DIME Beauty: Building a Healthy Skincare Brand from Scratch

welcome to the know your ship podcast presented by ehub I’m your
host Frank Dolce this is a good place to start welcome back to the podcast I
can’t wait to introduce Our Guest today because I I I because I knew you when
you were just a punk kid yep working sales in with a logistics a local
logistics company what a time and we always said that is a really solid
company but that guy Ralph not a solid gu no future he’s never going to
amount to anything it’s a fair assessment totally are you a are you a uh Su
Sonics fan oh yeah so my I was born in Seattle my dad’s from Seattle his
whole family is from Seattle so I have Seattle ties gotcha but I’ve grown up
in Sandy Draper my whole life okay Al to high school went to Alta High School
go Hawks I mentioned this you look like a baseball player yeah and you got
the tone yeah your Tone’s offensive you got my tone yeah because when people
say that if you say like you look like a football player then that’s a
courageous you you play on the grid iron I mean it’s take a bullet for
someone yeah if you say you’re an like a hockey player and people are like oh
selfless man that guy yeah you want that guy in a dark alley right exactly
and when you say I play baseball yeah what are what are the responses that
you get um cocky usually right yes know was why it’s a ding sport not sure
what we’re all cocky about prettyy pretty boy sure yeah it looks great in
those pants though absolutely the knock against baseball that you always hear
and golf too yeah which I love golf which is hilarious I know graduated
golf’s a gra for but but it the uh you don’t you don’t necessarily have to
have a super athletic body type fair to be really successful yeah different
kind of explosive movements swing’s pretty explosive so Works in both
definitely but everything else agreed and if you go down the Barry Bonds
route then you can become really EXP I mean that was when baseball was fun
though I know it’s so true the the home run it did the Home Run Race and I
even flew to San Diego to watch Sammy Sosa wow maybe have a chance at
breaking the record which he didn’t he went like 0 for four of course yeah
that day by the way just in case people don’t know dime Beauty you founded
dime Beauty along with several other companies I hope we’ll get to talk about
all of those things that led up to Dime Beauty but now that I’m thinking of
Samy Sosa Mark Maguire did you ever think about maybe transitioning into
performance enhancing like dime Peds you know why not it makes the game more
fun we were just talking about how save baseball we need to allow steroids in
just baseball that’ll that’ll I don’t disagree I don’t disagree because the
games are right now the games are too long yeah and but there’s nothing like
going to a baseball game sitting in the park having a hot dogood peanuts all
this stuff seventh in but it’s a long you have to committed yeah you look at
the scoreboard you’re like fourth inning You’ been there for two hours I’m
still not even close to the seventh inning stretch and it just doesn’t move
along it doesn’t and they they’ve taken all some of the excitement out of it
so some of the some of the Insight in how to make baseball better has been
allow hockey fighting rules if there if someone gets hit by a pitch or
there’s a close play at the plate or first base or something that would I
think that would bring people in be great I mean look at B in the ’90s when
it was like at its hottest there was fights all the time people sliding in
breaking up double plays yes cleats up you know I mean that stuff that stuff
was exciting we liked it same with basketball like I think basketball has
become it’s a little soft it’s so soft I can’t watch it I agree but back in
the day Charles Barkley Jordan yeah Larry Bird Bad Boys the bad boys like was
the time yeah Bill lambir rough anyway we’re getting off track let’s get back
is a sports podcast we should do that let’s get back to your stuff okay you
you were born in Seattle grew up here in in Sandy Sandy you had a passion for
baseball did you think I’m going to be a baseball player when I grow up I
totally did um so my oldest brother so I’m one of five mhm grew up seven of
us in 1900 ft house nice um most of my childhood shared a bedroom with two
two of my brothers and all four so one one sister and then four boys all four
of us played baseball at a high level competitively that was our life we
didn’t you know my dad was a hard worker software sales for most of what I
knew him for he was a chef before which is pretty cool he’s still a fantastic
cook um and my mom didn’t really work and so kind of that like typical
American type family and middle class and you know baseball was everything we
didn’t take vacations for fun it was we traveled for baseball MH so our
vacations were just baseball tournaments out of the state and that was just
the normal for us and when we were home it was wle ball in the backyard it
was playing baseball video games it was just that was all in consuming with
our lives yeah with everyone that’s awesome and that’s you know to to be
honest I’ve lived that with my kids and my family I did that growing up as
well and I wouldn’t change it like that was the best to go to tournaments
awesome and to have that opportunity and the experience with all of your
teammates and y i i it’s a great way to grow up totally there’s no doubt
