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On today’s episode, Meghan sits down with Kadi Lee, co-founder of Highbrow Hippie and the go-to colorist for some of Hollywood’s biggest names. What began as a blog has since grown into a brick-and-mortar salon and a thoughtfully crafted product line, all built with heart and the utmost attention to detail. The pair discuss what it means to grow something from the ground up, how to lead with your values, and why staying connected to your community is the ultimate marker of success.

Follow Meghan @Meghan and Kadi @highbrowhippie on Instagram. Stay up to date with us @LemonadaMedia on X, Facebook, and Instagram.

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Main Theme: “Crabbuckit” words and music by Kevin Deron Brereton (c) Universal Songs of Polygram Int., Inc. on behalf of Universal Music Publishing Canada (BMI) / 100% interest for the Territory.

Transcript

SPEAKERS

Kadi Lee, Megan, next interview

Kadi Lee  01:13

I think about what I knew back then, which was absolutely nothing about color and like, the gall that I had to like be like, Yeah, I’m gonna be a colorist. And the first day, showing up and then handing me my shampoo apron.

 

Megan  02:06

I’m Megan, and this is Confessions Of A Female Founder, a show where I chat with female entrepreneurs and friends about the sleepless nights, the lessons learned who and the laser focus that got them to where they are today. Okay, real talk. Running a business is a lot. Building something new is a long road of making decisions in the dark and then holding this vision in your head when no one else can even see it yet. It can be slow, it can be scrappy, it can be exhausting. It’s a process, and there’s no road map, there’s no manual and if you knew how hard it would get, you might hesitate to start it all, but that initial bravado, that initial going in, like I’ve got this, maybe it’s essential.

 

Kadi Lee  03:12

I feel really lucky, but I also know that I created that luck, because none of this was overnight. You know, this was all brick by brick.

 

Megan  03:22

And for today’s guest, brick by brick is literal. Kadi Lee is the co owner of the hair salon Highbrow Hippie in Venice, California. She’s also a go to colorist for a lot of names you’d be familiar with, and she’s recently launched a product line that sold out not once, but twice. Look, it’s clear that highbrow hippie is on a serious role. And I wanted to talk to Katie, who’s also a dear friend, about what it’s like to continually iterate and build on your brand. Her business started as a blog, then she opened a brick and mortar, and now she’s selling products that people can’t get enough of. Let’s get into her story. You There she is.

 

Kadi Lee  04:04

Hi.

 

Megan  04:06

Disregard the state of my hair right now. I’m so excited I’m seeing you next time. I should have a baseball cap on. Really? I mean, there’s a lot going on my friend, a lot indeed, but all good stuff. And even more, the reason that it’s exciting to talk to other female founders right now about their journey, their experience, their all the twists and turns that come with the choice to be a female entrepreneur, and especially one of color, and what that means. So let’s start when we first met. What year was that?

 

Kadi Lee  04:39

Oh, it was 2020.

 

Megan  04:41

It was 2020 it was very much. It was very funny.

 

Kadi Lee  04:46

But is all good things? A lot of good things in my life. The origin starts with Serge Norman.

 

Megan  04:54

No, does it ever Serge Norman, leading hairstylist in the industry. And you know him because he worked at his salon in LA way back when. Yeah, and, man, he and I became friends after he did my hair for my wedding. So my family had just moved to California. We were staying in our friend’s home, and because it was the pandemic, I kept ordering boxed hair dye, and I thought, I’m gonna look just like she does on the box. And instead, it was this very Inky, almost Elvira esque, black hair. And I texted Serge, and he said, You need to see Kadi. And you came over. I mean, we were masked and all the thing. I mean, it was such an interesting time, but I remember that day so well.

 

Kadi Lee  05:42

It’s so vivid in my memory too. You know so much was happening that day with LA in general, and the city and the protests. And I mean, I remember meeting you guys and a you were so warm, and both you and H like wrapped us up in these big bear hugs. And I was like, I don’t even know these people, and I’m not a hugger, but let’s do it, you know? Because I think everyone was just so just needed, like, this exhale of okay, like, it’s going to be okay, but what now?

 

Megan  06:16

Well, because for people who don’t remember, this is at the height of George Floyd and just so much unrest, and that’s we met. And I also hadn’t realized, until I was doing my research, I’d known you had your salon, but I didn’t know that you had just opened it, what eight or nine months before that? That we had met. I mean that what was that experience like to have opened it, to feel like you finally gotten there, and then things really come to a full stop.

