Latest / Skin Anarchy / Victoria McAbee and Jasmine Lee, co-founders of WHIMSY official

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Victoria McAbee and Jasmine Lee, co-founders of WHIMSY official · Skin Anarchy

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_02: Hi guys.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_02: I just wanted to pop in and say thank you so much to everyone who is supporting us, everyone is who is listening in, and just all of our guests.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_02: I am so humbled, the whole team is so humbled by the awesome response that we've gotten from all of you.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: So I wanted to actually come in and mention that we are offering sponsorships that are made for any type of brand, whether you're an indie brand, whether you're an established brand, or if you need some, you know, science curation for your brand and want to take it to the next step.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_02: We are offering sponsorship packages for everyone.
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_02: So um shoot us an email, skincareanarchy at gmail.com.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_02: We would love to work with you and enjoy the episode.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's my pleasure.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I would love to dive in by going into your background.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_02: So, Victoria, can you get us started on what your journey has been in the beauty industry and just you know everything that led you here?
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, absolutely.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: So our whimsy journey goes way back, way back even before 2018 when we even launched the business.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: And um, honestly, Jasmine and I we met in college, and you know, if you know other college students and people of that age, I mean, it's not the most healthy lifestyle for sure.
• 1:19
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, yeah.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, oh my god.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: I say mine was like the freshman 30.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: It was a really bad yeah, it was a rough year for me.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it was a huge transition, and so it was just like a lot of unhealthy habits that were developing.
• 1:38
  SPEAKER_00: I had pretty much stopped working out and then met jazz.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: We really hit it off.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but of course, like that lifestyle still somewhat continued.
• 1:48
  SPEAKER_00: And then I would say, probably like to give you a little like timestamp, around 2015, I actually started to want to dive deeper into like the modeling industry and acting.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so I started really spiraling downhill, started to suffer from like orthorexia, and then it turned into anorexia and bulimia, and um, it was just a really difficult time.
• 2:16
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then Jasmine had started eating plant-based, and so she started to introduce me to eating plant-based, and it really changed my life.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: And as I dove into my recovery process from anorexia, um, as someone who's five foot seven, I had gone down to under 95 pounds.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and it was just it was really, really bad.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: And so um Jasmine completely changed my perspective, and from there, um, that is where I would say the foundation of like whimsy even began, even before we had conceptualized the idea, because we started our own wellness journey, and then it really just was a ripple effect into like other areas of our lives, including like our our products.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: We started really understanding and looking at, you know, what are we even cleaning with and how is that affecting our environment and over all overall our health?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_02: No, Victoria, I'm gonna interrupt you for a second because really, really want to go back to everything you said, but first, um, you know, I want to get Jasmine's side of the background first.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_02: Jasmine, can you tell us a little bit about yourself as well and how you got involved with beauty?
• 3:23
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_01: So I um kind of back to what Victoria was saying, we met in 2013.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_01: We were freshmen in college, and I had been um involved in pageants and modeling for years since I was about nine years old to 22.
• 3:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um and as great as those were for me and kind of built who I am as a person, um, there was you know a lot of comparison to other girls involved.
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_01: And when I started doing swimsuit competitions in pageants, I developed a pretty severe form of orthorexia.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_01: So I was, you know, working out for hours and hours every single day, really restricting to my diet to what I thought was, you know, quote unquote healthy.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_01: That was, you know, chicken, sweet potato, asparagus, you know, for lunch, dinner, and cutting out like all sugars and everything like that.
• 4:15
  SPEAKER_01: So it got very, very restrictive.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, I started just, you know, not feeling very great about myself and my body, and just had a really kind of messed up relationship with the way I viewed food and how it's supposed to nourish our bodies and isn't supposed to determine necessarily what we look like on the outside.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_01: Um so I actually watched the documentary on Netflix, What the Health, and I don't know what that documentary did for me necessarily, but it just completely changed my view on food, and I started getting just so so excited about cooking plant-based recipes.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_01: I would start with making maybe making one plant-based meal a day, and then that turned to, you know, completely eating plant-based for the most part.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_01: And um that was something, and it kind of the timing of it was really interesting because I was sort of going through all of that when Victoria was also going through her recovery.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_01: So the way we kind of bonded over plant-based eating was really unique and special.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that that kind of makes like our brain story even stronger too, because it's something that has really healed us both as people.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: I am just, you know, I'm I'm in awe of both of your strengths.