about it yep but at some point all of us have to retire and like it sounds
like we ended up in the same boat we were forced to retire because we didn’t
have the skill to keep to keep going I mean your career was more successful
than mine I mean for me played in high school and I did I had a good high
school career um all of my brothers did and I out of high school I went on a
church mission like many do here I went to the Dominican Republic which is
like bball basb capital of the world I was like God is telling me I’m going
to be a professional baseball player because literally like he does work in
mysterious ways yeah like on on the P days like the rest days I would play
baseball with like the other missionaries and then on the streets teaching we
would play btia which is basically like a stick with bottle caps and we would
approach kids playing it and we’d play them to teach them lessons and you
know what I mean and so I was immersed in the sport and would see like the
MLBs like camps that they have there it’s really cool right so I was like I’m
going to play baseball and so I came back and I started started playing at
Utah Valley University M and I was like this is it but then I met who became
my wife and everything else changed well because she didn’t like baseball
players no it was it was more it was more god um so I came home wait are you
saying that he changed his mind like you’re gonna be a baseball player wait a
second here’s Bailey here’s Bailey you’re going to get into skin care okay
yeah you know it was it was I I met her we started to date at the same time I
was practicing with the team and all of a sudden my priorities were just
shifting I I very quickly fell in love and very quickly we got we met and
married in seven months very fast and in that time period baseball just be
took a back seat it became less and less important to me which was crazy
because that was my whole life yeah and so I remember the day I went into the
the head coach’s office and I sat down and I said I’m done I quit and he’s
like there’s other married guys on the team like this is very normal this is
Utah County yeah and I was like it’s kind it’s beyond that you know it’s it’s
more than baseball it’s I want to it has something in me was just like
baseball’s just a game you’re going on to do bigger things yeah well I think
that’s interesting that you followed your gut instinct at that point and I I
didn’t have the same experience in fact I think still deep down inside I
think I should be playing football professionally you you should heck yeah
let’s get you out there yes and at that point were you pretty accomplished in
baseball like you’re at Utah Valley do you have a starting position what’s
your specialty are you good hitter infield Outfield more of a hitter um
defense was okay wasn’t great at the time I was practicing with the team to
play first Bas and third base um but my whole thing was hitting I grew up
loving hitting didn’t practice defense that much yeah um but hitting was
something I really excelled at and you know in high school was was definitely
a top athlete in the state when it came to the hitting side of things yeah
well hitting is interesting in baseball because I know everybody knows this
but you you don’t succeed two-thirds of the time and you’re still considered
really successful yeah as a hitter which I love that about the sport it
teaches you failure and how to bounce back be a goldfish that’s what I was
well okay explain I know what you’re talking about Ted last the Goldfish but
explain being the Goldfish yeah so goldfish have basically really shortterm
memories they forget like instantly almost and so in baseball if you strike
out the first at bat you can’t think about that strikeout going into your
next bat or the next bat’s going to suck so you have to forget about that
strikeout the next abats a new abat and you know if you get a hit that’s you
know even if you have one for three that’s a good day abs game of failure well
I’m interested in that there’s two things that I’m I’m thinking about right
now one is kind of this gut feeling of my life is and passion have been
baseball I’m taking this other path yeah and and so that’s one thing you went
you went with this gut feeling and I’m curious about how that has manifested
itself in the rest of your life sure and then the lessons of baseball like I
think it’s really hard in fact I don’t know that you can teach all of the
things that you learn yeah in on the competitive field in the arena totally
those Les lessons are invaluable and you can’t put that in a classroom and so
this concept of failure MH learn from it put it past you I’m up to bat again
yeah and this time I’m going to succeed yeah failure nope it’s gone you do
you know what I mean I totally know what you mean cuz like for me my my
parents actually did not make me work growing up I never had to get a job
isn’t that interesting yeah baseball player yeah there it is exactly like it
was really interesting I my parents never pushed that my dad was just
baseball baseball and then also just be a kid enjoy your life with your
friends um that was kind of his his thing he was working a lot and traveling
a lot so maybe if he was home more he’d be seeing us sitting around be like
get your butt and go get a job but he never really pushed that on us and that
is something I’m going to be pushing on my kids the importance of
understanding the value of work and making a dollar and being an effective
