SHONTAY LUNDY – Franks & Beans with Sugar

beanies and wheenies and to others franks and beans. Franks and beans. So it could be called three things, one of three things to me different people, and it's your favorite dish, like to date, all the foods you've had. Yeah, because I'm not a cooker, and this is something that I can easily prepare, it's affordable, and so I'm curious, when was the last time you ate this? About a month and a half ago? Okay, okay, was it like the middle of the night or you were like, I'm

craving it? No, straight up dinner? Yeah, straight up dinner. Um. I work a lot long hours, and um, I didn't feel like, you know, spending money on delivery, and it was something that I had in the fridge, and you can't go wrong with beans not perishable in the in the cabinet. You know, I used to live in South Florida, so, um, we would have to prepare for hurricane season, so like beans isn't essential, So I always have beans in the house.

But you're originally from New York and then you lived in Florida and now you live in l A. That's right. Quite a journey, right, Yeah. You you're a mover and a shaker, a risk taker, a risk that's how I see those moves. Yeah, yeah, you're a visionary too. I like to consider myself as Yeah, that's amazing. So while you prepare this dish, I gotta know how you go from how you get to building black girls on the screen. This wasn't a first venture, was it? As an entrepreneur?

It was? It was it was leaving upstate New York right after college to South Florida, pursuing my graduate degree in business, and um, being in the corporate space for twelve or thirteen years, transitioning out and then saying, you know what, I must continue on my life journey and that meant coming to Los Angeles because that's always been

part of the plan. Um. While I got here, it was it was interesting because you can drive down the street whatever to three o'clock and see people having coffee, tea, eating and just kind of like, what do they do? Why are they not at work? How do they do what they do and live in these houses? Right? There's many different reasons, many different things. So it's kind of like, all right, So while I transitioned out of the corporate space, I had time on my hands because I moved here

with no job, no place to live. I just literally got into my Twodor infinity with my my English bulldog, and I drove to Los Angeles and I said, I'm gonna find whatever I'm gonna do when I get there.

And I got here to stay with a friend for legit two weeks, because that's the timeline I gave myself, found an apartment and started hiking and doing lots of yoga, and um, really appreciating the time that I had to myself because I'm coming from like a really structured you know, just time, right, Like most people are starting school at the age of five, then you go to twelfth grade. Some people go to college and some people don't. I choose to go to college, right, another four years. Then

I did my graduate program two years. Right, so we're on like whatever, eighteen years of school right. Then I worked in corporate for twelve years, so waking up at six o'clock in the morning and going till four or five. I was also in extracurriculum activities such as whatever cheerlating track. I played the violin. My first job was, um, I was. I did a paper out. I was at fifteen years old and I had to get a paper out because I wanted my own things. So in the eighties and

the nineties, I'm aging myself here. Um. One of the cool things was to have your own phone right in your bedroom, in your bedroom that is not a cell phone, like a phone that was like connected to the wall right with the caller I d But in order for me to get that that phone, I had to work for it. Right. It wasn't attached to my my family's phone line, like I had my own phone number as a teenage girl. Oh that's a big deal, A huge deal.

So what are they like answering? You know, back in the day, they would just you know, everyone would answer phone hello, Hello, Hello, and you'll be like mom, my got it like one of those and you're like, I'm done with this. I'm dealing with it. And then your parents were like, get you know, if you want a phone, you better you gotta get a job, whether it's babysitting. Yeah, but I was always um wanted to be like independent,

if you will. So first job, age of fifteen, And I'm gonna circle back to how we got to Black Girl's Sunsteen because all of these things that I'm sharing with you is part of the journey, right, So, first of all, having a job at the age of fifteen is huge sacrifice, especially as as a teenager. And if your job started at three o'clock in the morning, that means you can't have sleepovers like that's important for teenagers,

especially teenage girls. But it also sounds like you're very popular because you you needed this phone, so you're popular giving up your right. I don't know how do you define popular? Well, did you have a bunch of friends? No, I like a few friends, but I was on cheer leading. I don't know. Popular weird, that's weird. That term popular was weird. But you did sacrifice, Yes, I did sacrifice.

I did sacrifice, like not being able to go to those parties, not being able to sleep over and um having to roll up papers in the rain and deliver them. And then also like how do you get subscriptions to how do you get new customers? So that's where the salesmanship came in and that's how I learned. So anyway, fast forward to being in Los Angeles. UM, I said, you know what, I'm gonna take this time because I didn't have a job, I didn't have anything I wanted

to do. But at this point, you quit Corporate America. I'm just curious, what is your thought process when you're deciding to quit, because it sounds like you're a clean slate. You moved to l a clean slate, So what is the triggering moment where you're like, I want to break. I felt like I've done everything I needed to do in Miami. I wanted to change the pace, different scenery.