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_02: Like, seriously, I I want to say that, you know, was going through something like an eating disorder is probably one of the hardest things I've ever seen someone go through.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, the fact that you guys are openly talking about it and really sharing your story, this means the world.
• 5:40
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I I hope you know that because there are so many women and so many men, young men and women out there that really never realize how this happens.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_02: You know, this can happen to anybody.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_02: So I love that you shared that.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much for sharing that.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_02: I want to actually talk about that nutrition aspect that you both brought up because I think that's so excellent.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um, when you were really researching, you know, what were some of the things that that really sparked your interest in the beginning when you were formulating, you know, in your mind what you wanted this to be, you know?
• 6:10
  SPEAKER_02: Can you walk us through like the steps of that whole journey?
• 6:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for sure.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_00: Jazz, do you want me to speak on this?
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, you can go ahead.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: So really what sparked me personally um was getting into adaptogens and even discovering matcha, like that was so transformative, is in terms of just you know, jump starting our daily routines.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, I really attribute being a successful person to having, you know, that grounded every morning routine that you start your day with to really like set the pace.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I think that matcha adaptogens, like learning about like even the little things like coconut butter, like it was just so cool to us.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so those were things that we really dove deep into and bonded over yet again, and really prompted us to create an entire business um surrounding that.
• 7:08
  SPEAKER_00: So, I mean, that alone is just a huge part of our company from day one, even back to 2018 when we started our mobile matcha bar, um, which is also something that a lot of people don't know about us, is that Whimsy Official wasn't just like this business that was just born overnight.
• 7:25
  SPEAKER_00: You know, like a lot of retail um or D2C brands are just kind of like they're there everyone has a story, but I don't think that people realize how like many layers there are um to Whimsy Official.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I mean, I I I can imagine, but I also want to like, you know, Victoria, I want to say this that, you know, recently I got the feedback of somebody that was saying about, you know, about skincare brands and whatnot, and they were talking about how, you know, it's just always like we're trying to like someone's always trying to sell something that's a skincare brand.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_02: But I want to say this, okay.
• 8:01
  SPEAKER_02: I think that the fact that we have skincare in this industry of wellness is providing solutions when doctors cannot, that is huge, you know, and I and I want to say that for everyone listening out there that this industry is not just about, you know, like, oh, vanity, whatever.
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_02: Like, you know, it's not about that.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_02: It's because medicine fails us on so many fronts, you know.
• 8:24
  SPEAKER_02: So when it comes to something like an eating disorder, um, I know from a medical standpoint that the therapy and the the things you go through are so difficult to come by in this country, you know what I mean, like adequate care that you have to find solutions to some problems by yourself in ways, you know.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I think I see these these kinds of things like wellness brands, they're these are women who have had a problem and they found a solution, you know.
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_02: So I want to put that out there for everyone listening who might be a critic of, you know, just skincare and beauty brands right now.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: Oh yes, no, absolutely.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: And there are just so many modalities that, you know, start with just holistic from a holistic standpoint that I feel like a lot of people overlook because, you know, it isn't talked about as much.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_00: And like very luckily, I think that the wellness space and the the clean skincare space is definitely shifting.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: And you know, there's a lot of work to do, there's a lot of pros and cons, but the fact that it's able to, you know, it's such a simple solution to these really complex problems that I feel like our society has just made even more complex unnecessarily.
• 9:33
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
• 9:35
  SPEAKER_02: I completely agree.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I I want to go back to um what you said, uh Jasmine, because I know you mentioned that you were in pageants, you know, what was that lifestyle?
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: Like, did that can you tell us a little bit about that?
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_02: Like how that kind of, you know, played a part in in in how you felt like in terms of your own body image and everything?
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_02: Because I I wonder about that.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_02: If pageants are, you know, like how they impact what young women.
• 10:01
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so it I started so young in a pageant system that was all about natural beauty, right?
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_01: So there wasn't a whole lot of comparison there.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_01: It really built my confidence in a way that I don't think it would have been built um without pageantry in my life.
• 10:19
  SPEAKER_01: But it wasn't until I got older, which, you know, I think it's like 19 to 22 or 25, or the um like the prime ages where women will develop eating disorders.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and that was kind of around the time for me where I was being heavily involved in these like swimsuit competitions, which they're extremely competitive in pageants.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: And um I would have coaches tell me, you know, you need to get a more toned stomach, or you know, your legs are too muscular for this type of pageant, you're not going to succeed or or win or whatever.
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_01: And those words, I mean, even though I have come so far to this day, they have stuck with me and they're probably gonna stick with me for the rest of my life because people don't realize how much you know words can truly affect a person.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_01: And um I've actually kind of started working with girls in the pageant industry as a holistic coach.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_01: Um, and I've I've been able to sort of work with girls, you know, fighting against that fear of comparison and more so working towards like a growth mindset and not a competitive mindset.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_01: So it's just it's really cool to be able to um to help young girls with that because it's such a such a fundamental age.
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_02: I'm and I can completely understand that you know when someone comments on your body, you know, as women, we internalize everything, right?
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_02: So it's like you start noticing as you age, like that, you know, I'm I'm in my mid-30s now, and I and I look back and I'm like, damn, we really hold on to things, you know, like moments, like words and and phrases.
• 11:53
  SPEAKER_02: So I I hear you, you know, what you said.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: That's and I'm so glad that you're you're doing something because yeah, this this topic for me, like it's always been very, very close to my heart.
• 12:02
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I've seen a lot of my friends go through it.
• 12:04
  SPEAKER_02: So I want to commend both of you for beating something so difficult.
• 12:10
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, and I second everything that Jasmine said.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that is also just I think from day one too, just us being able to talk about that transparently and openly has just strengthened mine and Jasmine's, like our friendship, our sisterhood.
• 12:28
  SPEAKER_00: Um, I mean, and we've had each other to really overcome these things, whereas a lot of people don't have that type of support.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_00: And so, I mean, I think it's just a conversation that definitely needs to be had because in a world where social media and rising to the top when it comes to followers is so prevalent and it's happening all around us.
• 12:47
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, it is some damaging stuff.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_00: That is definitely where you know my anorexia stemmed from.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: Um, as I mentioned, trying to, you know, really get into the modeling industry and acting.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it's just it's kind of the same story that we keep seeing repeating itself over and over again, um, regardless of the person.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: And it's it's very sad.
• 13:07
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and I, you know, I I wanna I want to actually really dive into these ingredients you guys have because let me just say I love, love your line.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_02: You guys have a phenomenal line.
• 13:17
  SPEAKER_02: It's beautiful to look at, it's beautiful to, you know, just actually experience and use.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_02: And I've I've been obsessed, I've been using it since you sent it to me.
• 13:26
  SPEAKER_02: So I want to dive into that and I want to talk about how you picked your ingredients.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_02: Can you um, you know, Victorias, can you start us off by talking about, you know, the benefits of matcha and why you guys picked matcha?
• 13:38
  SPEAKER_02: Because I don't think people have real information out there.
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_02: So I want you guys to tell us um what everything you know about the these ingredients.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, matcha.
• 13:48
  SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh, matcha is like my favorite thing in the entire world.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna say that.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: I used to be diehard coffee, and whenever we launched our mobile matcha bar, um we really had to push forth this education, you know, on matcha because it's still um in some ways a new a new thing that a lot of people still haven't tried.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: And matcha has the most beautiful healing benefits.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um so it's full of antioxidants, it's full of amino acids, and some of the benefits is like clearer skin, um, more longevity throughout your day because of an amino acid called L-theanine in matcha.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: It actually is helping you focus and really grounding you.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_00: And rather than giving you that like jittery caffeine feeling from coffee, um, it has like a really slow to come on, slow to go type of release.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so you're really able to just stay grounded in what you're doing.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and then also there's just amazing antioxidant levels, like especially if you have a good pure form of matcha.
• 14:51
  SPEAKER_00: So our ceremonial grade matcha is in fact ceremonial grade.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: And the difference is that you have your culinary grade and then you have your ceremonial grade, which the difference between the two of those is the way that they're grown, harvested, um, the way that they're even protected from the sun during their harvesting.
• 15:10
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so ceremonial grade is it gets very little sunlight, it's grown in shade, um, and the leaves are very soft and tender when they're plucked.
• 15:19
  SPEAKER_00: So um it yields a very bold, umami, delicious and soft flavor, whereas your culinary grade is gonna be, it's gonna be almost a brown color rather than the bright green, it's gonna be bitter, it's not gonna be um a really nice, soft, full body flavor.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and of course, it's gonna be cheaper too.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: So if you see a tin of matcha that costs around like$10 as opposed to$30,$40,$50, um, you know you're not getting what I what we would consider the real deal.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_02: But um, I had no idea.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_02: That's so cool.
• 15:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, like you're like a botanist.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, we have we've tasted matcha from almost every farm across Japan, especially in like the Uji region.
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so I mean we're very um well-versed when it comes to matcha, and we love talking about it.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, so many people think that Starbucks, they're like, okay, so I've tried matcha, and I'm like, no, my that is that's not matcha.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_02: That is Starbucks destroyed chai, you know what I mean?
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: Like as an Indian woman, I'm like, okay, can we just, you know, I get it.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: I get it.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_02: I know it's gonna be.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_02: Starbucks must be stopped.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I agree.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: But um, you know, Jasmine, I want to also get your take on this because I matcha, you know, it's it's a very interesting ingredient.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_02: I agree, but you know, but were both of you kind of like on the same page about this?
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: Like you both really wanted to um dive into that, or was there some like, you know, some debate about what you should consider something else?
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_01: So we were both really on the same page about matcha.
• 16:52
  SPEAKER_01: We had learned so much about it.
• 16:54
  SPEAKER_01: Like Victoria said, we have tried so many different types of matcha.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_01: So we really know or knew how to get, you know, the perfect matcha that was going to meet all of our standards.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, it is from my perspective, it has completely changed my life.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_01: And I know that might sound silly about like matcha alone, but I mean, it has completely changed my mood on a day-to-day basis.
• 17:15
  SPEAKER_01: You know, I've had periods of time where I had I've gone from, you know, drinking matcha daily, maybe not drinking it for a couple of weeks, and I've completely seen a shift in my anxiety, depression, stress levels.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_01: So it really does help you adapt to those daily stressors, and you, you know, you don't really realize it until you don't have it.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: But I also was a die hard coffee person, just drinking, you know, sometimes two to three cups of coffee a day.
• 17:40
  SPEAKER_01: And now I'm I'm pretty much just solely matcha um with a little bit of coffee every now and then.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: But I mean, it is it's it's truly just the best.
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_01: The flavor I look forward to whisking it every single morning.
• 17:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's part of my like little morning routine and just a daily ritual.
• 17:55
  SPEAKER_01: So it's it's wonderful.
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_02: No, I mean, honestly, I love what you said because that's how how I've been.
• 18:01
  SPEAKER_02: I've been actually using your product, you know.
• 18:03
  SPEAKER_02: When I ask for products from people, I'm like, I really try them.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_02: And so like I've been using the matcha every day.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_02: And I have I'm a huge coffee person too, and I actually love it.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_02: You know, my body loves it.
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like naturally energetic.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_02: It's the it's the most insane, insanely cool feeling.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it's it's almost as if you have natural energy rather than like speed, you know what I mean, from like coffee.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_01: It's like smooth energy, and I'm I'm so glad that you love it.
• 18:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_02: No, I absolutely love it.
• 18:32
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I actually I I want to talk next about the collagen blend.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so how did you guys go from matcha to collagen?
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like where, you know, I feel like they're very different.
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_02: So can you tell me about that?
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, um, so uh when we had our we actually had our mobile matcha bar um in our college town, and our two best-selling drinks were our ceremonial grade matcha and our glow gitter um collagen uh that we have in pr in you know ingestible form now on our website and everything.
• 19:01
  SPEAKER_01: But um it's it's so cool because our collagen has five key ingredients.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: It has blue pea flour, goji berry, macho, rhodiola, and prickly pear.
• 19:10
  SPEAKER_01: And you know, we kind of thought, you know, we we had taken animal collagen before, but just like animals get or just like animals eat plants, they're getting that collagen from those plants, and that's what's building in their bones and in their tissues and everything.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_01: So we kind of thought, why can't our human bodies do the same thing?
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_01: And so when you really have the right combination of ingredients like our Glow Gitter collagen blend, it truly helps to stimulate the collagen production within your skin while also having other benefits like improving your mood, your focus, your libido even helps to cure hangover.
• 19:46
  SPEAKER_01: So it has so many different health benefits, and it's a beautiful, uh, like bright blue color that people really love too.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, I love the, I love the, it's like a purple, like a purpley blue.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_02: I love it.
• 20:00
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so okay, that's interesting because you know, when I think of collagen, now you know, Victoria, I'm gonna kind of jump to you because um I want to talk a little bit more about it.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_02: Um when I think of collagen, right, from the medical perspective, I think of like the building blocks that we need to build normal, healthy collagen in our bodies.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_02: So, like, you know, all of the ingredients that uh Jasmine just went into, like, were they are those things that do that?
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like I in terms of because I know like collagen production has like, you know, there's like a copper cofactor and there's a vitamin C cofactor, and you know, all this stuff goes into the production of that molecule or you know, that protein in our body.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_02: So what ingredients are really there that are, you know, in sync with that physiological effect?
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: So I will just say that, you know, really what our approach was when building the Glow Getter Collagen blend um is that we really wanted to take the approach of allowing the body to sustain itself.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: So rather than feeding it animal collagen and like literally giving it collagen, um, it's not having to do the work, right?
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: So what we're wanting to do is take that same like like if you've ever heard of supportive skincare, which I'm sure you have, um for the audience who who don't know, you know, the whole philosophy with supportive skincare is to really allow the skin to build it's a strong barrier so it's protecting itself and it's strong and functioning properly.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And so we really just translated that approach into an ingestible product, and we're giving our body these key ingredients, such as, you know, we have the blue pea flour, which is just wonderful for antioxidants, which is great for the skin.
• 21:37
  SPEAKER_00: Um, you have your rhodola, which is a beautiful um flower adaptogen, um, that is just has a lot of incredible um benefits.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then you have like your maca, which is great for hormone balancing, um, which you know your body can't really perform to the best of its ability if your hormones aren't in check.
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_00: That's a huge
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_02: Collagen as well, like collagen depletion, your hormone hormone.
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: Absolutely.
• 22:04
  SPEAKER_00: And then we even have like goji berry and prickly pear that is just chalk full of vitamins A and C.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: And so you have all of these key components that really go into building out strong skin and allowing the skin to produce its own collagen.
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_00: So we're taking that same approach and allowing, you know, our body to really do its do the work itself.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: Our bodies are intuitive.
• 22:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's they're very wise and they know what to do, but we have to give it the tools to really act and to produce results.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, that was that was our philosophy.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: That's very interesting.
• 22:38
  SPEAKER_02: I like it.
• 22:39
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I'm actually a huge fan of like um supplement-based skincare products, actually at this point, because you know, the more and more I learn about, you know, the medicine and also just the the way that things are manufactured and and created and formulated, I realize that I think what you know you guys are doing is is is actually more like forward thinking, right?
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_02: Because it's like we like me being in my mid-30s, like I'm starting to think of things like menopause.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_02: You know, I don't want my skin to go through like natural changes that happen during perimenopause and then through menopause, which is like, you know, your skin starts thinning, you lose collagen, elastin, and all these things.
• 23:17
  SPEAKER_02: So when I approach a brand like yours, it's almost like I'm thinking of it like a preventative measure that I'm taking, right?
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_02: So I I love that.
• 23:25
  SPEAKER_02: I really love that.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: For sure.
• 23:27
  SPEAKER_00: And yeah, Jasmine and I saw a very alarming fact.
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know where we read it, Jazz, but um, if you remember, it said something about like once you reach the age of 25, you lose up to a teaspoon of collagen in your skin every year.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: And that terrified the shit out of us.
• 23:45
  SPEAKER_00: We were like, what?
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:48
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that was also like as we are, you know, I just turned 26, Jazz will be 26 in July.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: We were like, we have to do something, we have to give the people something to use because we, you know, we really create products for ourselves first, and then we just hope that everyone else loves it.
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: We've always really taken that approach to our brand.
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_02: Right, right.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_02: And I love that.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_02: Now I have a question for for you, Jasmine.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_02: But when you were realizing that, you know, you wanted to have this like more healthier lifestyle, or you know, like just kind of make some changes in your lifestyle.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um, what were some of the first ingredients that you noticed like made a huge change in your body?
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_02: Was it was it the matcha and the you know, like the stuff, or was it like did you start with other stuff as well in terms of nutrition?
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so really just basing my diet off of like kind of plants alone was the biggest shift.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_01: I kind of went, you know, zero to 100 really, really quick as far as plant-based eating.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_01: But um, kind of like Victor Victoria said, it was really just kind of experimenting with adaptogens, researching adaptogens, kind of um, I had substituted my coffee for like a chaga coffee in the morning, and I noticed a big difference with that.
• 25:01
  SPEAKER_01: I wasn't feeling very anxious or jittery or anything like that.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um, so yeah, just kind of plants as a whole, experimenting with those adaptogens, kind of seeing how they affected my body short term and in the long term as well.
• 25:16
  SPEAKER_01: Because, you know, over time, especially adaptogens can really make some some big changes to your overall mental health and well-being.
• 25:23
  SPEAKER_01: And it's it's, you know, it's not just how you feel, it's like your mental health as well, right?
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_01: Like you just it sounds weird, but I just started having more positive thoughts, having a better outlook on life, you know, having more energy and different things like that.
• 25:36
  SPEAKER_01: So it really shifted my perspective on how we can truly use plants as medicine.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_02: So now I have a question for both of you about in terms of like regulation of supplements, what do you feel about that?
• 25:48
  SPEAKER_02: Because I know a lot of there are a lot of skeptics out there, you know, and we can sit here and tell them all day that, you know, there is a lot of truth in certain products and they really do help.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_02: Because I personally have I have Hashimoto's thyroiditis and I understand the benefits of a, you know, an anti-inflammatory diet and you know, the importance of supplements and taking in the right amount of nutrients daily as well, you know, in my own way.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_02: So, but the thing is that unfortunately, when we talk about it, and especially the medical community has all this negative stuff to say, and people I think get lost in all of that.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_02: So, can you tell, you know, can you guys just talk about that a little bit?
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_02: When you, you know, what were some of the hurdles?
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_02: What are some of the things you've come across that is like more of a critique that you've had to combat and really try to convince people that, hey, we have something legit here?
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I think that really we've been doing it long enough to where um I think at this point in our business, being a D2C brand, and of course we do have some retail partners.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: I don't feel that we actually have been experiencing that problem with Whimsy Official, but I will say when we first launched, I mean, we launched in a southern college town where people had first of all never even heard of matcha, let alone adaptogens.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: And so we definitely had some skeptics, and um, really it just came through education, telling people like why these adaptogens are so great.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_00: And really, when you look at all food, like if you're looking at food from the earth, plants, you know, whole grain food, um, I mean, it's it's food, and these adaptogens are essentially they first were just plants, you know, and so um just taken and dried into supplement-style powder.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that that's really where we started was just kind of explaining it like that, and then telling people what the benefits of it are.
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, if you can say that avocado has benefits for, you know, people who are on the keto diet or um trying to, you know, burn extra fat, then I think it's also fair to say that adaptogens contain other properties that can do X, Y, Z as well.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: So really, we just allowed our audience to come in organically and didn't really put a whole lot of emphasis on people who may have been more skeptical about it.
• 28:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but then when we did encounter it, of course, we always had our facts to back it up.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: But one thing I want to add quickly before Jasmine puts our says what she'd like to say is that it it is really a shame that on all of our boxes and jars we have to put the statement from the FDA that it's not been approved.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: Um I yeah, it really, it really sucks.
• 28:26
  SPEAKER_02: Please talk about that because I that's what I'm that's was really my question is you know, your product is more for me, honestly.
• 28:35
  SPEAKER_02: FDA, I get you, you know what I mean?
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm a a medical professional, I understand, but it's like it I feel like is more of a detriment sometimes to even discover good stuff because it it's this giant stamp that's like, well, we don't know, you know what I mean?
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_02: And it's like, but the entire science community doesn't know either.
• 28:55
  SPEAKER_02: So it's like you know, it's like a moot point.
• 28:58
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, I I I I understand, you know, go ahead though.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_02: I I interrupted you guys.
• 29:03
  SPEAKER_00: No, that's all right.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_00: I was just gonna say, I mean, I even walking through places like Whole Foods, I mean, Whole Foods is marketed to be like this clean and green, um, clean and green store, which I do love shopping there for a lot of things, but I even look at ingredients and some products there, and I'm like, how did this make it into the store?
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_00: Yet I'm having to put it is not approved by the FDA on our, you know, our matcha and our collagen um because of the claims that we're making to say that it can help with this or this.
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_00: Um, and so yeah, it's it's definitely discouraging, but I think that that just is a testament to how much work we have to do in our society to really reform like our food system and just everything that the FDA backs.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that conversation has definitely has kind of risen up a bit over the years, and I'm really happy to hear that in the wellness space it is being talked about more and more.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: Um, but it's just a matter of really um, I guess breaking that stigma that comes with like those Western terms or Eastern terms as well, you know?
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, absolutely.
• 30:09
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's an excellent point.
• 30:11
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, I just want to I just want to say that the idea of really, you know, if you if you guys want, and this is to everybody out there that might be a critic and you know whatnot, if you want something to progress, then you have to come up with, you know, solutions.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_02: And I think one of the solutions can be finding brands that are creating supplements and asking them, you know, if you're a scientist or if you're a PhD that's working on nutrition, you know what I mean?
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_02: Reach out to a brand, say, hey, can I get a sample of your product so that I can do some lab testing to figure out what's really going on, you know what I mean?
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_02: And and use that as a tool for research.
• 30:49
  SPEAKER_02: Don't go at it like, oh, it's you know what I'm like my my point is like we all need to collaborate.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_02: Let me just say that.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, the science community needs to collaborate with the wellness community.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_02: And I think a lot of breakthroughs can come come out of that.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_02: But um, but you know, I I just wanted to, you know, thank you guys.
• 31:08
  SPEAKER_02: This has been awesome.
• 31:09
  SPEAKER_02: I've learned love learning about whimsy.
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_02: I've really loved enjoying your products.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you know, I use it every day, the especially the matcha.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_02: I love the matcha.
• 31:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, the collagen blend is is beautiful as well.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you so much for giving me the opportunity to, you know, to experience it.
• 31:25
  SPEAKER_00: And thank you so much for trying it and having us.
• 31:28
  SPEAKER_00: This has been so lovely chatting with you.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_02: And I'd love to have you guys back anytime for any launches or anything.
• 31:34
  SPEAKER_02: So keep us in mind um for the future.
• 31:36
  SPEAKER_02: And everyone listening out there, I really urge you to check out Whimsy Official.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_02: They are a really great brand.
• 31:42
  SPEAKER_02: It's very well crafted, very well formulated.
• 31:45
  SPEAKER_02: Your body does feel better.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, I don't know.
• 31:47
  SPEAKER_02: I can't tell you medically, you know, what's going on, but I know for a fact it makes you feel better.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_02: I definitely feel the effects of my energy and my wellness, like overall.
• 31:56
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, check it out.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_02: Let us know what you think, leave us some comments, and we'll be back next time.
• 32:03
  SPEAKER_02: Hi guys, welcome back to Skincare Anarchy.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_02: This is your host, Ekta, and I'm super excited about our guests because I've been really loving their line so far.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_02: Um, so without further ado, I want to introduce you guys to Jasmine Lee and Victoria Mekabe, who are the co-founders for Whimsy Officials.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: So, welcome to the show, guys.
• 32:25
  SPEAKER_02: Hey guys, so I hope you love that episode.
• 32:28
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• 32:33
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• 32:35
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• 32:39
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• 32:42
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• 32:50
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• 33:01
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• 33:05
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• 33:07
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• 33:11
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• 33:16
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• 33:21
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• 33:28
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• 33:33
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you.