 

Kadi Lee  06:43

It felt like such whiplash. And it felt like, gosh, we cannot get a break. You know?

 

Megan  06:53

Oh, I understand.

 

Kadi Lee  06:54

Yeah, we just said, you know, what else do we have to do? And it felt like we had just conquered this big mountain. My co founder and I, and Micah, and I just remember when we’d made the decision to close, when it just started feeling so unsafe. I mean, I literally am in a touch point business, you know, like I’m in very close contact with people, and I just remember feeling scared for my own, obviously, health and safety, but then just the numbers running through my mind, of rent and my team, how are they going to pay their bills, and then my clients like, Will they still be here when we you know if and when we reopen and when? What is that gonna be? And it just felt like we’re entering the unknown, and it was really frightening. I mean, there’s a photo that a team member took of me when everything was just starting to happen, and my head is just literally in my hands. Oh, and yeah, it’s and I, my heart breaks when I look at it, because it just, I think is every founder who was just poured their everything into launching something and then being like, not really sure what’s next. Yeah, so it was, um, though it was a low time about, I want to say two months had then gone by before I met you. So in that two month period, we had, like we always do, because we figure things out, especially as black women, we had been mixing home color kits for clients. I mean, I was going around my clients called me the Florence Nightingale of hair color because I’m going around in my car in like a full hazmat suit, throwing hair color over, leaving at their door at night time and just scurrying away like a little mouse and but we did enough sales in just a few months to pay our rent on time. Wow. Make sure our team had some sort of money coming towards them. I had a few clients who asked how they could help some paid for their services a year in advance, so that I could write a check to every team member. So all of this happened. It was incredible.

 

Megan  09:28

But also, what’s incredible about that is it speaks to everything that I think is the ethos of what you’ve built, the salon and the brand off of, which is community.

 

Kadi Lee  09:37

Yeah.

 

Megan  09:37

Right, so for you, you had already invested so much in the relationships that people were going to show up for you in the same way that you showed up for them. And I remember as well you saying, when the salon was going to reopen, how were you going to address these big conversations and topics?

 

Kadi Lee  09:58

Yeah, that was, I mean. So it’s obvious I am a black woman, and most of my clients, many of my clients, are not. And then there’s this conversation that’s taking place in the world at large, that is not taking place in real time in the salon, and now we have to come together again and talk about that big elephant in the room, and as we gear to reopen, I had clients calling, texting, emailing, in tears, wanting, I think they were a lot of them were dealing with feelings they’d never felt before, thoughts that they’d never have to think about before, whether that be guilt, whether it be just Wow, I’ve never had to really step back and say that Katie’s existence may be very different than mine. And now here I’m asking her to take care of me once again, when really we should be taking care of her.

 

Megan  10:57

Wow.

 

Kadi Lee  10:58

Yeah, I get.

 

Megan  10:59

How, did that make you? How did that make you feel like, I mean, what was coming up for you every day must have felt different.

 

Kadi Lee  11:05

You know, I my body was stealing itself for heaviness. We worked for, like 42 days straight, no days off. That’s how booked we were when we reopen, yeah. So imagine just the physical toll of that.

 

Megan  11:25

But the emotional toll of 42 days straight, of a lot of feelings.

 

Kadi Lee  11:31

Yeah, you know, it was hard. I definitely felt that was probably one of the loneliest periods of my life at the time I was single, so then coming home felt like a relief, but then also, like, what now.

 

Megan  11:45

Are you saying, you’re not single now? Have I missed something in the past couple weeks? What’s happening? Can we stay focused? Please stay on track. Perhaps we’ll save this for a glass of a glass of wine on Sunday.

 

Kadi Lee  12:00

I tell this, yeah, I mean, by the way, lots of wine consumption during that time, true. You know, just sitting down with a glass, trying to let each day go, leaving it in the past. And you know, you’re actually touching people. So it’s like an energy exchange. And, you know, everyone knows I’m like, the least woo, woo person out there. But after that period, I really believe in it, because I would go home some days and be completely and utterly depleted, you know, and other days, people really tried to pour back into me. So it just was, like this big opening, I think, for everybody. And then Micah and I had the, I don’t know if it was grand or silly at the time, idea to have these patio chats, because our the patio is really the center of our Venice Atelier at high brow hippie and you know, it’s where services are performed. Clients can lounge out there, and the patio was so off limits, and when we were closed, that before we reopened, we decided to go on Instagram Live and have a patio chat about race in America.