It was time to go. I finished what I was doing, And maybe I shouldn't even have stayed that long, right because I went to Miami to do my masters and I found a job, So it was just like okay, like continue on the path. Like I still don't think that Los Angeles is a final stop for me. Oh okay, okay, the story is gonna get I'm just open and I'm just open to to always expanding and building and trying

new things. But now, when you're moving to l A, you're leaving stability at this point, so too, well, I'm curious you're leaving stability, right, I don't if I'll be leaving it. It was just like a piece, like a like a like a stopping point. Um, so I can always come back. Yeah. I go to New York very often. I go to South Florida, Miami very often. M Yeah, so I don't think I'm leaving anything behind. It was

just kind of like a touch point. Yeah. Yeah, I made my mark, penetrated the market, you know, cultivated great relationships, and built black Girl's suncreen here. So now what if we have a team in Texas or a team anywhere in the country. That's how I see that. Well, let's start trying to whip up some of this dish. And I'm imagining this dish only takes like five minutes. You're just heating it or what how do you do this? All? Right, so we have our boiling water. It's not boiling, So

let's turn this on. So I'm a non cooker, and that's why this is one of my favorite dishes a because I don't cook right, and it's just something really easy. Yes, all right, so and watch how because it gets hot? Yeah yeah. So we got um two pots, one of them that will be boiling water and then the other one where we're gonna put the beans. So um, early eighties nineties dated we did not have like to flip, right, So that's good that it's just kind of like a

regular like can just pop that open. There a lot of juice, but will make you someone's gonna pour the beans you Okay, I think this dish was less than ten dollars. It was definitely less and I don't want to say it was less than four dollars, uh, depending on exactly I was gonna say, depending on my hot dogs, Like I could have really came up. If I wanted a dollar store, this would have been a two dollar mail. So while those heat up, um, and I'll i'll help

keep a close eye. And the water has to boil before you put the hot dogs in. Some people put that dog in the water while boils. I would literally watched my husband boil spaghetti and he put the spaghetti in the water before the water boiled. And I've never seen that done. Needless to say, it came out as spaghetti. But I would never authorize that. So now I ask. So I've been eating this meal since. UM. I can remember as a little girl being from upstate New York. Newburgh.

UM is a place where you must leave if you have any aspiration of being anything. You know. I grew up in the early eighties, um, and that was like the crack academic um. And um. There wasn't much happening in Newburgh, so if you had like a decent job, you would have to travel down to Manhattan, UM, take the train and you know, find work. Um. So this meal was very affordable for my family. I am the oldest of six. Yep. That's also why you want another phone line. Four. There were four of us in one

household and then the other two in another household. So my parents, Um, we're both in the military. So I was born in Fort Knox, Kentucky. My parents were only married for one year and got divorce, but at we stay they were married, and UM, I grew up on my mom's side. But there are six of us, so anyway, my mother had to feed you know, four of us with not much means honestly, um, not that she was a young mom. It was just kind of like she had to do what she do what she could. Um,

and this was just our go to meal. Um. Hamburger helper was another go to meal. UM. We also love like grits and eggs, um and bacon for for breakfast. I can't say that word. It's really bizarre, but I can't. So um. You know, the thing is like I took this meal all the way through college because it was just something that reminded me of like being home and like feeling safe and just affordable and good. Yeah, and

it didn't. It never gave you the instinct so like you know, I know, on eating well broke, we call these dishes like broke dishes, but you didn't ever feel like, oh, I'm eating this broke dish. She felt like this was

like a homely this was your comfort meal per se. Yeah, you know, broke is a perspective because um, although um, we didn't have much when we were coming up, it didn't feel like we didn't not have much compared to you know, are my peers like people in my class, like, you know, they might have new sneakers, you know whatever, three or four times a year. My new sneakers might just come like in the beginning of the year for

for school. So um. But my grandparents they taught us to have pride, you know, to keep our things nice and clean. Um. So it didn't feel like we were you know, broke if you will. It just felt like like this is what we have for the time being. And broke is a mindset. Um. So if you're feeling like, hey, I'm down and out, I don't I don't have any money, Um, in my situation isn't going to change. I think that that is that is the definition of broke. It's not

just monetary thing. So even today, like I choose to eat this meal, but it is a choice. Yeah, it's a choice. As it's definitely a choice because you have black Girl sunscreen. And again this is all relative, right because is I mean, are we the Muska of the world? Are we the um what's this dude from Meta um Zuckerberg's of the world, right, Like this is all relative because that money and our money is we were broke. Yeah.

