Earlier than Billie co-founder Georgina Gooley launched the “web’s favourite razor” model, she was certainly one of many ladies struggling to discover a razor that may get the job achieved proper — sans pink tax, which generally marks merchandise made for ladies up by 7% on common.
Gooley was bored with utilizing razors marketed to males that did not tackle girls’s distinctive shaving wants — eradicating hair from the legs versus the face, for example — so she started to marvel what a razor model created particularly for ladies would appear to be.
“I spotted the class was very male-dominated,” Gooley says. “So whether or not it was the legacy model that had been round without end or the newcomers on the time, the opposite startups, they have been all very centered round giving males a greater or extra inexpensive shaving expertise. Nobody was actually specializing in girls’s shaving expertise.”
On a mission to cease girls from being an “afterthought” when it got here to shaving merchandise, Gooley and her co-founder Jason Bravman launched Billie in 2017.
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“I needed to return in and be a proud girls’s model and champion womankind,” Gooley says.
Based on the idea that ladies ought to have an inexpensive razor designed with their wants in thoughts and be empowered to resolve in the event that they need to take away their physique hair in any respect, Billie garnered widespread assist and noticed fast viral success.
The corporate, which was acquired by Edgewell Private Care Firm for $310 million in 2021, celebrated its fifth anniversary in November 2022. At present, Billie is a full-fledged body-care model with greater than 10 best-selling merchandise throughout its classes.
Entrepreneur sat down with Gooley to study extra about Billie’s rise to web stardom and the way it’s fueling the body-hair acceptance motion right this moment.
“We felt there was a possibility to return in with a product particularly designed for the way in which girls shave.”
It was the beginning of the twentieth century when manufacturers started focusing on American girls with hair elimination campaigns. In 1904, Gillette patented its first security razor, which made it simpler for males to shave at house; quickly, in a bid to develop their market, security razor producers unfold the concept physique hair on girls was “inherently masculine, “indelicate” and “unhygienic,” per The Smithsonian.
By 1915, Gillette launched the primary razor marketed particularly for ladies — the Milady Decollete. However it was the start of a 100-year-plus historical past of manufacturers promoting razors to girls with out essentially tailoring them to fulfill their wants, all whereas charging a premium and pushing the agenda that shaving wasn’t a selection, however a requirement when it got here to private grooming.
“We felt there was a possibility to return in with a product particularly designed for the way in which girls shave, [to] create a model that may converse to them,” Gooley explains.
Gooley acknowledged the clean area out there, however she confronted some skepticism in these early days. “After we spoke to traders,” Gooley remembers, “notably males, they type of questioned it: ‘Nicely, I do know males care about their razor, however do girls care?'”
Gooley knew the reply was sure — and she or he got here up with a product to place it to the check.
Billie’s razor has 5 nickel-free blades for an in depth, easy shave that will not irritate delicate pores and skin. Aloe moisturizer additionally surrounds the blades for additional consolation, and an ergonomic deal with and magnetic holder make it straightforward to make use of and retailer (no slipping).
The model’s subscription service additionally retains the acquisition course of easy, permitting clients to decide on an possibility that works finest for his or her shaving frequency.
Picture credit score: Courtesy of Billie
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“We needed to be a model all about selections, no strain.”
Along with its dedication to cautious product design at an inexpensive worth level, Billie strives to dismantle concepts about what girls ought to or should not do with their physique hair.
“For us, that meant by no means pressuring girls to look a sure means or take away or really feel like they should take away their physique hair,” Gooley explains. “It was at all times positioning shaving as a selection — we needed to be a model all about extra selections, no strain.”
When Billie launched in 2017, the model’s dedication to design and body-hair positivity spoke to girls everywhere in the U.S. Simply three days in, Billie’s razors had offered to clients in all 50 states, and 6 months later, the model’s Challenge Physique Hair marketing campaign additionally made a splash.
The marketing campaign celebrated physique hair and emphasised that shaving was a selection. It wasn’t a one-off push both, Gooley says, however the way in which that they needed to signify girls — and nonetheless do. That viral marketing campaign landed Billie billions of impressions and worldwide consideration.
“We had folks actually from all around the globe writing to us,” Gooley remembers, “saying, ‘I’ve by no means seen physique hair [in a campaign]. I am unable to consider that every one these razor firms had been shaving shaved legs. I did not even know that I wasn’t seeing [body hair] till you set it on the market.'”
“Even a small underdog model could make a big effect and alter a class that is a century outdated.”
Billie’s fast development “was a very thrilling wave to journey,” Gooley notes. It additionally meant making an attempt to maintain up with every part, together with having sufficient stock available to maintain that demand — “all wonderful issues to have,” Gooley says.
Nonetheless, regardless of the robust assist at launch, some skeptics, notably social media trolls, have been delay by Billie’s body-hair acceptance.
“I am at all times fairly stunned when folks have such robust opinions about how different folks look,” Gooley says.
Luckily, the model did not must intervene a lot in these conversations; its evangelists have been already on it. “We had such assist from girls everywhere in the world that anytime folks would say ‘physique hair is disgusting and ladies must look a sure means,’ [supporters] would simply are available in and defend our place, which is similar as their place,” Gooley says.
One other fascinating improvement got here out of Billie’s push to normalize physique hair too.
Hastily, legacy manufacturers began to indicate physique hair of their campaigns too, Gooley says: “That was in all probability the most important win for us — as a result of even a small underdog model could make a big effect and alter a class that is a century outdated.”
Picture credit score: Courtesy of Billie
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“We need to rejoice the total spectrum of womankind…there are numerous stunning ways in which girls can exist.”
The dialog round physique hair has continued to maneuver ahead within the years since Billie’s rise to web fame. “That is the factor with illustration,” Gooley says. “For those who see it, it turns into extra normalized, and it is much less of a shock.”
“We at all times make it possible for each picture shoot that we’re doing options girls with and with out physique hair in order that we’re normalizing each side of the coin,” she provides.
Searches for “feminine physique hair” elevated by 319% since Billie launched 5 years in the past, in accordance with Google Tendencies. Moreover, Gooley factors out which you could “stroll by a billboard in Soho” and see girls’s physique hair on full show right this moment — a sight that may’ve been far much less seemingly just some years again.
Via its campaigns, Billie continues to push for body-hair positivity, embracing the various methods girls select to signify themselves and their contributions.
“We need to rejoice the total spectrum of womankind and present that we should not all be having to suit inside [society’s] very particular field,” Gooley says. “Physique hair was type of the primary foray into exhibiting there are numerous stunning ways in which girls can exist.”
Supply: Entrepreneur