 

Megan  13:12

Okay, well, so you’ve always been fearless, and just getting right to the point my Leo sister. Okay, so how did those go?

 

Kadi Lee  13:23

You know, for us, it felt great. For us, it was a release, throwing another Leo into the mix. So it was my business partner. She’s a Leo, so we don’t know how to do things halfway, like we are doing them with our full heart and our full heads, you know, and really talking about subjects that we were never afraid to talk about, you know, within our own community or within our own safe spaces. But it was also in continuation of this conversation that we had started on MLK, day before the pandemic happened, we decided to have a salon chat in a true sense of the word, because, because we always saw highbrow hippie as a real salon, an old school salon where ideas were exchanged, etc, and it was always going to be a safe space of an exchange of ideas. So we decided, before the pandemic happened, that we are going to talk about race and feminism and intersectionality, and we invited clients of all walks of life, I mean, every religion, every color, and everyone sat next to someone they didn’t know. And we just went for it. We wanted to really dive into are you looking at how things affect you if they don’t directly affect you? We had probably one of the most emotional dinners I’ve been a part of, and people still to this day talk about that patio chat. So that was the original patio chat. And then George Floyd happened, and the pandemic happened. Were like, okay, I guess this is going virtual to the point where we ended up having a reunion online the next MLK Day of the original patio chat invitees, and everyone was in tears. Couldn’t believe it that they were like, you guys were talking about this stuff way before anyone else was.

 

Megan  15:28

It’s interesting because you started your company first as a blog, which I didn’t know.

 

Kadi Lee  17:28

Yeah.

 

Megan  17:29

So then it was really a means to connect in a way that was virtual, but to create community, and then the evolution of brick and mortar. But how did you and Micah decide to do that first?

 

Kadi Lee  17:40

Gosh, I mean, so we’ve known each other now. Cannot believe it going on almost 30 years. Wow. Met at Spelman. Met at Spelman College. Micah was an outgoing senior. I was a freshman. We worked in the same store at BCBG in Lenox mall in Atlanta.

 

Megan  17:56

I used to work at BB, that sparkly BB shirt. It was that time.

 

Kadi Lee  18:01

And honestly, Atlanta, late 90s, early 2000s like we were having the time. I mean, it was we had so much fun. Spelman is obviously a very special place. I was born in Jamaica, and then immigrated to Connecticut when I was around 11. Micah is born and raised in Atlanta, so we very different backgrounds, but when you get to Spelman at the time, it was a really special safe space for me, because I’d never been around so many smart, beautiful black women before, and to spend four years out of your life not having to worry about being judged for anything else, but just your pure merit was the most freeing place on the planet. I mean, plus we were fly, plus we were cute, like, you know, like it was just like, I mean, you couldn’t tell us anything. We had the time. You had it going on. We just had a great time. And people often think because it’s, you know, an HBCU, all black women that you know. Oh, is that like, the only people that you guys spend your time with? But weirdly enough, we all came from, like, private white high schools, and the fact that I went to Spellman, and now, you know, known for, like, my blonde highlights is like, like, no one’s even surprised.

 

Megan  19:28

Well, especially because you were doing hair at 11, is when you realize in Connecticut there weren’t a lot of people there that could do your hair right texture of hair. So you started experimenting on your own. I can’t imagine what that was like. It kind of reminds me of when I was at Northwestern and I moved into Kappa, our sorority there. I don’t even think they made plug in flat irons at the time. They couldn’t, if they did, I didn’t know where they were because I had the little stove, yeah, with the with the flat iron that would go in, have a paper towel on the side. I mean, there’s probably half the people listening to this. Going, What is she talking about? Or you’d pull it out, we’d have the little scorch marks. And I remember most of the girls in the sorority who were not black, say, what’s that smell? It’s hair burning. And it was just what you would do to figure out how to grapple with this texture of hair. Were you using things like that back then, or is that what you were doing in college?

 

Kadi Lee  20:19

College was like when we entered, like, the flat iron era. But when I was in Connecticut, oh my gosh, my mom, a did not have a lot of time to help me with any of this. So, you know, she’s a housekeeper, still is, and was just busy trying to keep us afloat. So I was really, I’ve always been very self sufficient, left to handle and figure things out on my own. So whether it be putting my hair in braids or, you know, just learning my texture and I experimented with everything, I’ve worn my hair in every single hairstyle you could ever imagine on the planet.