citizen in our world you know I mean that was something I didn’t appreciate
but I will say that baseball the work ethic the competitive nature of sports
definitely bled into when I started getting into the work force and and
starting to figure out my career and like you said pursuing entrepreneurship
I didn’t even know what the word entrepreneur was growing up even post
Mission getting into college I took a sales job because here I am quit
baseball and I’m like okay I need to like start making money if I’m going to
marry this girl who came from like you know a father who’s done well and so
I’m like got all this pressure and I’m like okay I got to be that guy you
know and um these were pressures that I felt and and you know getting a sales
job I learned oh there’s competitive nature to this and it was was fueling
that so even though you know I didn’t have to work or understand that the the
sports aspect of being a competitor and then failing and bouncing back from
failure and just overall work ethic is is a great thing that sports taught me
all of those lessons hard work effort determin having a game plan strategy
scking to it learning from failure all of that stuff you canar you can learn
that in the workplace you totally can as well but if you can translate it
from the athletic field it’s it’s as effective it totally is and certainly it
has been for you okay so and by the way you knew Bailey yes your future wife
your current wife Y in high school as well yeah so when I was a senior she
was a sophomore MH and then my business partner Mitch Casey who we’ll talk
about when the story he was my same grade I knew him from middle school but
we weren’t friends we were actually kind of Frenemies because he says I love
this story he says that I was with a girl in middle school that he really
liked middle school so it started then and then and then in high school he
played basketball and football I played baseball so we didn’t run in we ran
in similar circles but we just weren’t friends you know what I mean and so we
didn’t come across each other much and if you would have told me today I mean
back then that I would be in business and married well in business with Mitch
Casey and married to Bailey snow I would have been like what you’re crazy
what are you talking about so it’s just funny how life works out I thought
you were going to tell me that maybe Mitch dated Bailey no man luckily that
did not happen cuz you know the ru don’t know if the business would the
Business Partnership would have worked you know the rule actually you weren’t
really friends but you know the rule if you you can’t date your friend’s
former girl like that doesn’t work the table okay so luckily it worked out
yeah super super lucky for Bailey too cuz rough we know that we know the
Casey’s from Cas pack yes so they’ve been in business in Utah for a long time
that’s that’s an interesting part of your story as well we we’ll get to that
so now you have a new motivation it’s not you’re going to be you’re going to
hit home runs in you know MLB yep who was your favorite team by the way I
grew up a Rockies fan which was terrible I mean there were just so close it
was actually Troy tulowitzky he’s going to listen to this podcast shout out
um he he was like my guy when he came on in 2007 uhhuh um I can’t remember
when his rookie year was but like he was shortstop and he was like my hero so
I loved that him and I loved the Rockies they just were terrible so they’re
really hard to cheer for so now I don’t I don’t really have a team I kind of
like a couple teams do you follow players more or follow players more yeah I
know it’s become that with all the great free agency everything else
interesting fact the owner of the Colorado Rockies is a guy named Charlie
monford yeah graduated from the University of Utah oh wow that is a fun fact
yeah yeah uh and so he yeah he grew up in that area came to the University of
Utah family got into the family business and then bought the Rockies so wow
that’s awesome fun fact uh so now you have this new motivation it’s not baseball
but you feel like you want to be a person that Bailey wants to marry yeah and
what does that mean what kind of person is that totally I mean for me it was
I needed to step up financially and provide for us right I mean I hadn’t
really ever experienced like a pressure like that obviously and I think when
we got married I had like $2,000 in my bank account you know so I got us into
an apartment in Midville by Top Golf that wasn’t there that was just land and
a windco windco still there yeah wico was there and it was just this teeny
little apartment and I was actually really embarrassed I mean it was what I
could afford I was my dad when I quit baseball and when I got married he was
like you won’t see a dime from me not in like a malicious way but he’s just
like if you’re going to go be your own man go be your own man and so and I
and I respect that you know sure and so I was like okay and then I was too
prideful to ever ask my father-in-law for money or to like stay in his
basement or anything like that so I was like I’m going to go make this happen
so I found this teeny little apartment and I was embarrassed but why I love
her so much is she’s always just like Gone With the Flow you know like she
just is like this is our chapter of life and things will get better and we’ll
just work hard and like she’s always been a amazing Supporting Cast for me
