0:02

I've learned what confidence is. Like

0:05

honestly, it's like a no-brainer. Confidence

0:07

just means that you're comfortable in your skin.

0:11

And it's like, okay, I'm comfortable with who I am.

0:13

I can't change my age, my height.

0:16

I can change my hair. I can

0:19

change my muscle tone in my body, how

0:21

limber I am, but there's things I

0:23

can't change. There

0:28

are not many entrepreneurs who can say they

0:31

started one of the most influential beauty brands

0:33

in America. But Bobbi Brown

0:35

has started, too. In

0:38

1991, she launched Bobbi Brown Cosmetics,

0:40

a company which ushered in a

0:42

new era of natural-looking makeup, defined

0:44

the look of the 90s, and

0:47

transformed the way women thought about

0:49

their appearance. Now, 25

0:51

years after Bobbi Brown Cosmetics was

0:53

acquired by Estée Lauder, Brown

0:56

has launched another transformative beauty

0:58

brand, Jones Road Beauty, a

1:00

skincare-based cosmetics company that is redefining

1:02

how we think about aging and

1:05

natural beauty in the age of

1:07

Instagram. This is one

1:09

of my favorite conversations I've ever had on this

1:11

show, because I've known Bobbi since I was young.

1:14

She lives in the New Jersey town where I grew up.

1:17

And so we were able to get

1:19

really frank about how mothers and daughters

1:21

talk about beauty, the perils

1:23

of injections and plastic surgery, and

1:26

what she learned from starting another iconic

1:28

beauty brand, this time in her 60s.

1:31

I'm Charlotte Alter, senior correspondent for Time,

1:34

and this is Person of the Week.

1:45

So Bobbi, can you tell me

1:47

a little bit about what your relationship with

1:49

beauty was when you were growing up? What

1:52

kinds of beauty advice did you get from your mom, for

1:54

example? Well, I grew up with

1:56

a very young mom. My mom was 20

1:58

when I was born. came

6:00

to me and said, you're really pretty. I

6:02

said, thanks, mom. She said, but you'd be

6:04

beautiful if you had your nose fixed. And

6:07

I remember looking at her like, what?

6:09

I mean, I never once complained, mom,

6:11

I don't like my nose. And

6:14

she said, oh, by the way, when you're older, you're

6:16

probably going to have to have your eyes done. I

6:18

mean, she was probably right about the eyes, but I

6:20

don't do that. And I never had my nose done.

6:22

And it just made me realize that

6:25

we all have what

6:27

we have and we're supposed to have it. You're

6:29

not supposed to change. And I also

6:31

am really grateful that I

6:33

raised three boys and didn't have a girl

6:35

to pass the beauty and security to. So

6:38

when your mom said this to you about your nose and

6:40

your eyes, what did it feel like?

6:42

I mean, did you have to spend a lot

6:44

of time recovering from that

6:46

or were you immediately like, no, I'm

6:49

not doing that? Honestly, the weirdest thing,

6:51

I don't remember having any angst. Like

6:53

it didn't carry over. I moved to

6:57

New York City and I start working with

6:59

supermodels that have one name and all of

7:01

a sudden, five foot tall, insecure. And I

7:03

was pregnant with my first baby at the

7:05

time is there sitting on

7:08

a chair, looking up at Naomi and

7:10

Cindy and Christie. I just remember saying

7:12

to myself, oh my God. And

7:15

then I said, okay, dude, don't go

7:17

comparing yourself to them because they're weird

7:19

because there's not a lot of people

7:21

like them and you're going to lose.

7:24

And so my mission has always

7:26

been to help people appreciate what's

7:28

special about them. Yeah. And

7:30

so tell me about that time working with

7:32

these supermodels as a makeup artist. What did

7:34

you learn from that? Well,

7:37

I learned a lot. First of all, I learned how

7:39

to do makeup because I don't know

7:41

why, but I wasn't great when I

7:43

started and I would do people's makeup and

7:45

I always showed them a mirror because

7:48

I wanted them to feel good about

7:50

it. And often, you know, depending on

7:52

the supermodel, in the beginning, they

7:54

would say, thank you, it's beautiful. Do you mind

7:56

if I touch it up? And I'd say no.

