Latest / Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast) / Her Tiktok video went viral and sold out 4000 units (!!!) so she sold her house.. with Love & Pebble’s Lynda Truong

Transcript

Her Tiktok video went viral and sold out 4000 units (!!!) so she sold her house.. with Love & Pebble’s Lynda Truong · Imagine If with Doone Roisin | Health, Wealth & Wisdom for Women (formerly Female Startup Club Podcast)

• 0:00
  This is Linda Trong for Female Startup Club.
• 0:12
  Hey everyone, it's Dune here, host and hype girl. I am so excited about this episode. Linda is a longtime listener of the show and we got to cross paths having her share her story behind Love & Pebble, the beauty pops that have been taking TikTok by storm.
• 0:30
  In this episode, we're once again talking about the power of TikTok, and I hope you're hearing these and immediately jumping to create content and giving yourself these same opportunities to go viral. It is crazy stuff out there. We're also talking about her worst and best advice that she's received so far, and an insight to what happened when she didn't get a deal on Shark Tank.
• 0:55
  And by the way, if you're feeling groovy, please feel free to pop over to the Apple podcast app or Spotify to leave us a review. It makes a huge difference to helping new ears find us. And I would be so grateful. Let's get into this episode. This is Linda for Female Startup Club.
• 1:16
  Linda, hi. Welcome to the show. Thank you so much for having me. I'm so excited to be here. Me too. I'm excited to have you on here. Tell us about Love & Pebble and the ethos behind the brand. Sure. Yeah, so we are a icy facial mask that melts into a skin-loving face mask. So
• 1:37
  It's made with all natural superfoods and it's like all food grade. So what sets us different is that it's a food grade product that you mix with water and you freeze and apply it to your face as like an icy facial.
• 1:51
  That is so cool. I've never seen anything like it. And I was watching videos of like your mom using it and it just looks so interesting. How on earth did you come up with this idea? And when, like take us back to this time in your life where you were deciding to actually start this and turn it into a beauty business.
• 2:14
  Yeah, so I actually struggled with acne growing up. And I would get this really bad, like, cystic acne, like, on my chin, where it's, like, not ready to pop, but it was just, like, deep into my skin. So what I would do is I would take, like, ice cubes, or I would freeze, like, aloe vera and then just, like, rub it on my skin. And I noticed that that was, like, really working for me. And so I continued to do this, like, you know,
• 2:41
  Even as an adult, I would apply like frozen bananas or I'd mix up this concoction and like I'd blend it and then I'd freeze it and apply it to my skin. And so one day I was like with my boyfriend, who's my husband now, we were like on the couch and I was like applying it on my face. He's like, what the heck are you doing? And I was like.
• 3:00
  Oh my God, you have to try this. This is so amazing. It's really good. So he tried it and he was instantly hooked. Like he was like, Oh my gosh, like this feels so good. And it just gave him like this instant glow. And so he was like, you know, like, how can we share this with everyone? Like, how can we create this as a product? So I was like, so we were just like, you know, it's like, how do we, how do we send like fresh fruits to consumers? You know?
• 3:28
  You know, after two years of R&D, we figured out how to do that. And so we wanted to make sure that we maintain like natural ingredients. So, you know, our formula is food grade, but still keeping it like fresh and not require chemicals or preservatives. So we kept it in powder. And so it's kind of like a little...
• 3:47
  make sure that you mix with water. And we were able to do that without having chemicals in there. And so here we are. Here you are. And what year are we talking when you started that, when you had that conversation on the couch? Okay. So that was in 2018, right? And when we first launched, like when we first started our company, we didn't start with our beauty pops. We started with facial tools.
• 4:14
  having the beauty pops in mind. So, you know, we were, I was really worried about, like, I was scared about launching it. Like, you know, what do people think it's stupid? What if people don't like this, you know, but thankfully it's been a success. And like, you know, after two years, so 2021, which is last year is when we officially launched our beauty pops.
• 4:34
  Okay, right. Got it. I love a bit of a timeline so I can kind of keep in mind when everything is. So going back to that two years of development, are you kind of like, have you invested a lot of savings in that? How much money did you need to actually get it to the point where it was able to be put out into the world? So when we first started our company, we started with about $20,000 and then we reinvested everything. And then we got to a certain point where like,
• 5:02
  when we launched the beauty pops, it required new molds or new, more inventory and just like new formulas. So we, I sold my house actually. No way. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So I sold my house and we were like, you know what? Are we all in? We're all in. So let's do this. So I love how you're also like not going straight to like raising money. You're like, Hmm.
• 5:26
  what money can I pull out of myself right now? Where's the asset that I can sell? Yes. So because we were going back and forth a lot, like my boyfriend and I, we were, it would be like your house or my house. And it just made no sense. So we're just like, okay, I'll just move in with him, sell my house. And, you know, we were really serious about this, this business. So I sold my house and then I put another $100,000 into the company after we launched the Beauty Pops.
• 5:53
  And you know, when you were saying just a moment ago, you know, you weren't sure what the feedback was going to be when you put it out there into the world. What was your personal community of people around you saying, like your friends and your family or, you know, old colleagues, that kind of thing?
• 6:09
  So a lot of people were unsure because it's something they've never seen before. So they're just like, I don't know. You know, like it seems interesting, but there's nothing to compare it to because there's nothing like it. So, you know, actually, like when we first launched, we did a little we call it the beauty pop ups. So we were at like a local salon and this lady, you know, we were talking about a product and she came up to us and just laughed at us. She was like, that's silly. Like...
• 6:38
  these are pops to eat, not for your face. You know, we're like, no, it's for your skin. And my husband's a pharmacist. He's been a pharmacist for over 15 years. And so he helped me formulate it. And he was like, you know, the ingredients in here are,
• 6:54
  You know, there's research behind this, like there's turmeric is great for it's anti-inflammatory. Aloe vera is antibacterial. So these ingredients are actually good for your skin. There's a there's a reason why we chose these ingredients. So it's not I mean, it's there is a cute and fun aspect to our product, but they really work. Mm hmm. Mm hmm.
• 7:15
  And so when you launch in 2021, obviously, I'm assuming you had a bit of a customer base from, you know, the previous year selling the beauty tools. Are you able to paint kind of a picture like how big was the business before you launched the Beauty Pops?
• 7:30
  So we weren't really big, actually. We started off with some tools on Amazon, and I didn't have much of a community at that time. And what really changed was when we reinvented ourselves and did the Beauty Pops.
• 7:49
  I was really surprised because I started really, we started small. I only ordered like 4,000 units of the Beauty Pops. I didn't, I was expecting, we called it a soft launch. It was kind of like getting your MVP product out. And I was expecting, you know, just to sell it, not sell it, but just like give it away, get some feedback. Yeah.
• 8:08
  And just kind of see how like the market reacts to this. Right. But we actually went viral like two weeks after launching it because they, um, an influencer, well, she wasn't really an influencer, but she was just like, I think she only had like 2000 followers and she posted our product on Tik TOK and overnight she had a million views. So we, and so completely sold out our inventory. So I, I sold out the 4,000 units like within two weeks and,
• 8:37
  And we were like, whoa, like, this is crazy. Like, and we've got, and at that time we got so much good feedback. People were like, oh my gosh, this is so cool. This, like, this really worked for my skin. So we had to like get, you know, we, we had to do another order.
• 8:52
  And then after the other order, it took us about like two months to get back in stock. We went viral again. And it was my mom's video. Oh, I love that video. Like seriously, when my mom did the video, it was like unintentional. It was just like, okay, I'm just going to throw this video up of my mom because it was her first time trying my new concoction. So she applies it. And then the before and after was like...
• 9:17
  Amazing. And people fell in love with it. They were like, you know, we sold out again within two weeks. Within those two weeks, we made over $100,000 in sales. Like we sold out like all of our inventory. You're like, thanks, mom. Yeah, seriously. It was just...
• 9:33
  Thank you very much. Yeah, it's been wild. And, you know, it's like really reassuring to know that what we created, like people love it. And it's just like now it's just like we can't stay in stock, which is a good thing. But it's really stressful. It's really hard. It's a bittersweet problem to have because, of course, you want to be in stock. But, yeah, of course, having that demand is interesting.
• 9:56
  I have a few questions just going back to the first influencer post that went viral, the 2000 followers influencer. Was she someone that just posted off the bat like you didn't know she was posting or was it like a paid opportunity?
• 10:12
  Not at all. We did not pay her anything. We just gave her, she, you know, she was like, I think she only had like 2000 followers on her Instagram and like barely any on her TikTok. And we were just like, you know, why not? Like, let's just give it away to as many people as possible. So we just gave it away. And then all of a sudden, like her video was pretty, it was good, but we didn't think much of it. And so
• 10:36
  when she posted on TikTok, we just started seeing sales coming in. We're like, what in the world's going on? And then she DMs me and she was like, do you see my post? I have like 700,000 views right now. And we were like, holy moly.
• 10:51
  It's just mind blowing to me, like how many times I'm speaking to people now and they're like, yeah, we just had a video go viral for no good reason. And it's just changed the game. The power of these platforms now is like next. Well, I haven't seen it as much on Instagram or heard of that happening on Instagram, to be honest. It's TikTok, really. But not leveraging that and harnessing that power is like such a missed opportunity right now in today's landscape.
• 11:19
  Absolutely. I mean, we have gone viral five times at this point. And it's like, my husband's like, what do you do? Like, how do you do it? I'm like, I don't know. It just, I'm not doing anything fancy. It's just, there's no, I mean, there's no like...
• 11:35
  equipment like I'm not I don't have like a full like production team behind me like doing things it's seriously like in my kitchen or like in my in my room you know doing the pops or like clipping videos together and honestly I think it's it's telling a story I think that's what TikTok likes to see it's it's
• 11:53
  organic, authentic, and just being able to tell like your story. A hundred percent. What is your like posting schedule? Like how much time do you create, like how much time do you spend creating videos and how much are you posting on these platforms on a daily basis? So we started doing TikTok April of 2021 and I didn't take it seriously until like June. And I was doing it every day for about
• 12:21
  four months. Like once a day or? Yes, every day. Just one post a day? Yes, one post a day. He was like, get on TikTok. So I was like, okay. So I did, I was doing it every once a day, every day for about four months. And then when we got reached out by Shark Tank, it just kind of everything went out the window because I got really busy. I had to like do a lot of prep work.
• 12:52
  And then after airing on Shark Tank, I got pregnant. So I didn't have any time. I got pregnant and I got really, I was really sick in my first trimester. So for like two months, I was just, I was not posting as frequently as I'd like to, but I'm still like, it's, you know, I think that people find their way to us and we have like 80,000 followers right now, which is pretty cool. We're pretty proud about that. Yeah. I mean, that's amazing. Yeah.
• 13:19
  Let's backtrack a little bit. So we're still pre Shark Tank. You've got the TikTok going on. Is there any other initiatives or any other marketing efforts that you're doing or you're just focusing on getting that daily video up on TikTok? So we dabbled with some paid ads, Instagram and Facebook and stuff, but it was never our main focus. You know, it's like everything for us has really been organic. Yeah.
• 13:44
  And we find that we get better results that way. You know, it's something that I still think is important to have, but we haven't really mastered that yet. It's just, it's like TikTok has been the best thing for us. And then obviously, you know, being on Shark Tank and a lot of press, but that happened all organically. So yeah, I'm not against paid ads, but it's just something that we haven't mastered yet.
• 14:10
  Okay, let's talk about the Shark Tank experience. Someone reaches out to you. When are we talking about? Like, what's the timeline for this? We got reached out in April.
• 14:22
  And so did they see you on TikTok? Is that kind of like, did they see one of your viral videos, do you think? Yep. Okay. They see you that way. They did. And they reached out to us and we got an email and we're like, is this fake? You know, like, does Shark Tank reach out to people? I thought you apply. I had someone say the exact same thing on the show yesterday. It's the founder of Bora Bora. And she was like, you know, we had someone claiming that.
• 14:48
  that they were like the producers or like the casting team. And we were like, righto, this is a scam. Like, ooh. Yeah. You know what's crazy is that two days before being reached out by Shark Tank, my husband and I walked into Kendra Scott's store and,
• 15:04
  And, you know, Kendra Scott is actually one of the, she was one of the guest sharks on there. And my husband's like, we're going to be on Shark Tank. And I was like, later, you know, like, we're not ready for Shark Tank. Like, let's, let's maybe next year, you know? And he was like, well, you know, like...
• 15:21
  He's like, I think we're going to be on there. You know, I think our product's pretty cool. And I was like, okay, cool. You know, I wasn't thinking much. It's so weird. Yeah. So manifestation, I believe wholeheartedly in that. But anyway, like they reached out to us and we didn't think it was real, but we went on some interviews and yeah, surely it was legit. It was real. So we were like jumping up and down, but they do have like, it wasn't, it was a process. Like there are several interview processes and like,
• 15:51
  you have to kind of do like, they have to do like your due diligence just to make sure everything looks, you know, good and it's accurate. And so it was, it was a really cool experience. Tell us about the experience. What happens when you go on the show? So like we were, you know, it was a lot of prepping. We were really nervous, but honestly it was probably the most exciting experience I've ever been
• 16:14
  Like it was like the adrenaline we had. It was, we were really nervous. And just seeing the sharks in real life was so surreal. They didn't feel real to me because they were just like perfect looking. Like they looked like, like the, uh, the wax. Madame Tussauds. Yeah. Like they were just so perfect looking, their hair and everything, wardrobe. They were just beautiful. And I,
• 16:37
  It just happened so fast. Like everything was just, it went by really fast. And, you know, we got a lot of love and support. Like they were really nice and really good feedback. And ultimately, like we didn't get a deal, but we learned a lot. And I took a lot of their feedback, you know, back to our business and really applied that. And I think what they said was that we were too early and, you know, we grew so fast, like,
• 17:07
  you know, within,
• 17:08
  couple of weeks of launching, we went viral. And so they weren't sure if we were going to, you know, if that was like sustainable or if it was like a one hit wonder thing. But, you know, it's been, it's been like eight months since then. And, you know, we're still going strong. So we're working really hard. With their feedback, like what did they say rather like what they would have needed to see to be interested? Like, were they interested in like, obviously, yes, you'd been viral, but what would they have needed?
• 17:38
  to be interested? So they were really interested in the product. They really liked our numbers, but I think they just needed more time and more of like a track record. Because when we pitched, it was only like three months in.
• 17:53
  three months in of after launching the beauty pop. So it was just like, you know, they were just like, I'm not sure like you're where you're really early on. And you know, you went viral a few times. Is that something that is like, you know, going viral is kind of unpredictable. Like you can't really you can't plan for that. You can't plan for that. So that was their concern. But
• 18:19
  Also, I think it was just really new for them. I think that was the main feedback that we got. The episode aired though, right? Yes, it aired in November of last year. And how was it, like the impact after the episode aired? Oh, we got so much support and love. I think just like, you know, we were
• 18:40
  like really humbled and grateful for all the support that we got. Like a lot of people reached out to us and was like, you know, I really feel like you should have gotten a deal, but you know, it's, yeah, it's, I think the love and support that we got from the show was even more. It was like actually better for us. I think us not getting a deal was a blessing in disguise because on the show, you'll see like at the end, like, I don't want to spoil it for anyone who hasn't seen it, but we were really emotional and,
• 19:08
  And I was really bummed that we didn't get a deal, but like it was a blessing in disguise. And like now looking back, I learned so much and I realized that we weren't ready. Like we can't even stay in stock. Like we just got back in stock.
• 19:24
  a week ago. And we're still working on supply chain and all of that. So it's like, I think that it's best to go slow. And we're just listening to our customers, trying to collect feedback, trying to see how we can improve. We've been in some interviews with some retailers and that's been great. So I think it's better this way that we go slow so that we're not getting ahead of ourselves. Yeah.
• 19:53
  And I also feel like you probably reaped the benefits of being on Shark Tank and –
• 20:02
  you know, still got what you needed to get out of it, out of that experience. Obviously, mass exposure. I'm sure you had sales through the roof, all that kind of good stuff and lots of love from your community. So, you know, that's amazing. Yeah, it was really, I mean, sales were through the roof. Are you able to share? Yeah, I mean, I could share some. I could like, so we did sell out. We sold out in like two weeks of airing and I think we had like
• 20:31
  I can't remember because this was my first trimester and I was like really nauseous. I was sick. It was really good. We sold a lot and we had, we set up a pre-order list and we had like over 2000 pre-orders and
• 20:46
  Yeah, it was just, it was wild. But what was really crazy was that it was right before Black Friday. So yeah, like, you know, during Black Friday, sales are like, sales are really crazy. So when we aired, it was like the weekend before that. And people were, you know, people were buying a lot for like gifts and stuff. So it was just.
• 21:07
  It was crazy. Just completely nuts. My gosh. So where is the business today coming into 2022? And what are the kind of what's the future roadmap looking like for you?
• 21:18
  Yeah. So a lot of people have been asking for more flavors and that is what we're going to do. We have three more flavors coming this year. We're hoping that we can get it out. I've been working on this, the new formulas since last year, but I'm not like, I have to make sure that it's perfect before we launch. So we're hoping to have it launched by second quarter. So new flavors. And then we're actually in a talks with some retailers. So
• 21:45
  We'll see. Retail expansion. It's exciting. Yeah. We're really excited. How do you approach like funding now and what are your thoughts on, you know, getting investors and things like that? So we haven't paid ourselves and that's actually not the best way to go, honestly, because we sometimes feel burnt out. I don't recommend that, but that's what we did. We kept reinvesting our money, our profits and...
• 22:14
  Friends and family, we got some loans from family and that's helped and gotten some credit card. You know, we increased our credit card limit and some bank loans. We're trying to hold out as long as possible. Yeah. So it also sounds like probably really the right decision to not take a deal on Shark Tank until you're in a much better kind of like position for more leverage.
• 22:38
  Yeah. Yeah. It's just, we've been bootstrapping everything and, you know, we don't, we don't have the fanciest, you know, marketing, but it's, you know, for us, what's really worked is just organic. And I think people appreciate that nowadays. It's like, we, you don't, we don't have the fanciest, like, like pictures on Instagram, but, you know, we show, like, we tell our story and we show a lot of like the behind the scenes and it's worked for us.
• 23:05
  Yeah, absolutely. I think it's also like people now want that breath of fresh air with just like what's real, what's actually happening, who is this like, you know, what's the more authentic side of this brand versus like everything being polished and, you know, everyone having just huge marketing budgets to spray all over the internet. Absolutely. What is the best and worst advice that you've received in your entrepreneurial journey?
• 23:35
  Let's see. The best advice would be to honestly was what we got from Shark Tank, which was grow slow. And I didn't understand that until we started running into a lot of issues. And like, you know, with staying in stock, like supply chain, that was, you know, we grew so fast, we couldn't fulfill our orders in time. And a lot of
• 24:00
  things fell through the crack. Now I really understand why they said grow slow. And then the worst advice would probably be, I think someone, you know, the lady laughing at us, she, you know, she didn't, I felt really bummed when she did that. And I felt discouraged. And if I had let that get to me, then I probably wouldn't have launched the beauty pops. So now looking back, it's just like, you know, like,
• 24:28
  go for it, believe in your product and believe in yourself. Because it's like, we wouldn't be where we were at if we were if we let, you know, that one person put us down.
• 24:40
  One hundred percent. I think blocking out the noise and choosing what advice you take on and what you kind of leave behind. It's like it's a skill. I think it's pretty hard to develop the, you know, the thick skin attitude where you're like, oh, yeah, I just brush that off because, you know, those things really can get into your psyche and your like mental brain.
• 25:03
  state, but it's so important to try and just leave that stuff behind and keep forging forward. So there was actually this one TikTok of a really famous, she was like a really famous TikToker and she made fun of our product. She kind of used a clip of my viral video and it was just kind of like laughing at it. Like these are,
• 25:26
  pops that you should eat. And I was really bummed out about that too. And it took me some time to get over it because so many people were commenting like, that's crazy. Like, you know, why are you, like, why are you rubbing popsicles on your face? And, but then I realized that, you know, like not everybody has the same like mythology, you know, like there are some people that, you know, believe in, um,
• 25:51
  like using like doctors and I guess I'd say like dermatologists would, you know, sometimes for acne, they would recommend using acne treatments where like Roaccutane and stuff. Yeah. Like Roaccutane or taking like drugs. Whereas for us, it's all, it's natural and going the holistic way.
• 26:12
  Yeah, everyone has a different opinion and a different approach for life themselves. But yeah, I mean, that sounds tough. I get like a, you know, snide comment on TikTok and I'm like, oh, like, what the heck? It's tough. Yeah. So I can't even imagine that kind of feeling like must be, you know, a difficult one to rattle with, battle with. Yeah, battle with. That's what I was going to say. Not rattle with.
• 26:43
  Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 27:07
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 27:30
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that. Thank you.
• 27:47
  Hey, it's June here. Thanks for listening to this amazing episode of the Female Startup Club podcast. If you're a fan of the show and want even more of the good stuff, I'd recommend checking out femalestartupclub.com where you can subscribe to our free newsletter. We send it out weekly covering female founder business news, insights and learnings in D2C, and interesting business resources.
• 28:11
  And if you're a founder building an e-commerce brand, you can join our private network of entrepreneurs called Hype Club at femalestartupclub.com forward slash Hype Club. We have guests from the show joining us for intimate Ask Me Anythings, expert workshops, and a group of totally amazing, like-minded women building the future of D2C brands.
• 28:34
  As always, please do subscribe, rate and review the show and post your favorite episodes to Instagram stories. I am beyond grateful when you do that. Thank you.