How Karen Young Built OUI the People
Side Hustle ProPlay episode
Show notes
In this episode, I sat down with Karen Young, founder of OUI the People, a fine fragrance and body care brand born out of her own struggle with razor burn and ingrown hairs. Karen walks us through her path from fashion, where she interned at Dolce and Gabbana, to becoming an executive at Estee Lauder, to eventually building a beauty brand now sold in Sephora.
But Karen's story starts before OUI the People, with a lifestyle and home goods brand called Hammocks and High T that she built and ultimately had to close. We talk about the hard lessons on margins and capital that came out of that experience, the unexpected subway encounter that led to her job at Estee Lauder, and how she used her years inside a major beauty conglomerate to build her own brand from the ground up.
Karen also gets honest about the financial rollercoaster of raising venture capital, scaling a team, and chasing growth without profitability for years, and what finally shifted this year. We close things out with her thoughts on consumer psychology, pricing a premium product, and her advice for women weighing whether to leave a steady paycheck for their side hustle.
Main TakeawaysWhy closing a business is not failure, but tuition in a school of hard knocks that teaches you margins, capital, and scale.How to price a premium product by studying who your customer already trusts enough to spend on, not just what they say they need.Why visibility does not equal revenue, and how chasing growth without watching profitability can quietly sink a business.How building a trusted circle of fellow founders can matter more than any book when the entrepreneurial journey gets lonely.
Highlights Include00:20 - How a lifelong struggle with razor burn and ingrown hairs on melanated skin became the idea behind OUI the People05:49 - Why Karen closed her first business, a lifestyle and home goods brand called Hammocks and High T11:19 - Learning the difference between spotting a market gap and finding real money inside of it16:00 - The subway encounter that led to Karen's job offer at Estee Lauder25:37 - What Karen absorbed from watching a major beauty conglomerate acquire and scale brands from the inside34:15 - The origins of OUI the People, which started as a direct to consumer razor brand called We Shave41:14 - How Karen priced her first razor at seventy five dollars, then raised it to eighty five to ninety, by studying who was already buying La Mer43:49 - Why Karen called manufacturers in the UK, Germany, and Japan before choosing a small German razor maker50:39 - How the brand expanded from razors into body care, then into Sephora in 2019, then a full fragrance launch in 202357:57 - The honest truth about raising venture capital, scaling a team, and finally hitting profitability this year1:12:19 - Lightning round: her go to founder resource, the mentor she admires, her non negotiable evening ritual, and her advice for side hustlers
Links Mentioned in This EpisodeShop OUI the People: ouithepeople.com
Social Mediaouithepeople.comOUI the People on Instagram: @ouithepeople https://www.instagram.com/ouithepeople/ OUI The People TikTok: @ouithepeople https://www.tiktok.com/@ouithepeople
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