buy Their Way Into Fragrance
In late February 2026, nearly every major consumer goods company in the world walked into a ballroom in Orlando and told institutional investors their plans. CAGNY, the Consumer Analyst Group of New York’s annual conference, is one of...
What Happens When Brand DNA Erodes
In beauty, brand DNA is simultaneously the most valuable and most fragile asset, yet history proves it can erode easily. After buying the trademarks for Juice Beauty in 2005, I built the brand from scratch, obsessively protecting its...
The Big Divide: How 2025 Exposed The Real Winners And Losers In Beauty And Wellness
If there is a single idea that defined beauty and wellness in 2025, it was this: The industry stopped pretending that everyone was playing the same game. For years, capital markets and pundits treated...
Kenvue, Kimberly-Clark And The $48B Question: WTF Just Happened?
One Deal To Rule Over Them All When L’Oréal announced its $4.8 billion acquisition of Kering’s beauty business last month, the consensus in beauty was simple: Alright,...
What Everyone’s Missing About Ami Colé Founder Diarrha N’Diaye’s Skims Move
ICYMI, Diarrha Ndiaye, the founder behind the now-shuttered Ami Colé, has just been appointed as the new EVP of beauty and fragrance at Skims (beauty is something Kim Kardashian has been teasing since...