I was just on the phone call with someone today and I no one judged me on this show, but I've been going through my own personal But I said something like, well, you know, a minimum in l A market, I have to make like at least a hundred fifty And the guys stopped me and he was like, a hundred fifty thousand, and he started laughing. He was like, you mean a hundred fifty million, and I said huh, And then I said no, facts like you're right, Like,

why is my my parameter so low? Yo? Not even one percent of the population of the United States makes a hundred thousand dollars. But that's a real statue, that's a real statu Yes, So again, it's all relative. It's relative on where you live, you know, how you spend your money. All of that six figures for a person

is is an accomplishment. Yeah, except for in l A. It feels like because this is this is this is La La ly and then you have to understand that, and it's it's hard to remain ground it here because when you drive around and you see t G wagons and everyone has a test, You're like, oh shit, what am I doing wrong? Am I doing something wrong? Or what am I not doing right? And how do I get that? It's all about your mindset. Though. Speaking of mindset,

I want to circle back to you at Corporate America. Yep, you have a graduate degree. Clear, I'm gonna just assume you're making great money, You're moving up the corporate ladder. You decide you want to exit. What is the reason you wanted to exit? Um? I felt like I learned a lot from my corporate positions, and I felt like, um, there was nothing more for me to do there. M So she's adding sugar to the thing. I sure, I am. We're gonna sweet it even more. A lot of then was.

And I used white sugar because that's what it was in the eighties and not brown sugar. It wasn't brown. It wasn't brown sugar. So now when you make it to use brown sugar, do you still use white? Um? I still use white. I use white sugar actually for everything, and um, people on me like why are you using And I did not have a wooden spoon. Also, I would just probably shake it up or use a metal spoon.

It is what it is, right, Um. So you know, transitioning out of corporate was a realization of Hey, like I learned some valuable Um, I had some valuable takeaways from from that position, and it helped me to where I am today in terms of how to run my business, how to establish different departments, how to hire, how to build corporate culture. So it wasn't that, hey, I have this awesome idea for a product, because that's that's just one piece of it, but how do you run? How

do you run the business? So you were able to get that experience. So it sounds like while you were there, you looked at your job is more of almost like another form of education. You are just trying to catch a check. You were over there like observing absolutely and um the space that I was in you had to be a top performer. And what that meant was you had to perform at a high level in all aspects.

So there was different like measurables, whether it's like customer service or sales, or retaining employees, recruiting employees, you know, gaining accounts. So if you were like in the top of kind of like your class and like you would always not advance, but you were doing well. But if you were in the bottom of your job was in jeopardy of getting termed. UM. So it taught me like I was always competitive, but this is not a different

This is not a different level. Right. You're competing against whoever, people you don't know, for money, for bragging, race, for promotability, and um, I've just learned a lot from that space. I have nothing bad to say about my corporate experience, um at all. And again, like I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for those things. Now, while it was a corporate I also wasn't rolled into a pH d program. Um. So one of my goals in life is to become

a doctor, a professor if you will. And I had to transition out that as well because it was a lot it was corporate PhD and then Black Girls sunscreen. So you're working on a Black Girl sunscreen this whole time, Um, not the whole time two thousands in fifteen SI. So I transitioned out of the one job after like whatever ten years, moved to Los Angeles and then I mean, your money kind of runs out, of course. So I didn't work for four months, best four months of my life.

And that's how I came up with the concept the Black Girls Sunscreen because I had the freedom to let my mind just run wild, right, So when people go on vacation from their jobs, it's kind of like, oh, all right, I have seven days off, great, like disconnect, do whatever you want. But guess what on that if day, you're back at work. So when you take time them all four months, five months, there is no like, oh, shift, I gotta go back. You're just doing whatever you do.