7:59

And some of them would. redo their face. Some

8:02

people like their eyebrows a certain way. Some

8:05

people like their lips a certain way. I

8:08

learned a lot watching them. And I also know,

8:10

you know, being a woman, you want to feel

8:12

good. Like I wanted them, when I was done with

8:14

their makeup, to look in the mirror and say, oh

8:16

my God, I look amazing. Then I know I've

8:18

done my job. Do you think

8:20

that you had a different approach than

8:22

the other makeup artists whose chair they

8:25

could have been sitting in? Absolutely,

8:27

100%. And

8:29

I didn't realize it at the time. So, you

8:32

know, I wasn't trying to be a disruptor.

8:34

I was not trying for anything.

8:36

It just, I always kind of go

8:38

with my natural gut and

8:40

I couldn't do ugly makeup. Like

8:43

I couldn't do makeup that

8:45

I didn't think looked good, which was at

8:47

the time, really pale

8:49

faces, contoured faces, overlined

8:52

lips, like all this stuff. And

8:54

I just started putting, you know,

8:57

bronzer on their cheeks and pinky

8:59

blush. And, you know, I

9:01

wasn't a painter. I was a beauty

9:04

enhancer, right? And so I

9:06

started realizing that there were certain

9:09

photographers I probably

9:11

shouldn't work with and other people I

9:13

should. So I started kind

9:15

of finding my peeps and my peeps

9:17

were the photographers like Bruce Weber, Patrick

9:20

de Marchelier, that loved natural makeup,

9:22

that loved, you know, this beauty,

9:25

but didn't want a painted person.

9:28

Yeah. And so, you know, one

9:30

of the things that I think people

9:32

really took away from Bobby Brown is

9:34

this idea of sort of a natural

9:36

beauty that embraces and accepts your flaws

9:39

as part of what makes you special.

9:41

Right. There were no flaws. I don't

9:43

believe in flaws. I mean, a gapped

9:45

tooth, I love a gapped tooth. Freckles,

9:48

love it. And guess what? I actually

9:50

like lines in the face. Yeah. And

9:53

so how did you go from working as

9:55

a makeup artist to starting your own company,

9:57

your first company, Bobby Brown? Well,

9:59

you know, could

12:00

actually have the no lipstick lipstick,

12:03

which now I call nude. It's

12:05

a nude lipstick, but nude depending on your

12:07

lip color. And then when I got

12:09

to it, he said, you know, we could sell this.

12:12

And I'm like, yeah, we could sell this. My models

12:14

would buy it and we made a

12:16

business deal. You know, we'll sell them for

12:18

$15 and we each get 750.

12:21

He'll give it to me. So for me, it was all

12:23

profit. You know, I had to mail them out and market

12:25

them. And my girlfriend who

12:28

worked at Glamour magazine said, can I write

12:30

about this? Like, why would you

12:32

want to write about this? Well, now I know it's called

12:34

PR and marketing.

12:37

And then, you know, I started

12:39

just selling out of my house. And,

12:41

you know, fast forward a couple of years

12:43

later, I met this grandmother, Grandma

12:46

Fran, who said, oh my God, I think

12:48

you should be on the Today Show. And

12:51

she introduced me to her grandson, Jeff Zucker.

12:53

He was the executive producer then. And then

12:55

I went on the Today Show. No way. Oh

12:58

my God. I didn't know that. Oh yeah. That's

13:00

how I got on the Today Show. So

13:02

Jeff said, Grandma Fran wants you on. I

13:04

said, okay, great. And he said,

13:06

how often do you want to come on? I said,

13:08

can I come on once a month? He said, okay.