 

Megan  20:56

But also, this is before, I mean, you 11 in Connecticut, this is before the World Wide Web, it’s not like you were googling different ways to do your hair and your hair texture. Where were you finding inspiration for that?

 

Kadi Lee  21:09

Well, there’s a town next. I grew up in Westport, Connecticut, which anyone is familiar with. Connecticut is like, wow.

 

Megan  21:17

Is there an immigrant community there at all?

 

Kadi Lee  21:20

Not really, no. I mean, my brother and I were two of maybe four black children in the entire school system. So and then immigrants like we were it, that was it. But quickly, obviously lost the accents. And you know, now I sound like a freaking Connecticut newscaster, but when I’m back in Jamaica, I’m back, you know, like there was a town next to Westport called Norwalk that had a bit more of a diverse community. And I started working as, you know, soon as I could have an after school job, and I met a few girls that lived in Norwalk, and then discovered there was a salon there that had these hairdressers that knew how to do my hair. So I think just learning, just by watching, but I never thought it would be a career like I got this Fellman had fun doing it, like just playing with hair, and then realized that I could, like, make money doing it. It became like the side hustle in the dorm. And I mean, to this day, my friends from Spellman will comment on some photos that I’ll post on Instagram and be like, we cannot believe this is your job. Because, like, you know, like, you literally used to go to the pharmacy and just do color on us. And, you know, they just, they think it’s the wildest, greatest, you know, manifestation of just your natural talent. I just always knew how to do it.

 

Megan  22:47

What did you think you were gonna end up doing professionally?

 

Kadi Lee  22:51

I mean, I was an English major, so I maybe wanted to be a writer. I worked in PR briefly. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I lost my job after that soft recession of 2000 when people were just getting laid off left and right after I was done with Spellman, and I ended up back in my mom’s house in Connecticut. And you know, like all good Jamaican mothers, she’s like, well, you’re not staying here. So what’s the plan? Yeah, literally figure something out. And so my mom had this friend, Miss Lindsey, who used to take care of us, this older Jamaican woman who immigrated to Connecticut and was like a janitor in our school system. And Miss Lindsey took money that she had saved and she gave it to me for my train fare to go to New York City and enroll in beauty school.

 

Megan  23:48

Oh, wow.

 

Kadi Lee  23:49

So I started Beauty School in New York, and I was at Aveda, and the minute I started, I just knew I was where I should be. It felt like home. It felt completely natural. I could do it with my eyes closed.

 

Megan  24:05

Did you ever think that you would start your own business? Did you think you would have a chair at a salon? Was that the ultimate goal, or did you always feel entrepreneurial in what you were really sort of striving for?

 

Kadi Lee  24:16

At that point? Not entrepreneurial. There was a job fair, and all the top salons came to recruit, and one of the salons was Frederick fakai, which, at the time, in, you know, early 2000s was the salon. And I remember being like, Oh, great, amazing. I’ll just be a colorist at fakai, you know, not really realizing that they’ll hire anyone to be an assistant or to shampoo, but like, you’re not a colorist right away, like you don’t I think about what I knew back then, which was absolutely nothing about color, and like, the gall that I had to, like, be like, yeah, I’m gonna be a colorist. And the first day, showing up and then handing me my shampoo apron, yeah, you’re like, $4 an hour, and but for color, it was, you know, I always painted. I loved art, and it always felt like, Okay, this is a canvas, and it felt really freeing to me, and I just, I loved every bit of it, and not ever thinking that there would be a roadblock because I was black, because there weren’t any black colorists. But it never even crossed my mind that it would be an issue.

 

Megan  25:30

When did it start to cross your mind then?

 

Kadi Lee  25:33

When I showed up at Frederick fakai and saw that there were no black people that were actually colorists there, there were a couple of black assistants, and I was like, Well, does anyone ever get promoted to be a colorist? And they were like, maybe then you start really doing some research in the industry. And you’re like, it actually just doesn’t exist. But I don’t know if, like, I was going through life naively. I just never think, until this day, I still think that anything is off limits for me, like, that’s what I feel like doing. Great. I’m gonna do it. And I knew, obviously, that I had the artistic ability. I knew that I had the intelligence. But when you realize and get into the real world that, like, there is no one else that looks like you, you’re like, huh?

 

Megan  26:22

Did it ever create any anxiety for you, though?