And I've never had that freedom before because I've been so structured school, school work, you know what I mean. Like up at six bed eleven twelve repeat, coming to Los Angeles, who was like, la la la la la la la la la la. Yeah, I don't have ship to do today. I'm going to do yoga. I'm gonna go to Balwa Hills and and take a hike. Um, I'm gonna walk my dog. I'm gonna just be aimlessly like, oh, buildings are pretty. And that's when I was able to

like just think of different ideas. I have a lot of ideas always, and my friends would ask me like, hey, we see here out in the sun pretty often, like are you protecting your skin? And my my response was like do you see the sun screens that on the market,

and do you see my complexion? And they're like, yeah, but you should probably do something about that because you're gonna be And they would say like, oh, let's go to this rooftop party or let's go to the beach, and I'm like, okay, so we need an umbrella or I need it any because I'm not getting darker and I don't want to burn. And that's what your friends

were saying. They would ask me put on sunscreen because I have a very day, verst group of friends that do wear sunscreen, right, and they're not all my complexion, and I would be very hesitant, but Legit paid twenty five dollars for an umbrella because I didn't want to get darker, and that was my own security, Like I'm a dark skinned woman, what does that mean to get darker? And why don't I want to get darker? And that that wasn't beautiful in society in two thousand and fifteen. No,

it wasn't, not, not at all. I don't know if one hund dogar was enough for you. But you got to cut this up in there, okay, And then we're gonna add more sugar because I'm a sugar fanatic kind of sugar. I'm a sugar person too. So you're you're out there, your friends are like, hey, you know you should be wearing sunscreen, and then you're doing all these things to protect your skin, but you're not wearing sunscreen, essentially negative. We didn't. So first, first off, black people

don't grow up with the words suntreen in their house. Um, with the notion of wearing sunscreen. Most don't anyway, And um, we have been taught that melanin is built into our skin. Yeah, that melanine is our protector. It's our superpower. So why are we taking away our superpower? Right? Like that's the feedback today that we would get as a corporation, like why are you doing this? Not so much anymore, they still say it today. Of course, there's always gonna be

I'm not gonna lie. I was that girl that would be like people be like, do you wear sunscreen? But like I'm black? What what? But every once in a while, like my nose would burn, you know, it would be like every other year hit or miss I would get a burn, but burn when my skin started appealing off.

So that means it was too late, right. So so if that's another thing you got, you got sunburned, you didn't know what was sunburn had on and then you know, started to peel or whatever part of your body started to peel, and you're like, oh, crap, I have to burn. I had no idea it was possible. And that's the disconnect between you know, professionals, industry, health care professionals, and our population is that it's not caught until it's too late.

So that's why there hasn't been marketing or communication to people of color because it's detected at later stages. Yes, and then I did realize for the first time ever in my life. Shout outs to Kidding's wife Asia, she owns a uh smooth skin lounge, And I want to get my first facial, and you know, I asked what was your age? It was like a couple of weeks ago. Seven seven. There's no judgment, but listen to that, and you got your first facial at have you been to

the dermot oologist before? No? Okay, So this is an issue within our community that people of color are not going to the dermatologists. They're not having annual check ins in terms of like full body skin. Right, We're not taking care of our skin the same way of our lighters. Can counterparts. And this is why Black Girls sun Screen exists because we're here to talk about the y y

wise instead of the bye bye byes. So like, set aside suncare, right, think about your skin, exfoliating, moisturizing, toning. There's so many things that you need to take care of. You look fantastic. Right, We're not gonna give you thirty seven. We're gonna we're gonna we're gonna backwards aids you to twenty seven. Right, because you do have melonated skin. Typically our skin doesn't wrinkle, it will start to drop before anything.

But let's say you catch that pre and you're like, hey, I got my skin care regiment, and then you're adding SPF, you're gonna be fifty looking like your third five. Yeah. Well, one of the things I realized at the when I got the face so was the number one recommendation was where sunscreen every day? And I was like every day, they were like every day where sunscreen? And I was sure, I'll do a little bit more sugar a little bit so I can be like I can experience you. All right, Well,

here's my dish, here's what it looks like. Sugar topped delicious, got it got it. Now, let's try it. It's gonna taste like hot dog and beans, beanies and whenies. You know what. I like it. I didn't even mix the sugar, and I like the little pasty sugar frosting. I mean, I don't know if you just would have fourk course boom, but I'm gonna do it a four. Yeah, I'm doing my work. It's delicious. M I love this dish. This dish can't grow old. So that is a turkey hot

dog and I've never had a turkey hot dog ever. Um. And also, turkey was not available in the eighties, so it wasn't like turkey bacon, turkey hot dogs. It was not turkey burgers. It was none of those things. Like so, food has evolved, just like everything else. At thirty eight, I'm just now realizing how important sunscreen is, which as a testament, and I still occasionally make the joke that, hey,