13:11

He said, is there anything you want? And

13:13

I said, yes, can I be the beauty

13:15

editor? He said, we've

13:18

never had a beauty editor, but okay. You

13:20

could be the beauty editor. I

13:22

was on the show for 14 years. And

13:25

that was a platform to

13:27

teach and become someone that

13:30

people know, oh, Bobby taught me how to

13:32

do this. And it happened to

13:34

sell the products. So in that

13:36

time, how do you think

13:38

Bobby Brown, the company, but also you

13:41

as Bobby Brown, how were you changing

13:43

how people were thinking about beauty and

13:45

their faces? What did you hope people

13:47

would take away from these segments on

13:49

the Today Show? Well, I

13:52

hope that people would actually learn

13:54

something. I know the importance of

13:56

a takeaway. I wanted to do

13:58

segments like, your

14:00

eyes. Let me show you how to do it,

14:02

you know? And so I would literally, you know,

14:04

the camera, I would say, get as close as

14:06

you can. Let me show you how you do

14:09

this. Make sure your pencil is sharpened. I mean,

14:11

I kind of looked at it like a cooking

14:13

segment. Let me show you how to do it.

14:15

But you know, I had to think of things

14:17

every month for 14 years. Right. So

14:20

in 1995, you famously sold

14:22

Bobby Brown to Estee Lauder for a

14:24

lot of money with the caveat

14:26

of a 25-year non-compete clause.

14:29

Do you think you would take that same deal

14:31

today? Well, I don't think it's legal anymore.

14:34

But I'll never forget when Stephen said,

14:36

you know, good news, we've agreed on

14:38

all these different terms. And

14:40

Stephen's your husband. Stephen's my husband and

14:43

he's a lawyer. And

14:45

he just said, okay, well, they want

14:47

a 25-year non-compete. And I

14:49

like counted on my fingers and I'm like,

14:51

25 years,

14:53

I'm gonna be in my 60s. I'm

14:55

not gonna want to work. Guess what?

14:58

So I signed away my

15:00

name for cosmetics purposes and

15:03

anything else I ever want to do with my

15:05

name, I need their permission. Yeah.

15:08

So I mean, what was that

15:10

like for you to essentially lose

15:12

control of your name, something that you

15:14

had worked so hard to build? Well,

15:17

first of all, it wasn't a loss

15:20

for me. It's not like, oh, I

15:22

lost control of my name. No, I

15:24

was like, wow, this is so cool.

15:26

I now had these amazing partners. You

15:29

know, you became part of the Lauder

15:31

family. Every time there was some amazing

15:33

event and party, I'm sitting at Leonard

15:35

Lauder's right or left side. He's introduced

15:38

me to everyone. So for the longest

15:40

time, it was just so cool. And

15:43

you know, I was a naive kid

15:45

that didn't have a ton

15:47

of experience and Leonard believed

15:50

in me and really loved

15:52

my creativity and he was

15:54

incredibly supportive. But guess what?

15:56

Leonard wasn't always in charge

15:58

and towards the end of. of my contracts,

16:01

it was not fun. So it

16:03

didn't work out at the end.

16:06

So you told the Financial Times in 2021, I

16:08

don't ever want to be part of a billion dollar

16:11

brand again. Oops. At that

16:13

point. Oops. So

16:16

Bobby, what's the secret? We

16:18

built these two cosmetics

16:20

brands, really for different

16:22

generations in one lifetime.

16:24

Yeah, it's kind of weird. Honestly, Charlotte, I

16:27

never thought about it. I never thought ever

16:29

about, oh, I want to be famous. Oh,

16:31

I want to be well known. I want

16:33

to be loved. I just do

16:35

my stuff. Like I am the same Chicago

16:39

suburb, five foot

16:41

tall girl that I have always been, you

16:43

know? I've been wearing clogs. I

16:45

know they're popular again, since

16:47

I was in middle school

16:49

and scrunchies and fanny packs.

16:52

I'm the same person I've always been.

16:55

So the success of my

16:57

life for me personally overtakes

16:59

the success of my companies. I

17:01

mean, I'm 35 years married and

17:03

have three incredible babies. Like they grew up

17:05

to be great men. To me,

17:07

that's success. More

17:11

with beauty icon, Bobby Brown in

17:13

a minute. So

17:24

I want to talk about Jones Road. Can

17:42

you tell me the story of how

17:44

you started Jones Road and

17:46

why you decided to start another beauty

17:48

brand in the first place? Well,

17:51

when I left Bobby Brown Cosmetics,

17:54

everything was different. When you're

17:56

working on one thing with all

17:58

these people,