 

Kadi Lee  26:25

Yeah, that anxiety was there. But I had such wonderful mentors. You know, the color director, Constance Hartnett, her and I really, yeah, we bonded. And I think she never saw, you know, me as, like a black colorist, I was just like her amazing assistant, you know, who showed up every day, never missed a day of work, and had the talent. So she was appalled when I told her I wanted to transfer to California, because, in her mind, like New York was just it. And, you know, her clients were just like the most sophisticated women on the planet. We’re talking like Nan Kempner and Sigourney Weaver and just Merrill and all these women that I’m learning literally how to do color corrections on and I just one day was like, I’m cold, and I want to live and study California. And Frederick Bucha had a, like, an outpost there, and I was like to Callie, I go.

 

Megan  27:25

I love that you were just like, I’m cold. This doesn’t work for me anymore. Yeah, so you’d go to the LA salon. You obviously start working up in the ranks. And I mean, a lot of that, I think, feels like it’s part of your journey as a colorist. But then at what point does it shift that you say I am going to have my own brick and mortar. I am going to open a salon and a space, because I find it really interesting to go from you have you’ve had two entrepreneurial journeys from that to then creating the brand. And how different those experiences have been for you.

 

Kadi Lee  27:56

Well, first, I was working with Serge, our mutual friend, and when his LA outpost closed, I found myself wanting to only work if I couldn’t find anyone as elegant as surge, then I had to only work for myself.

 

Megan  28:14

That’s such a beautiful compliment. That’s so sweet.

 

Kadi Lee  28:16

Yeah, then the answer was, there wasn’t anyone as elegant as surge. And as the time was ticking by, it just became clearer that there was a need for it. There was a huge white space in just how people approached the salon experience and how they had become something that was honestly untenable for me to work in. In what way too big, too loud. I don’t know. I don’t know if you find the older you get. I just need quiet. I need peace and quiet. And like you, peace and quiet does not really equate to a salon environment. So we started with that as our driver of, how could we create a physical space that feels good when you’re in it, that actually, you know, regulates your nervous system, instead of having you, like, be completely hopped up on overdrive when you’re walking out. Could the music be better? Could the just approach to the business be better, and that’s where we started from. And I think we really just hit it on the nail when we opened highbrow hippie, I can like confidently say there was nothing like it in the country.

 

Megan  29:37

The name Highbrow Hippie, which I love, we love. I know the origin. But for people who don’t, can you share that?

 

Kadi Lee  29:43

Yeah, I mean, Mike and I were chatting one day, and we’re like, what would it be? And she had a boyfriend who used to call her a bourgeois bohemian. And then we were like, people will never know how to spell that. They’ll butcher it. And then I was like, I love the name highbrow. And then, literally, at the same time, we both, like, screamed out, highbrow. It’s just we’ve had the name for so long. Same thing kept it under wraps. Like it felt like this, like big secret that we had that, like we just knew was going to be our future. And we’re talking 2009, 2008?

 

Megan  32:05

Oh, my God, but you knew. We just knew you knew. And also the alliteration is so good, and it’s a perfect barefoot cheek, all the things that you are. So I love that. And also to be working on something quietly, you know, I had secured as ever as a name in 2022 and then, as everything started to evolve last year, and bringing in a partner the size that it was, and it was just so interesting, because you remember I said I like American Riviera as an umbrella, yeah? And then to be able to have verticals beneath it, maybe have the orchard really small, but when that’s not feasible, suddenly became this word salad. I love that so much. It’s okay. Well, let’s go back to the thing that I’ve always loved. Let’s use the name that I had protected for a reason that had been sort of under wraps, and then we were able to focus in the quiet and put our heads down and build on something that no one was sniffing around to even see about was just really, really helpful to have that quiet period, which you would know after spending so many years working on something, building it, and the pivots that you had to take with it. Look at you now. I mean, the name Highbrow Hippie is no longer just a blog and a hair salon. It’s a product line too. You have a hair supplement and a hair serum that you just launched late last year, and it’s already been named best hair serum by Oprah daily. How on earth did you go from getting your financing together, creating the business, having this incredible clientele of the most loyal people who’ve been with you from the beginning, from high profile to everything in between, to then saying, in the midst of still being a startup in those first five years, we’re gonna start something else too.