I'm black, what do I need sunscreen for? So you are facing this celemma, and I'm trying to corner you into figuring out you face the cellamma, you realize that when do you realize that there's a space that needs filling or a problem that needs addressing. When does this epiphany head? After hiking every single day and being beat

in the head of hey where sunscreen were? Sunscreen? Just jumped on onto onto Google and putting keywords such as, you know, sunscreen for Melania skin and sunscreen for black girl, sunscreen for brown girls, sunscreen for dark complexions, and came up just underwhelmed. Um. So there was nothing on the market that spoke to me. Of course there are products that say, hey, sunscreen for all, but like, it wouldn't

have worked. So then I had to decide if there was something I can do about this white space there, if there's something I can do about the information that I just found that there's lack of information and a lack of product. So I had to determine if I had the resources, if I had the confidence. Now confidence is a big one. You have an idea, you might even have the resources, but like, are you bold enough

to do this and to name it black girl sunscreen? Um? So, once I was able to decide and muster up the courage, and I talked to a few people like like, hey, what do you think about this? What do you think about that? And everyone that just had good spirits and good energy. Was like, yes, we had a few naysators, even within my s goal. Um, I was like Okay, I'm gonna do this and it was like lightning in

the bottle. So you decide. And then at this point, had you gone to a dermatologist, had you get god facials? I just want to know, like, okay, okay, So you were doing this consistently and being asked all the time whether you wear sunscreen. No, I wasn't asked to wear sunscreen. Um in my first dermatologist appointment. So I am older than you, right, Um, but you would never know, yeah,

you would not. You look amazing, Thank you. So my first dermatologist visit was at the age of twenty five, and um, it was just more of like, hey, here's how to take care of your skin. SPF was never recommended to me. Wow, it's the lack of education. And I think studying of a brown skin skin dark skin. That's interesting because especially coming from where I just had a facial and they're like sps. But but this was yeah, this was fifteen years ago. So I just used myself. Right,

that's amazing. So the conversation has transitioned right now, people have started to incorporate it, uh, incorporate SPF into their language. And it's also being received from the community. It's not like, no, I'm not using this, women are asking about it now. I'm I didn't do a lot of research into this, but I would imagine you're the first to market when it comes to black girls on screen targeted right. So you're the first to market, which can be very scary

because you know, the question is is their market for this? Right? That's the immediate question you met with. So how did you discover whether the market was there? I mean quick math um, So deciding who your total addressable market it's called tam um. And you can do by you know, figuring out the population of the United States, which is fo million people, A lot of people, right, Um of us are black. Fourteen percent of us are black, Right,

So that brings us down to about four million people. Okay, black people. Then you say, all right, half of those people are women. So now we're at twenty million potential customers. How many of those customers do we need to be successful? That's how I determined if this made sense or not to go to marketing. But now you're also faced with one other question, because yes, you have the market, but the market has been sold a bad bill of goods,

right because through culturally we're taught oh we're melani. So now you have this obstacle, right you have to overcome. So what is your thought You're like, well, we're gonna obviously the name was brilliant, but what was your thought were not or not that was? Yeah? What was your thought process though? Going Okay, we have this huge demo, but this demo has been lied to four years, even me myself. You know, you said you went to the

German college. They basically they didn't have the education to support. So what was your like thought process going in like okay, not not only do we have a product that's viable, that has a market, but the market has now been they have been misinformed. So how do you go? How do you do you get what I'm trying to write, like,

how do we get over that? That obstacle? Um, it's just something that we think about today, and you know, it's all about the y y y not to buy bye By and to educate and to get to the to the folks that are at least open minded. That's who we want to speak to. Not necessarily people that are like f sunscreen, I don't need it. Our ancestors never board. That's literally our biggest competitor. Literally, our biggest competitor are people that like, hey, I don't want to

wear it. Not other sunscreen brands. Think about that, right, I think that, um. Like, So, the number one obstacle is the education of sun safety within black and brown people period. So we are slowly chipping away. However, it's taken more than just Black Girl Sunscreen too continue on with the mission and mission and vision. We need other brands, we need other advocates to hold hands on Hey, not just black people and brown people, all people, because literally

this is a universal problem. It's not just within our community. A lot of people don't wear sunscreen. Yeah, because because we're well, it's because we forget. Yeah, we forget, and we're also very miss informed. I would imagine why people don't forget because they, like I said, the appealing and the burns and the red or whatever. But with us, because there's no there's not as much I would assume, not as much burn the actual but they're also we're

also overlooking the huge thing of skin cancer. Right, Okay, So I think the resounding message here is understanding the journey that you're on, not taking nose as final answers. And we are about five and a half years old, and we've made a lot of traction because we are bold. Our name is writing your face, and that was intentional. I am proud to be a black woman. I am proud UM to be who I am and to represent

UM a group of people. I don't speak for all, but by by no means, but at least I understand from the consumer perspective of what we could be looking for in a sun screen product. So with that being said, UM we secured our first major partnership in two thousand and nineteen. UM we are the number one selling sunscreen in that retailer. UM UM. I didn't say the name until I'll leave it, but what I can say is that, UM.