yeah and so it was it was fun but it was definitely like the pressure of like
got to make something happen especially where I didn’t even know what I wanted
to do in life I knew sales cuz my dad had done sales my sister-in-laws who
got me my first job in sales MH and like I had said that I realized I was
actually kind of good at it um it’s a lot of relationships there’s that
competitive n nature to you know get sales and grow numbers and things like
that so I did like that but what I found myself every job I took before
starting my own companies was I was like I could do this company better again
going back to theball BB guy in me um I just felt like I could take the
business model and do it better as I learned more about it and so what I
essentially I was realizing was I was more entrepreneurial than I didn’t than
I even knew and I started to become obsessed with product inventions I loved
this idea of creating a solution that made people’s lives better or easier
and I loved like how products functioned coming up with solutions that was
like all of sudden became really fascinating to me mhm and so I had this
product invention and I started to pursue it and I learned it takes a lot of
money to develop those types of products there’s tooling design cost
development cost of all kind yeah and I was like H I don’t have that and so
then I started to learn about like licensing and you know getting royalties
for licensing your ideas and I was like okay this is really interesting and
ultimately what happened was I came across this design this design firm
locally here off aome group and I was like Hey I’m going to create my own
design firm mhm and I’m going to get clients you guys will perform the
services charge me and I’ll turn around and charge my clients I was
essentially a broker you’re broker a broker yeah I didn’t know what that that
term was at the time you thought you just made it up I thought I like made up
this like brilliant look at this and people are like yeah you’re a broker
yeah exactly so it was kind of my first dipping my toes into my own business
what it meant to go get your own clients take care of them manage
expectations build the product price it out yep the client had the product in
mind you said that you could produce it you would sell it to them correct
essentially okay at this point are you married married yeah so now you’ve you
got married Y and are you are you working somewhere as well yeah so this was
going into working at the logistics company gotcha so I was doing that
full-time working at the logistics company and now you’re starting to to
broker product yeah doing some side hust it kind of sounds like you’re a drug
dealer it’s exactly what it was you caught me um no wonder you’ve been so
successful yeah and and is is what is Bailey doing at this point is she in
school is she yeah great question so she decided she didn’t want to go to
college she just felt like that was going to be a waste of time but she she
wanted to pursue something and growing up she had troubles with her skin she
would go meet with dermatologists and things like that and so she’s always
kind of had this desire for skin care and skin wellness and so when it was
like time for her to like are you taking a career path what’s your plan she
started to look into becoming a master esthetician and so an aesthetician
think for some of us who yeah okay so it’s a step down it’s not a
dermatologist right like they’re actually a medical professional an
esthetician is what I would call a skin professional they learn an array of
services from facials like skin treatments but even doing like waxing and
eyebrow shaping and you know eyelash extensions yeah I noticed that your
eyebrows are fantastic yeah no doubt absolutely so so she was like I’m I
think I’m going to pursue this and I was like I think that’s awesome so she
went to Nema which is in South Jordan and she did I think it was like an
eight-month fulltime it was literally like 8 to five type of course she did
extra hours that earned her the master esthetician so you can be an
esthetician you can take more hours that earns you the master esthetician got
and then she worked at coming out of that practice or that schooling she she
took a job at like some spas and things and but just didn’t love it she
started to realize she as well was very entrepreneurial mhm so she started
her own practice and she started to take clients doing facials eyebrows all
that stuff and she started to grow the practice actually to a decent amount
of clientele and um it was so funny that she’s going to hate that I share the
story but I love sharing the story is you know she’s not a money-driven
individual she is like a passion person and she loves to take care of people
and she likes to make people feel better about themselves that’s her number
one quality both internally and externally she likes to make people feel good
about themselves and so one day I went into her salon and I was opening up
drawers and I opened up drawers and there are like wads of cash like wads of
them and I was like there is so much money in here what are you like why
didn’t you bring like we should put this in the bank and she’s like I don’t
know I just I just would put it in there and close it and I didn’t really
think about it I was like we need this money you know so it just kind of
speaks to her and how she is as a person she’s just an incredible person