 

Kadi Lee  33:45

Yeah, we always saw highbrow hippie as, like, this multidimensional thing. I mean, we never put, like, any sort of box around what Highbrow Hippie could be. So when the brick and mortar was built, it really was just supposed to be the landing spot for the community, because people often launch a product and then try to have the community come to them. We were like, we’ve got this like gold mine of women who are just like the best women on the planet, and who have all built incredible businesses, or run incredible businesses, or are running, or are starting, or it’s just this collective power of a lot of positivity, but really, the record speaks for itself. You know, we have Leela Becker, who founded and built mother denim. I’ve got Kristen Davis who actually just had a birthday yesterday, and she did, yeah, she did.

 

Megan  34:41

And happy birthday. I will Julia. And Julia, who’s like, championed you for so long. Julia Roberts.

 

Kadi Lee  34:47

Yes, it’s I feel really lucky. So we knew that we could create any sort of product, because we have this community already, and when it was time to create the product, we took. The downtime that kind of came with some of the pandemic, and we sent out a survey to our clients, and it was like, what products are you using, hair, skin, body, what kind of services do you get? What kind of procedures do you get? You know, what do you feel comfortable spending? I mean, we asked every question. It was probably like a 200 question survey. We sent it out.

 

Megan  35:27

No.

 

Kadi Lee  35:27

I mean, it was so in depth, and it was just, it was being super nosy. Not everyone answered it, but we had enough of a kind of a.

 

Megan  35:36

Yeah, the little R and D.

 

Kadi Lee  35:37

Yeah, we did a lot of R and D, and it was just to inform ourselves, this is what people are thinking, this is what people need. And at that moment in time when we sent it out, it was when the impact of stress started really showing on people’s hair. And so we knew that if we were going to launch a product, it just became really clear that it had to be about hair, health and wellness. We’ve always included wellness. Literally, our tagline from the very beginning of the blog was beauty, wellness and conscious living, and we knew the product had to encompass all three of those things, which is why we were very quickly able to hone in on our growth serum and our well being supplement, and then we worked on it for years.

 

Megan  36:31

But that for years, because I remember, because to go from what would be the natural and perhaps more obvious choice, his people would say, great, you have a hair salon, so you’re gonna make shampoo and conditioner, and that’s what it’s gonna start with, and that’s what it will evolve into, which I would also guess, from an investor standpoint, it might feel like a safer bet, even if it’s really saturated in the market. So what was it like for you when you guys are really sort of creating this business plan and ideating on the idea of something that is not, perhaps most typical, but based on your own focus group from your clientele, you were able to really have a proof point and say, We know that there is a hole in the market for this. We can fulfill it in this way, holistically. But that still feels like a gamble.

 

Kadi Lee  37:18

You know, I guess it didn’t feel like a gamble to me because I I joined an accelerator program at the beginning of oh gosh, I guess last year, because I a raising money. I mean, we’re talking about a whole world that I do absolutely nothing about. And I think that especially knowing the numbers out there for how little black women raise, whether it be VC or I mean, it’s the number so small, it actually is abysmal.

 

Megan  37:49

I don’t know if it’s shifted since last year, but 2% for just women from venture capital raise. And what is it? Point three, 4.35% for women of color? Yeah, you’re right. It is abysmal. It is a shockingly low number of investment that goes into black, female, owned companies and trade.

 

Kadi Lee  38:07

Yeah, so I knew that it might be an uphill battle. So if I’m going to do it, I need to actually have the knowledge that I need to be able to execute this. So with the time that I do not have, I signed up for this accelerator, which was Monday and Tuesday mornings, and I definitely asked the most questions, but you learned really quickly, like, there are no stupid questions and any opportunity I had, whether they had, like the Extra office hours or anything that I could get some extra time with these two women, Kelly and Annie, who are just amazing. Is called Dream ventures. I carved it out and just asked anything, whatever they could teach me. I was like, Please, just tell me what to do, because I also wanted to respect my clients time I knew I’d probably be doing a friends and family raise, because, luckily, I have clients with the means to be a part of a friends and family raise, and I knew the amount that we needed could probably be accomplished in a friends and family raise. And it was so you still want to be respectful of people’s time and their energy and that you’re taking this really seriously, but I knew we were onto something when I did the accelerator and I won.

 

Megan  39:36

I mean, you were here, what was that? A week or two afterwards, you were here, and I was just, you were glowing. You won, yeah.