You know, our distribution stems across the United States and we're in about ten thousand stores and that's accumulation of Target, ALTA, UM, Walgreens,

and CBS. That's major distribution. Yeah. Yeah, and and scaling and scaling meaning you know, just starting from a certain number and continuing to climb UM, which means you need the capital, which means you need the manpower, which means that you need to be organized and um fulfill your commitments to whoever it is that you know you're partnering with. So there's a lot that I learned very quickly now to grow your business from you know what we're talking

about capital. Um, So the capital piece of it is, uh, it's interesting. I hate to use the race card in the gender card, but but it's a real thing. Um. You know, I could never have walked into a meeting with an angel and Lester or a VC fund um based off of like concept in a power point whereas you know, tech and other folks can say like, hey, this is my idea. You know this is a seed round, meaning like you know, pre market and get millions of

dollars black Girls Sunscreen. We had to go in with traction um sales numbers, but now you had to get distribution to So did you get your distribution and your sales numbers first before you actually raised capital? That's crazy? So UM, I started Black Girl Sunscreen with like thirty three thousand dollars fifty dollars something like that, and that was your savings. That was my savings from working in corporate. That was a hard journey now, which like because you

had to use your own capital. Then you built the business, you sold, you got your distribution, you got your sales numbers, then you went and you've got the capital. Then there's plenty of businesses where it's the opposite, and we're still raised. So we're going on our second round now to raise double digit capital and it's still really hard lessons even

when all the distribution in sale. Let me tell you, let me let me tell you something right now, So the top sunscreen brands are like the generic market brands right like we all know them that are in every store. Black Girls Sunscreen has done an insane job of changing the mindset on sun safety and how it's feud and even wearing it on a day to day basis. So we're coming in with velocity, meaning our cells through numbers are like, wait, wait, how much do you sell in

these stores? And yes, people are they don't believe And for me, if you don't believe in that's okay. We don't need to be partners, right Like it's like you're going out with with a person and they just kind of like you, now, we're cool. That's insane out of your entire journey with Black Girl Soundscame for the last five and a half years, what would you say was

the hardest feet of your of your entire company. What was like the hardest thing where you were like I kind of want to quit, or I'm crazy, I'm crazy and delusional. No, I don't think I'm crazy or delusional. Um I canswer that out loud anyway, right, Well, no, because I know as a business owner, like I always feel like, oh Colleen, you're tripping, like you're you know, maybe you're just crazy, you know, or you're delusional if

you think you can accomplish this. You've accomplished so many amazing milestones that either you're Kanye West or you had to have that point of maybe this is um. No, I think that I was literally put on this planet to make this impact, so um it is all worth it to me. But there was never a moment that was a little too challenging because you're scaling. No, there was no part of the scaling part that was like no, um, I think that I think that one of my really

um my best attributes are keeping composure. There have been times where I just kind of want to throw a candle against the wall, whether it's deciding on what partner to bring on. UM. I mean there are there are bad days. There are really bad, bad sheety days. When I look at it in from a holistic approach, if there's three d and sixty five days in the year, and um, only five of them the bad are bad,

then this is totally worth it. So when when you asked me like, hey, what's challenging, I would say currently today is really like retaining talent within the company, because there's like great resignation of just people just finding out like hey, this is truly my passion and not being here helping you grow the business or people pretending they can do something really well and they can't, and it's just kind of like, oh you don't find out until you know a days in UM. But that's really the

challenges now. I think everything else is just really fun, really fun. We celebrate, you know, um, all the small winds to the big winds, but the small ones equal the big ones. UM. I would say that, you know, work life balance for me is non existent, um, because Black Girls Sunscreen is is who I am and what I'm doing. So I'm always thinking about different ideas, product innovation, um, marketing, Like, I don't look at anything without a marketing hat. I

just can't. So when I'm driving, like looking at billboards, bus stops, you know, car wraps, I'm just I look at what people wear in terms of trends, like you know what storeship black Girls sunscreen being it's it's black where my mind is? So this is all fun? Yeah? So you you're is it safe to say that your last vacation was the four months before Black Girls on screen? Uh? So I like to do work trips and then a little bit of play on the back end of a

work trip. Okay, but I will have my laptop. I'm accessible, So there is no just like disconnect. No, we're we're too popping to like just be like I'm out of here. Yeah, I love it. I love it. So where do you see yourself five years from now? And I feel like you've shifted the culture, You've shifted the discussion. So you've already done like an amazing job because people are talking