that’s amazing and she’s not driven by money which is amazing but it was it
just a funny little story so I can see this story coming together it’s really
fascinating did she have any thought at that that point because I’m sure that
she’s using product for her clients did she have any thought at that point
like I maybe this is something that I could do now now you’re kind of on the
side building products for other people did that were you guys ever talking
about that always talking about it so she she would initiate the
conversations I mean she was using like the clinical based skincare products
right the tried andrue proven used used by professionals only but a lot of
them wouldn’t work for people that had acne or looking for anti-aging
solutions they weren’t working and she’s like these should be working and
then like they would come in and say drugstore like products they got from
Walgreens were working and you’re like okay that’s really weird yeah and post
working at the logistics company which I’ll tell how I got there but working
at the manufacturing company was awesome for me to learn the ins and outs of
the industry because then her and I we joke about our Pillow Talk was talking
about ingredients and we were reading like product labels going okay this
product’s terrible this is old this one’s super irritating like d d d and
we’d go down the list and yeah I think at the time it was more just like
picking apart products and which ones were good and which ones not but I
think what was happening is we started to realize we were going to create our
own solution yeah that’s fascinating okay so that leads us up to you’re at
the logistics company you’re doing a side hustle where does this relationship
with me come into play that is that the next kind of Step yeah so working in
the logistics company was amazing because it was the first time I sunk my
teeth into e-commerce didn’t really Embrace that much uh coming into that job
it was so cool to talk to other brands and what they were doing I always
wanted to be on the other side of the phone you know what I mean I wanted to
be the brand owner doing a Cool brand that was always my aspiration I just
didn’t have the cash to make that happen right but it was cool to learn you
know the ins and outs of the logistics side like you know that’s really
valuable information that a lot of brand owners have no idea how to approach
that right and so that was super cool um to understand and then I get a
LinkedIn message from Mitch Casey I’m like Mitch Casey from high school and
uh he had done a Kickstarter you’re familiar yes and so he I know I look like
I’m old and I am but I do thank you for clarifying try to clarify I haven’t
felt that old in a while I think I should be offended but I’m not back to
that baseball player mentality um um so yeah so he had done a kickstar he was
doing like these wallets for this Lifestyle brand he was trying to get going
and he was like Hey I’ve done some orders I want I heard you can give me
cheaper shipping rates fulfillment rates I was like yeah man I can help you out
so I had him come uh to the facility and I just fulfilled his orders with him
so he didn’t have any like Pick and Pack costs and then he paid the the rates
that I could get him essentially but as we doing that um we were just kind of
catching up like what are you up to what are you up to what are you doing and
he said hey my dad owns this packaging company and this contract manufacturer
he’s looking for younger sales guys he has old sales guys sorry for those
guys if they listen to this those older sales guys they’re looking for some
Young Bucks and and essentially he was going to go be a sales guy even though
he for his dad for his dad okay even though he you know he wanted his own
thing to take off but it wasn’t so he needed a day job job more steady income
insurance he just had his first child and I I was like you know what like if
he can pay me more as a sales guy that’s enticing but I also liked this
Prospect of going and learning about product development because I didn’t
know anything about packaging formulas but it was closer to my passion than
say shipping Logistics was it was creating products for Brands and I was like
wow that could get me another step closer to like doing my own thing one day
yeah so took the job and uh we started working at casac yep and that was
there was two companies case pack and wasach product development M case pack
was the packaging arm and so that’s when I learned everything the ins and
outs of bottles and tubes and jars and what people don’t appreciate when they
go to you know grocery stores or whatever when you see all those shampoos and
Skin Care bottles on the shelves they don’t appreciate what goes behind the
scenes to get that product to that shelf it’s a lot of work there’s a lot of
intricacies a lot of supp buers a lot of things to take into account when
you’re doing your artwork and making sure you’re FDA compliant all this stuff
right yeah and so learning that was super fascinating to me and then learning
the contract manufacturing side getting close to their chemists I learned
that I nerd out about chemistry like not breaking bad style but like but you
know I I when I went in high school I took chemistry and I think I got like
an F or a d probably like but the skin SC skin care side like I really
appreciated this formulation to create Solutions taking care of the skin this
is how you treat acne this is how you treat anti- you know aging signs that
became really fascinating to me and I um one of the co-founders of was
product development he was their chemist one of probably a world-renowned
chemist I would say he is a an awesome chemist in the industry has made
products for massive Brands he kind of made the time for me to go into his
office on a weekly basis and just kind of pick his brain really and just ask
him questions about skin care and formulation what’s old ingredients new
ingredients what what’s out there that’s new where’s Trends heading and so
that was a really cool educational time for me to eventually lead us to
starting what we started okay I have two things from that story that you were
telling us one the logistics experience I think is invaluable yeah because
moving product around and knowing how to move product around and get there
under the right time frame and for the right cost is that something you’ve
been able to rely on as you’ve built your career yeah it has actually so
starting so dime does all of its orders in-house and so we built an
infrastructure brought in a software and like how we I mean it’s been we’ve
improved it over time but the way that we first built it out was stuff that I
had learned yeah at my job yeah and so yes and then knowing the carriers to
work with and to not work with and then yeah all the intricacies super
helpful yes I we hear that story fairly regularly is the logistics side of it
the transportation side of it yeah is complex and people don’t always get it
right and sometimes it’s just like they they treat it as a necessary evil
yeah and rather than really managing it yeah appropriately so that experience
has been super helpful super for you when you decided to move from the
logistics industry to this product development and packaging side you said
that well you know if they could if they could pay me a little more money was
that the motivation or were you did you have something in the back of your
head like I think I can I think I can build something based on this next
experience what what’s going on no I mean as I think back at it for sure
because I had been having those conversations with Bailey and so I’m like wow
this kind of like like the stars are linning I’m going to get be able to get
closer to the industry that we were talking about reading ingredient labels
you know what I mean I’m going to be able to get closer and like learn about
it how is it made and so they’re definitely that and like the product side
just learning about how those types of products get developed is was very
intriguing for me I mean ultimately again that pressure to be a better
provider that was always a motivating factor for me like I wanted to provide
a great life for my family um but the opportunity to go and learn that space
that my wife was already dabbling in and become a professional in it was
pretty cool to be like okay I’m going to go learn this side of it I think
that is really interesting your wife’s in it she’s had maybe this lifelong
concern about skin care for for her own and then maybe helping trying to help
others and then you discover that you have this kind of funny passion yeah
about building product that would be in the skin care world so these kind of
worlds are con converging and I see I I said that as well it feels like a
Stars aligning kind of story but you’ve also made some decisions to get there
and maybe following your your gut there wasn’t I well you tell me was it more
like just gut feel this is the right path for me or was there more of a
strategic I’m going to be in the skincare world and this is my path I think
it was gut feeli it was opportunity presented itself sees on the opportunity
I think that’s something I’ve learned in life is everyone has opportunity
around them it’s the those who go and sees it they take action and sees it
right and like even though you think an opportunity takes you what you hope
is a great outcome it might not be but it’s going to lead you to the next
opportunity and that’s what I’ve learned in my life is like I thought I would
take this opportunity it would lead me to this great thing it didn’t but then
it opened up this new opportunity and I explored that and oh okay this is now
you know it’s never how you picture it yourself but the outcomes seem to get
greater the more you can follow that got feeling so let’s take a just a
little pause here I want to before we get to your next event which is dime
yeah but but this concept of following your gut and trusting that and I mean
I have to I have to imagine that financially you’re not where exactly where
you want to be at at that time yeah totally and you’re taking you’re probably
taking some risks making these decisions how difficult is that you you had a
stable job yep you’re your guts telling you to maybe try something else how
difficult was it to to make that leap it was actually really difficult um
especially when you develop relationships at at companies you know and you’re
like okay should I do this am I going to burn Bridges but at the end of the
day I wasn’t happy with where I was mhm and I knew I was going to be on to
greater things and that was just this I don’t know false sense of confidence
or something like I just had this hope that I was going to be successful but
I didn’t know how to define success right at the time I just knew that where
I was right now wasn’t it so I’m going to try to keep moving and keep
throwing dart