 

Kadi Lee  39:46

I was the top business out of all 25 and I mean, I someone caught it on camera when they said my name, I just burst into tears, because it is just so unlikely, you know. But in my pitch in my pitch contest, when I said the words, the world does not need another shampoo and conditioner, literally, I could have heard an amen from the crowd, like people were over it. You know, they wanted a real solution. And then with the statistic that, like 80% of women are going to experience some sort of hair loss in their lifetime, yes. It also just kind of took the band aid off. People were looking around. I asked everyone to raise their hands if they’d experienced any, and everyone’s kind of peeking around, and then the hands are slowly going up, and it felt like they were safe to finally admit it, and which we knew there was a market, because, you know, look at nutrifoll, they literally just sold to Unilever for a billion dollars. So there is a market for this, but never one that was created by salon experts. Sure, there were some doctor created products, physician approved products, but we had the direct connection to the consumer, and I just knew.

 

Megan  41:03

And you live and breathe, hair, health.

 

Kadi Lee  41:05

yes, it’s always been my thing,

 

Megan  41:07

Yeah, and so much of that raise came from the fact that people feel so confident in their belief about you and your work ethic. And I think that’s that’s a piece that is such a common thread through how you show up in the salon, how you show up in those chats that you created. It’s all about, really just your ethos, and, of course, having a really strong business partner as well. What has it been like to have a friend that’s your business partner?

 

Kadi Lee  41:35

You know, there are good times and bad times. That’s life and that’s life. Yeah, I think that our biggest strength is that her and I are always on the same page when it comes to the bigger picture. We know that we want to build a company, and we actually also know that we want to sell the company eventually, because we both have such varied interests and curiosity about the world and life, we want to have another chapter in our lives, and because that’s always been the goal, when we find ourselves having a moment of friction, we come back to the goal, yeah, and we come back to our dedication to that goal and to each other.

 

Megan  42:21

And to be really aligned in that. I mean, it’s great that you know, well, one of our other really good friends, Vicki Tsai, I think, has been a mentor for both of us, certainly in what she created with Tatcha, from her parents garage to also selling to Unilever for quite a hefty sum. But the level of dedication, work ethic and her thoughtfulness and her approach is what I think is so key. But I remember very early on, when I was talking about starting a business, she had said to me, okay, well, Meg, you need a reverse engineer. Who do you want to sell to? As opposed to just thinking, I’m going to create this thing and then we’re going to see what’s going to happen, and then, oh, I think they might be interested. No, let’s reverse engineer 510, years from now, who’s going to buy this? And everything you do starts at the intention of what the ultimate goal is. So you’re not task oriented, you’re goal oriented. And when you have that level of business savvy right out of the gate, you’re looking at it through such a different lens. So let’s imagine and assume, when you sell.

 

Kadi Lee  43:20

Yes.

 

Megan  43:21

Because you will Yes, then it will be a great day of celebration. What would you do in your next chapter?

 

Kadi Lee  43:28

Oh, gosh, I want to kind of go back to my English major roots. I want to get some writing done. I’d like to live in another country, perhaps my native land of Jamaica, maybe I’ll try a stint in Europe. I’m just a really naturally curious person, and I was not blessed with kids. I’m still holding out hope I might be a step mom or, you know, one day, but for right now, I’m just super aunt.

 

Megan  43:55

I mean, our kids love Auntie Kadi. Their favorite when they run out with their cars like Kadi.

 

Kadi Lee  44:01

I know I feel like I look for them first […] how the kids, um, and I don’t know. I feel like, with the freedom that that gives me, I should be able to just live a completely new chapter. And you know, perhaps it’s with this new love of mine.

 

Megan  44:23

I can’t with you so unfair, because we have nine minutes and all I want to do is ask about is it the guy? Okay, well, this is very exciting.

 

Kadi Lee  44:41

Very handsome.

 

Megan  44:42

Okay, so, yeah, a different chapter where you would have gone through all of this adventure, all of these twists and turns we haven’t even touched on. What was the one hurdle that you didn’t see coming? What was the one mistake that you made that, my gosh, if you could say to someone who was doing their. Own grind and building their own business. Do not do that. That is a no trespassing. Don’t go there.

 

Kadi Lee  45:05

I mean, listen, there are a lot of predators out there, and Predator is a strong word, but there are. There’s a lot of ways for entrepreneurs to really waste a lot of money and a lot of time. And we definitely had some people who Bill themselves as quote, unquote experts, and we didn’t need them along the way, and certainly not for the amount of money that we paid, for the duration that we paid, but we were able to spot it and, you know, pivot from there. It’s really just keeping your wits about yourself and not getting too comfortable. We also always have our bottom line in mind. We are very responsible fiscally. And the reason why we were even able to get a small business loan to put into the product company where we didn’t have to raise so much money is because we were able to, with our small, mighty team in our Atelier during the pandemic, still managed to net well over a million dollars in profit. That’s outstanding, yeah, so we were able to literally provide the numbers to the bank, and, you know, very few people also get approved for those loans, so we are able to be fiscally responsible, which then created freedom and opportunity for us, right?

 

Megan  46:29

So by instilling confidence in the people that were gonna invest in you, it gave you freedom, which I think, as an entrepreneur, part of it too is you’ve always kept a really tight team, yes, and even when you have a cap table, and you have investors. I think all the investors that you’ve brought on, they are so emotionally invested in you, as well as financially invested in you. So you don’t have people breathing down your neck, which I think can happen quite a bit, certainly in private equity. But you have people that either have big businesses or big voices or platforms that, in whatever way they can help support you in this growth and in this chapter.

 

Kadi Lee  47:06

Yes.

 

Megan  47:07

We show up for you.

 

Kadi Lee  47:08

Yes, it’s I feel really lucky, but I also know that I created that luck.

 

Megan  47:15

What does that mean to you?

 

Kadi Lee  47:16

Yeah, I I hope it’s like the one thing that our team sees that like hard work can really open up a lot of opportunities in your life, because none of this was overnight. You know, this was all brick by brick, but because we always just stuck to our vision of excellence, I mean, every little detail that we do, even at the Atelier, is so well thought out, we serve everything with a linen napkin underneath it. You know.

 

Megan  47:48

You sure do. Everything is beautiful.

 

Kadi Lee  47:52

Yeah, everything is beautiful. Everything should be beautiful. And I just feel that if you really stick to what your core morals and like essence is you’re never gonna lose. So I don’t know, Micah and I, we always feel like, of course, we’re here. You know, like we, we have, we have a lot of self belief in ourselves, because the world is hard enough being a black woman. So we definitely lift each other up. We lift this business up. We’re not going to be ever have any negative self talk. It’s, you know, it’s hard enough.

 

Megan  48:30

I’m so proud of you.

 

Kadi Lee  48:31

Oh, thanks, Meg.

 

Megan  48:33

It’s amazing. It’s just so it’s just, honestly, it’s so amazing. And I’m sure there’s so many women who are listening and and people just in general, who are listening that feel inspired and to go, there’s a certain point where, even if you don’t know exactly what it is from the onset, as you’re discovering it, what is unwavering is your commitment to excellence and your value system, your value system, right? So that that appears in any of these iterations of what you did to now continue to build while you’re still building. I know that sounds odd, but again, like most people go, I built a salon, not I built the salon, then the brand, and then still thinking about what could come next. I mean, I’m doing the podcast right now, the show and the brand, yeah, and I went, that’s three launches at the same time, it’s a lot of moving pieces, but it’s also energizing.

 

Kadi Lee  49:22

Yeah, but I mean, I I look at what’s coming up for you, and it all makes complete sense, because nobody entertains like Megan, okay, you know, everything is just beautiful and intentional and thoughtful, and that’s why you’re not going to lose either.

 

Megan  49:43

Thank you, Kadi I love you. You’re the best. Thank you so much.

 

Kadi Lee  49:47

Thank you.

 

Megan  49:52

Next week, we’re talking to a founder who never let no get in her way.

 

next interview  49:56

I had no idea how many know no’s I would get no’s from amazing experts in the beauty industry. No’s from some of my favorite stores I would shop in. I mean, I would send our samples to everyone.

 

Megan  50:12

Can you guess who it is? And if you don’t know, next week, you’ll know […]

 

CREDITS  50:26

Confessions Of A Female Founder is a production of Lemonada Media.  Created and hosted by Megan. Our producers are Kathryn Barnes and Hoja Lopez.  Kristen Lepore is our senior supervising producer. Executive producers are Stephanie Wittels Wachs, Jessica Cordova Kramer and Megan. Mix and sound design are by Johnny Vince Evans. Rachel Neel is our VP of new content and production, and Steve Nelson is our SVP of weekly content and production. You can help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review. There’s more Confessions Of A Female Founder with Lemonada Premium. Subscribers get exclusive access to bonus content when you subscribe in Apple podcasts, you can also listen ad free on Amazon music with your Prime membership. Thanks so much for listening. We’ll see you next week.