about screen. Um, just just continuing to play on all the piece press podcasts people, Right, but within black Coat, Sunscreen, not necessarily in the gritty the nitty gritty of it all, in the weeds of it all, but more of like you know, higher higher, higher level if you will, okay, and then what if vice would you give to an entrepreneur that has a similar background from you? What is similar meaning I like what I like about you, and not knocking any of our other guests, but I like

that you come here. You are very educated, and you know you went to school for a lot a lot a long, long long time, and so you have you're not dropping out of school and selling stuff out the trunk of your car. You have a very diverse But I would have if if I couldn't sell sunscreen on Black Girl Sunscreen dot Com, I would have totally put the sunscreen in my book bag and gone down to South Beach and sold the ship out of my book bag. You have to do what you need to do in

order for it to work, right. It just so happened that, you know, our s c o ing on on on the web was strong. You know, people were writing articles, people were writing reviews, and that's how we got discovered. So currently like it's from it's it is fantastic that we don't actually have to ask a retailer to be in their store. They're coming to us, but that's because we make so much joys that you you can't avoid us.

We're also like revitalizing the suncare um departments in a couple of these stories because they're just kind of old and crusty. Like it's the same brands. So we're bringing

a different five as well as a different consumer. Right because black people did not go down the sun aisle of any store before ever, So when you say, like, hey, you didn't start with selling um, you know, the product out of your trunk, how I did start with with just Shante alone picking up her first palette of sunscreen, which is five thousand units, packing it into an suv. At this time, I lived in Miami in a high rise. I unloaded it. It took forty bell card trips up

and down to my loft apartment. I unloaded it into my second bathroom, into the bathtub, impacked every damn order myself. So you you had your website, you built it, or you I didn't build it. That was one thing that I do encourage any person that is starting this is to probably bring in somebody for web deb That was my forte and wis dot com was not around, right. So, um so in terms of like the hustle, the greediness, the scrappiness, that I had to have all of that

before I where I am today. I do have a team of fifty, right, but in two thousand in sixteen, I didn't have the resources. So I had to do everything that I possibly could. I was Black Girls sn screens first model. Did I want to be the model? No? I didn't, but but I had to. Yeah, but that's not I'm not the face of the brand. Right. So when it came to email marketing, like I had to make the emails like I had to, I was writing handwritting notes to all the consumers. We had to go

away from that because it's just it's it's high volume. Um. But yeah, like my hustle maybe a little bit different than selling CDs out of a trunk, but my hustle is it's still a hustle. And I did not start off with being able and fortunate to hire a team to go, hey, you know what, here's a turn case, turnkey solution. I designed the logo, I did market research on what colors UM were highly desirable, what symbolized luxury UM. I did the research on hey, like, this is how

many people we need to make to make money. I did the research on Okay, so price points, right, what is a comfortable price point for this type of product where people feel like, okay, like I'm cool with it, doesn't feel like I'm overspilding. Black Girl sent Screen is a brand for the for the people, right, like it's it's relative, but the price is relative in terms of

affordable now, but we feel like it's affordable. So there were a lot of things that Shanta and I'm speaking in third person because sometimes I don't believe it's me, but yes, Shanta had to do so much to get where I am. I love it today when the black lives matter, when that whole during the pandemic happened, what did that do for your sales? Okay, So in the beginning of the pandemic, I was in South Africa and we were pitching to um department stores in an s

A and every single meeting got canceled. And also like ship um do I come back to the States because I heard it was just like pandemonium in South Africa. I hadn't hit the same way yet, and so I stayed a few days and then I caught a flight back and it was only seven people on my flight from South Africa to the States. Yeah, because you could only why you can only fly if you were an

American citizen. And anyway, I got back and um, the tone from our partner, our retail partner, was hey, you know, UM, we're probably not going to be ordering too much more from you because, um, right now we're essentials or at the four front. So essentials were you know, toilet paper, dish, so whatever, they were like, okay, like totally get it. Um. And then we just had to re strategize, Um, how

do we become an essential? And because folks were working from home, um, parents were schooling UM from home, we said, hey, what about when you go for a walk, you gotta lader up and you're standing bout your window. You know mom's dads that are um having their kids do recess in the front yard or the backyard, you gotta you gotta put on your sunscreen. So we were able to SUFFI to SUFFI from from that messaging, right, So that's

one aspect of it. And then of course Bill m brought attention and awareness not just from black people but from our lighter skin partners right now. For for them, it was more about like retaining them, like how do you keep them focused on your brand because it's kinda wait, it's dissolved, right, And and that's why even so Covid, I don't think you know was the was part of the demise of some brands. But even if you got that attention, how do you keep up with those sales?

So like you can't even really include that in your balance sheet. It's false. The numbers are false because it's inflated. Yeah, right, all of a sudden, people want to be your ally, they want to be your friends, so they're going to support, but they don't come back, got it, right, So you can't really compare your numbers to one. You gotta do like one to like nineteen yeah. Yeah, So so Black Lives Matter the movement really really catapulted um Black Girls

sunscreen in terms of what waren is. But we were able to keep it up, thankfully, Yeah, thankfully, And well you have a great product, and it was just about letting people know about it. I love your background, I love everything you stand for. You worked your butt off to be really and still do right and they'll still do I love that. And I don't know if the listeners actually heard that pivot they're like and they said, okay, we're looking for essential. You were like, okay, well how

can we be essential? Like it wasn't like, oh, well that's I guess that's it, you know. I was like, no, we're gonna pivot. We're gonna change our marketing approach and and resell. And that that probably comes from also you learning sales from a very young age. So sunscreen is

over the counter drug. So um, don't know if you know, but you can bring a six out sunscreen and t s a. I'm a I'm an avid traveler, so um, you know, with our formulations and stuff, you can't just like make it at home and put it on the shelves like it has to go through rigors testing. Wow. So we're sold on like hospital websites right because it's a preventive measure for for for cancer. Right. And I'm not talking about that because it's a scary thing. We're

not here, too scary to wear sunscreen at hall. And also melanoma cases are very low within you know, the black and brown community. We talked about, hey where so you don't get somewhere and and then on because excite, Hey, we want to prevent premature aging. Women want to maintain their youth. That's how I got a facial right, premature aging filines and then hyper pigmentation, and that's what we're really running with. We try to stay away from, Hey,

you're gonna get melanoma died like we don't. We don't want to talk about that. Of course, Well, I'm so excited for you to come and feed me. You ate it all? I ate it all, of course I did. I loved it. I loved it, okay, and I loved What would you have made? I think about this all the time. I'm saving it for an episode, but I have been thinking all week. I think my dish would be in cornmeal porridge. That sounds complicated, you know what. I don't know how to make it. I'd have to

call my mom. But my mom used to make it. I used to love it when I was a kid, and I'm pretty sure it was broke dish. I don't think i've had pordge. It's like it reminds it's like a Grits but not Brits. It's it's like Grit's cousin smoother. You know, I'm not a real big fan of Gress. I didn't know about this yellow right it's yellow, yeah, And you could add sugar and then the sugar has like a little syrupy look on the top. It's bomb okay, and then you just get that first layer so it

on burn yourself. But UM, thank you so much for coming out, Sante, and for all our listeners. If you are trying to get black girls sunscreen, where can they get it? How can they reach out? And if you're an investor, you may wanna halla, Um, how can they all get it? How can people get ahold of you and get ahold of the product hold of me? So Seante does do mentoring sessions, UM complimentary and you would send a note to contact that black Girl Sunscreen dot com.

And the reason why I'm sharing that is because UM, coming up on this journey or in this journey, UM, I didn't have anyone to talk to ask questions, to bounce ideas off of. And UM I allocate you know, twenty to thirty minutes every Tuesday and Thursday to someone that jumped in the inboxes, like, hey, I just want to talk to Shante about whatever. And my assistant does oversee that that scheduling process. UM, but so many folks

UM take advantage of it. And sometimes it's just more about like validation if they're on the right track and UM, you know, do they are their ideas good? What? What do they if they're what they're doing is good? UM. So that's how you can actually reach me personally. I'm pretty accessible, UM assensible excuse me. And then in terms of the product, I mean, we're nationwide, so you can find us in you know, one of four stores which

is UM Target Autumn, UH, Walgreens and CBS UM. And then of course, UM black girl sent to being dot com. And then UM, what we really really value is our special TV tail partners, and those UM folks consist of you're like local Astetian salons and other UM dot coms that speak to UM, brown and black women. Awesome. I can't believe you. Mentor that's amazing. I won't be in the inbox real quickly. UM, that's amazing. You know. I think people say things too and they're not like about

the action and we're about the action. Have black girls on screen? I like that. I like that? All right, Well, thank you so much for coming on Eating wall Broke and sharing your franks and beans and wig and beans with sugar. All right, he said by For more Eating wall Broke from I Heart Radio and The Black Effect, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows,