Clean Beauty to $228M: Tower 28's Amy Liu on Scaling a Sensitive Skin Empire
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No one's going to pat you on the back if you don't lose their money. Statistics research have shown that, and I quote, pretty people get paid more. My parents never had a lot of money. Are we shaping AI or is AI shaping us? There's a number of existential risks that confront human beings. I think AI just being developed reduces the overall existential risk characteristics.

I'm Preet Bharara, and this week, Reid Hoffman, entrepreneur, investor, and author of Super Agency, What Could Possibly Go Right With Our AI Future, joins me on my podcast, Stay Tuned with Preet. The episode is out now. Search and follow Stay Tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts.

What's up, rich friends? Welcome back to another episode of Net Worth and Chill with me, your host, Vivian Tu, aka your rich BFF and your favorite Wall Street girly.

And today I am getting vulnerable about the skin that I'm in. In particular, the itchy skin. I don't know how high res this camera is, but as you can see, I am currently in LA. The air's a little dry. Everything's feeling a little different than the moist, humid East Coast air. And I am having an eczema flare up on my skin. The worst.

And I can't tell you when it started, but at some point my smooth preteen baby's butt skin started to turn into sandpaper. And then there were little itchy patches on it and they started to form on my back and on my torso and my arms. And it just felt like I had a perpetual rash. Yeah.

And ultimately, I was diagnosed with eczema. And it's been, I would say, a medium struggle for me ever since. I don't want to equate it to people who are truly living with severe eczema or, frankly, any other chronic conditions.

Mine is just a little itchy. It's a little unsightly sometimes, but it still had a really big impact on my confidence. For almost all of my adult life, I've dealt with it, and I have paid for pricey lotions, prescription creams, some that you, by the way, your skin can get addicted to, which can get a little scary. Yeah.

And, you know, I will say I am not alone. More than 31 million people have eczema in the U.S. alone. And having sensitive skin often means you are relegated to using products that are kind of

Shall we say made for your grandmother. They are herbaceous smelling as a polite term. They are super not sexy. You don't get to use the type of makeup that you see in advertisements that's fun and chic. You kind of have to go with the boring, unscented, unsexy stuff.

But today I've invited a close personal friend who is changing the game and bringing sensitive skin products into the mainstream while also showing the legacy beauty players how A-plus marketing is done.

Everyone, please welcome the CEO and founder of Tower 28 Beauty, Amy Liu. Hi, thank you so much for having me, Vivian. I'm so excited to be here. Thank you so much for chatting with me. I feel like the last time we hung out in your office, it was like free therapy for me. And me. But as a fellow eczema girly, you've shared your struggle on social media. So I kind of want to start this conversation with you.

about your journey. Like, when did your skin issues start to impact your life? Yeah, my eczema actually started happening right around the time that I was in college and probably towards the end of college. And I'll never really know, but they say that eczema –

either is genetic, it is bacterial, or it is something that happens environmentally. And for me, I think it was when I lived with eight girls in a house and I pulled the short straw and I ended up living in the garage. Wait, what? When I was in college, I lived in a garage and it wasn't like a, was it insulated? Yeah.

Probably not really. I mean, no, it was a garage that we remodeled. I mean, remodeled as in like we threw a carpet in there. Oh, my goodness. Okay. And I was trying to save money at the time. Yeah, of course, of course, of course. And who knows? But I mean, after that, I really have had eczema since then. Yeah. And did it ever like impact your confidence? I mean –

I think that's why I feel so passionate about what I do. And I ended up going into the beauty industry because I think I actually am not someone who is so obsessed with makeup. It's not like I love makeup so much. I think the thing that really gets me up in the morning and the part that is my purpose is I think a lot about the relationship we as women have with

not just makeup and beauty products, but the way that we relate to confidence and the way that we look and how that affects the way we walk through the world and our ability to kind of strive and achieve is really related to oftentimes the way that we feel about ourselves. And I think for me, my eczema was something that showed up on my face. It showed up on my hands in really public ways. And so it was something I really understood about how when you have a skin condition and

Or anything that shows up on your face in a public way that you just feel – you feel it so much. Yeah, it's so visible, so apparent. And since this is a money show, we should talk about the fact that like statistics, research have shown that –

And I quote, pretty people get paid more. So not only is having an underlying medical condition that impacts your confidence going to impact how you walk and talk and breathe, but it's probably going to also impact your work and the opportunities you're given. And then consider trying to work in areas like fashion business.

beauty, editorial, like those types of industries where whether we like it or not, people are biased, right? So there is an expectation that you know how to wear makeup, that you have good skin. And if you're the one sitting there marketing and selling these products, that you implicitly understand it and that you would walk the walk and talk the talk. Yeah. From a financial perspective, just give me a quick ballpark. How much money do you think

you have spent on eczema, on like products to tackle your eczema or like random solutions that you Googled online? I'm sure upwards of, I'm sure in the five digits. Yeah, really? Like for sure. Because, or even more than that, I mean, I have had

bouts. It's been a journey for me. So this has been, I would say, in the neighborhood of like 30 years that I've now had eczema. And so I've tried everything from, I've done acupuncture really regularly. I've done TCM herbs. I've done kind of all the Eastern medicine things. And on the Western medicine side, I've done steroids. I've done shots. There's a shot called- Dupixent. Dupixent at one point that I couldn't get a

And it was if you don't have a prescription or if you're – you can get a prescription, but if you don't get it covered by your insurance. Pre-authorization. Yeah. I think it's $3,000 a shot. And you got to take it like every other week or every week. It's wild, right? So a lot of these things are not just like steroids are cheap, but like the new –

Things are not necessarily... And steroids you can get addicted to. Well, and there's topical steroid withdrawal. And I used to, I'm not proud of this, but there were times in my life where, especially when I was in my 20s and I had like a wedding every weekend or I was dating a lot and

you know, you want to look pretty for lack of a better word. And like, I mean, there's nothing wrong with saying that. Yeah. Wanting to look and feel your best is not a crime. Totally. Totally. And I think there is like a vanity, right? Like we as a society have, and I think it's kind of forced upon women to be honest in a lot of ways. But I was that person that would wake up in the morning and I would literally like not know what my skin would be like that day. And I would literally touch my skin like, is it today an okay day? Or is it going to be red? Is it going to be rashy?

Are my eyes going to be swollen? Like what kind of a day is it today? And so I would even pop steroid pills sometimes before I needed to because I wanted to. Before, like proactively. Proactively. Like I would do it two days before I had like a big meeting or an event or something like that because I didn't want to have a problem. Yeah. And even now I worry that as I get older that there will be problems that result out of that because I'm

All of those pills have warning signs on the side that say, you know, like one day you might have like bone density loss or eye vision issues. And so, I mean, there's a lot of side effects too. Yeah, definitely. And I want to switch gears really quickly. You're the daughter of immigrant parents like me. Your parents immigrated to the States from Taiwan. What was it like growing up

in the immigrant experience and how did that play into your early relationship with money? Yeah. So my parents immigrated from Taiwan for grad school. First, they migrated to Minnesota, then Illinois. Minnesota. Minnesota. So I was actually born in Minnesota. Yeah. My parents say that I was born right next to the Hormel chili plant. Really sexy. And then we ended up moving to Los Angeles when I was probably five years old. But

I remember growing up in really predominantly white communities. Like, my parents – my dad, when he moved here, had – he had a host family. And so growing up, like, my host – my dad's host family, like, I called them grandpa and grandma. Yeah. Yeah. Right? They were –

And so I think that was actually lovely. But I think in terms of money, my parents never had a lot of money when they were young because they were students too. So they were grad school students. And I think my dad really felt like he became an entrepreneur. So he was a general contractor. He did a lot of commercial like condos, that type of a thing.

And I think he would say that entrepreneurship was something that he ended up doing because he had to because he didn't feel like he was able to get jobs that were willing to pay him what he wanted to make because of the fact that English was his second language. And he felt like it was much more productive for him to go and get jobs working with people

who spoke the same language as him. So that's why he ended up moving. We ended up moving to LA. A lot of the work that he did was in the San Gabriel Valley, which is here, which is where a lot of the Asians live. It's where all the best Asian food is, by the way. All the best Asian food. I mean, you can literally live in the San Gabriel Valley and not speak English. Yeah. Um,

But, you know, in terms of money, like I was really raised with a mentality of like never have credit card debt, never had debt in general, don't ever borrow money, don't ever spend more than you make, save, save, save. I find it very interesting that entrepreneurship was the route that your dad felt like he had to take because that's so opposite of what

I feel like many immigrants think they're like, oh, I should just put my head down, work for somebody else, and then I'll get noticed and maybe get promoted. That was very bold. Maybe. I mean, maybe, but I don't think he felt like he was – he wasn't prepared or like educated to be like a doctor or a lawyer. Gotcha. An engineer. So like the thing that he – and actually come from a family that is maybe different in the sense too that –

Like my dad was an architect where he got a degree in architecture too and at one point practiced. And I think like had more of an artistic kind of like feeling to it. And so I think to do what he wanted to do, he didn't feel like he was able to get the shot that he wanted. But yeah, you're right. It is a little bit different. And since we are on the topic of Asians...

Have you noticed that Asian people get eczema a lot more? Actually, it's like statistically true that Asian and black people get more – and children. Children have a higher propensity of getting eczema too. And I don't know why. I don't know if it's like the melanin in the skin or what it is. But –

Did you get any money habits from your parents that you are one, proud of or two, felt like you had to unlearn? I think that probably the biggest one is just being risk averse. And I think that – You want to unlearn or keep that one?

I think – honestly, I think it's a dual-edged sword, right? I think there's a part of it where part of the – so we've been profitable for a very long time and that's something I'm proud of as a company. But also like it is because I pay attention, because I'm not trying to waste money. But at the same time, at the beginning of my journey and even now, I have to remind myself like I had a – I actually had a career like a founder mentor who was like you – no one's going to pat you on the back if you –

don't lose their money. Like I raised friends and family money and she was like, no one's going to be proud of you because you didn't lose it. You have to actually spend it to try to get it back and to invest it and make money. And so that was something I had to learn as well. And I think even now I'm trying to learn that on a regular basis.

Can you give me the Tower 28 birth story for those of us who don't know? Yeah, sure. So quickly, I've had eczema my entire adult life. I've also been a beauty executive for a really long time. It's been 22 years now.

And I think the combination of those two things made me really conscious of what I looked like and self-conscious, I should say. And I was always looking for products that were not only clean but safe for sensitive skin. And that's what Tower 28 is today. So the thing I really wanted to do was to be able to wear makeup because I think when you have something on –

your skin. Yes, you want to cure it, but you also in the short term, you want to cover it up. And I was so worried that by putting on product on top of my skin that I was just exacerbating my own issues or making them worse. And so about six years ago, I raised friends and family money. I raised $500,000 before I

I did anything basically on my resume and really did raise it from people I like go to lunch with and, you know, vacation with like my friends from high school. These are like real friends. These aren't like, oh, like networking friends. No. And people I worked with. And it's like small checks, big checks. Yeah. Very few big checks. You're like actually just two. No. Actually, when you said that, it's true. I had two big checks and a lot of small checks.

But it was really motivating for me too. So we launched five years ago. We raised money six years ago. We launched five years ago. Today we're in all Sephoras, US and Canada. We're in Mecca, in distribution to in Australia. And it's been a really fun and fast ride. Yeah. And I do want to take a second to focus on the numbers. I think we hear this a lot like, oh, you're 40. Your life is over. You didn't even start Tower 28 until you turned 40. Yeah. Yeah.

Can you give me like your perspective on aging, your career, and how to continue to make the most of what you want to do through your life? I actually love the fact that I didn't start until I was 40. Not to say that when I was 40 and starting, I felt like that. But looking back on it, I was really nervous at the time. But part of the reason I think it happened was because

And frankly, I had a friend who invested that had said to me, he was like, if you don't do this now, you're literally never going to do it. And at the time, I had three kids. I still have three kids. And that I have three kids, I had a mortgage, still have a mortgage. But we had just bought our first house because we live in LA and it takes a long time to save up money and do that. And I wasn't going to start a company. And I got a little bit of tough love where he was like, you've said you wanted to do this now.

for 20 years. And because I was in business school saying I majored in entrepreneurship. Yeah. And I never did it because I kept working for other people, which part of it was because of fear. But part of it, I thought, was such a good thing in retrospect, because I learned so much from doing that. And not only did I learn a lot, but I also gained the community and the resources of being able to ask people if I had questions. And so fast forward to today, I'm

I actually – like sometimes people in these types of settings are like, is it okay if we talk about your age? And I'm like, I'm so proud of the fact that I'm 46 today because honestly, like I don't think I would have been able to handle this if I was younger. And also I think that there are so many women who – people, never mind women, but I do think a lot of women –

have kids when they're in like the prime of their career. And especially during COVID, a lot of people had to give up their careers because somebody had to step back and help take care of the kids. And then they worry so much about not being able to get back in or they feel like their life is over. And even I have a lot of friends who are in their 40s now who are like, I guess it's too late, too late to be happy. Whether it is

choosing a new career, whether it is divorcing your husband and finding a new one because you're not happy or whatever it is. And I just, it makes me so sad because we have like another half of my life to live at this point. So like to think that it's too late seems crazy to me. Yeah. You're only at the halfway mark. We're only at the halfway mark. But yes. So like I would encourage anyone to learn on someone else's dime. I think like

Some people say to me like, oh, you've had this like overnight success. And I'm like, well. Can you define that? Learn on someone else's dime. So I'm meaning like other people were paying me to work for them. Yeah. At other beauty companies. At other beauty companies. And I was able to not only observe through like I learned the positives, what to do, but I also learned what not to do. I learned from other people's mistakes. Yes.

And so I think I was able to apply that to what I'm doing today. So as an example of that, like I worked for a brand who went into full distribution. When we went into retail, we went into Nordstrom's, Neiman's, Sephora, QVC. We went everywhere at the same time. Yeah.

And that's like going into like having a lot of boyfriends. Like if you have a lot of boyfriends, like does anyone – It's hard to juggle. It's hard to juggle. And does anyone think that you're the one that they're going to marry? They're like a little bit paying attention and they're like, well, you're dating lots of people. I don't know how important I am to you. As opposed to like that's why looking at that, I was like, okay, well, I'm going to pick –

one person, which is Sephora. We're going to get married. It's funny because we just – we literally call it – I was like joking. We call it like our vow renewal. We just upped our exclusivity with them. Amazing. But it is. It's like if you can pay to do one thing and do it really well, I think there is a real benefit to that, especially when you're small and you're not like this huge conglomerate. Yeah. And you're not spreading yourself too thin. I do want to take a second to play devil's advocate. Yeah. You said –

You didn't think that you would have been ready to make Tower 28 what it was had you been younger and single and not had the family and stuff. But how were you able to juggle that?

of building this company, which takes money, you had to raise money while also knowing in the back of your mind, oh, my kids need lunch money and I need to pay my mortgage and my car payment and all this other stuff going on in your personal life. So by the way, I genuinely think there is no right way to do it. Like I think, I look at young people sometimes, I have a lot of founder friends who are much younger than I am. And I'm like, I think it's great that they're going for it. And they're

able to do it in a different way. So I don't think there's a right or wrong. It was for me personally, I think that my journey happened the way it did in a really beautiful way. But you're right. I think it's a different type of a struggle if you do it later in life. And I had the privilege of the fact that I married someone who was able to help me

hold down the fort financially, right? So my husband made enough money that we could like, it wasn't a question of can my kids eat? Yeah. So we didn't have those types of golden handcuffs, but we did have golden handcuffs in the sense where, you know, I didn't take a salary. I didn't, we invested money. We had to

This is like rich people problems to some degree, but we had to pull our kids out of private school. Yeah. We had to think about the way that we like vacation, the way they spent money. So it definitely changes things. Of course. But there is a privilege to being able to like just live. I'm not worried about feeding myself in that situation. Yeah. I think that's very, very important.

honest, but also like practical. Practical. But I also say the thing that we did that I thought was good is my husband really upfront was like, especially since we're talking about money, he was like, okay, he is, I might be risk averse. He's even less. Really? He is even more risk averse. Like he is really a frugal guy. If anyone who knows, knows. We're all here laughing at him. If you saw his, he just bought like a

You have to try to buy a minivan that is like the base level, like doesn't have any... Yeah, no, no, no. Because you're at the dealership. They're like, do you want this and that and this and that? No, you have to like pre-order it and wait for it because they don't actually normally sell it. And I still get mad because he doesn't even have like the automatic trunk.

You have to like actually like – So physically grab it. So when you're holding things, you have to – anyways, that's a whole different thing. No, but my husband and I had a lot of conversations up front because our relationship is important to me too. We've been together for 24 years. And he knew that this was my dream, but at the same time he was like –

We need to have a ceiling on this. Yeah. Oh, like a pull-out point. Yes. Like both like time because there's like a certain amount of – because if I just keep doing this and I'm not making money, that's not making money. Yeah. And then if I also keep doing this and I keep wanting to put more into it financially –

That's hard because we also invested. I did take money from friends and family, but we also invested. And he was like, I can't – like let's just agree up front. Like it can't be like you just keep pouring money into this. And I actually think that's really healthy. What was – do you mind me asking? What was your eject number? Oh.

Oh, God. I can't remember. But it was probably – I'm going to guess it was like $250,000. Of your own personal money. Of our own personal money. Yeah. I mean, that's a huge amount. Yeah. That's college tuition for one kid. Well, it was. I mean, I think that's essentially the money that we – Had earmarks. Had. And so we were also kind of like – I mean, in terms of taking risk too, it's like we –

At one point we, you know, collateralized our house and we took money against our house. Yeah. Just so we would have in case, you know what I mean? Yeah. Did you ever have a moment where you're like, shit, I might've made the wrong call? I mean, there are moments I think when you're like, oh,

this is hard that you, but financially we haven't had that because I was, because I raised money up front. Yeah. I haven't had those types of issues. I think in terms of risk where it would have been really hard for me, I hear about other founders talking about how like we've never had cashflow issues. I've never, I've never hired someone and been fearful I couldn't pay them. That would make me very anxious if I was, you know, cause now we have people on our team who

Are the breadwinners or their families? They have kids. Like that would make me super nervous. Or even vendors. I've never not been able to pay my vendors. And I think that's the type of thing that would make me anxious. But in terms of risk tolerance, I do think that all entrepreneurs need to think a little bit about how their own –

minds work, like that would be really hard for me to be in that mindset. And I think for that reason, I'm really glad that I raised money early. Yeah. So for anybody at home who hasn't used Tower 28 products, they are unbelievable. They feel so nice on your skin, especially if you're

You know, I think something aside from the actual quality of your product being able to stand on its own, you got to convince people to buy it. Yeah. And if there is one thing that I feel like you really have bested the old guard, those behemoth companies who very literally have hundreds of millions of dollars to spend on marketing.

It's social media. Yeah. And social media, you know, obviously you're hiring people, but social media is a marketing channel from an organic perspective that is free. Yeah. What were you thinking when you were like, we are going to leverage this? And how did you do it strategically? So honestly, I mean, I'd love to say that I'm so strategic and we did this from the beginning and I like really, you know, whatever. But I think the most important thing is you have to have good products, really. There's nothing...

Your products do speak for themselves. Yeah, you cannot skip that step. There's nothing like that. And I think the thing that I'm always flattered by is that when I look at the comments, when I read the testimonials, people are like, I will try anything you make because I love everything Tower 28 makes. And that makes me really proud. Quick side note, Amy was so kind to like make me goodie bags for my bachelorette party. Oh, yeah. And one of my girlfriends, my little from my sorority actually texted me the other day and she was like,

yo, this is entirely your fault, but now my entire family uses Tower 28 products. Because she's like, we are... She made the joke. She was like, we are the type of white that has rosacea and eczema and has super sensitive skin. She's like, I wear SPF 50 on my whole body every single day. Like, very, very sensitive. And she's like, this is the first product that...

everybody in my family uses. Oh, that makes me so happy. I mean, we really try so hard to make sure that our products are safe for sensitive skin. So we like avoid, avoid, avoid. We test. We're the only brand that is 100% compliant with the National Eczema Association. And we really like to say we are creating a safe space for sensitive skin. So there's a huge part of what we do. Hey, this is Peter Kafka. I'm the host of Channels, a podcast about technology and media.

And maybe you've noticed that a lot of people are investing a lot of money trying to encourage you to bet on sports right now, right from your phone. That is a huge change, and it's happened so fast that most of us haven't spent much time thinking about what it means and if it's a good thing.

But Michael Lewis, that's the guy who wrote Moneyball and The Big Short and Liar's Poker, has been thinking a lot about it. And he tells me that he's pretty worried. I mean, there was never a delivery mechanism for cigarettes as efficient as the phone is for delivering the gambling apps. It's like the world has created less and less friction for the behavior when what it needs is more and more. You can hear my chat with Michael Lewis right now on channels, wherever you get your podcasts.

Yeah. So when it comes to the social media piece, like talk to me about what you think made some of your content go viral versus anybody else's. I mean, the content hits. Well, I appreciate that. Well, I'll take you back to 2020. So what happened was in 2020- We're in the pandemic. Well, right before the pandemic, we launched, we, Tower 20, launched for the first time. It was my

Like I wanted to launch in Sephora and somehow – What month was this? January? March of 2020. Oh, my jeez. Okay. We launched in all stores at Sephora on a half shelf. I thought I was going to spend that year as a one-man salesperson going all to the different Sephoras and educating and selling and doing events and things like that. And then all of a sudden the pandemic hit. Yeah. So none of that exists. And I literally thought it's over like –

The business is over. It's done. Because quite literally my inventory is sitting in stores and the stores are closed. Yeah. And if you remember, we also didn't – we didn't know how long we were going to be in pandemic. It was two weeks and then two weeks and then two weeks and then two weeks. So there's like an incrementalism to it where you're like – it's like dread, more dread. Yeah. And like it just keeps getting worse. It's like when they keep delaying your flight but they won't cancel it. Yeah.

And then you're sleeping on the floor. Yes. So it's all of those things. And so, yes, my mindset at that point was like you didn't really know what was going to happen. But at the same time, we were like, okay, well, we're at home. What else are we doing? So we started paying attention to social. And you say we. Who's we? So I literally started the business with me and –

there were two girls in the very beginning who start, my first three girls who started with me had never had jobs before. The third one started in pandemic because she was my nanny. And I actually was like, okay, if I'm going to pay you anyways, why don't you write some purchase orders for me? So she became my ops person. Nice. And those three girls are still with me today, which I'm super grateful for. And I love being on the ride with them because it's just, it's fun to be able. Your kids grew up and your nanny.

And he needed a new job. And she was pretty good at it. And she ended up being really good at it. So anyways, those girls and I, we all started just paying attention. We were like doing social content. And we kind of focused on social. And what we found was a lot of people. So SOS Spray, which I know you're a stan. Yes.

Do you know how much product I have to go through to be too embarrassed to ask a personal friend founder to send me PR? I am running through these bottles. Like, it is literally just liquid gold. I put it on. I just sent you all sizes. Oh, my gosh. So you would have them. The SOS is this really interesting product that is an antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, but also 100% natural. So during the pandemic, we were all wearing masks. And because we were all wearing masks—

I got maskne. People started getting maskne because when you are wearing a mask, you're still talking, you're still eating. That saliva literally comes out and then it sits on your skin, which is basically just a hotbed of bacteria. Yeah. And bacteria is the thing that makes anything worse. Yeah, of course. So any type of inflammation you have on your skin, it just exacerbates it, right? Because it just makes it worse. Yeah.

And so that's what we started seeing happen. And people started writing us and saying, hey, I tried your SOS spray and it changed my skin. It cured my mask. And so we were like, that's interesting. Why don't we start sending this to essential workers if this is for people who are wearing masks? Right. So we would send it to like ERs. We would send it to like nurses. We would send it to friends who are doctors. I was like,

tell me about like whatever and I would have them walk it in and then we started just seeding it to people and people started writing us and saying I would send us on their own before and afters and I was like this is kind of amazing and then I would say okay well if you let me post it I'll give you another bottle yeah and so they all said yes and they all say it and I was like and if it's real like they've already come to me telling me that this is their experience I'm like if

If you would write a review, I would be so happy and so grateful. And so they would write reviews. And it just was this thing that truly organically grew on its own. And we fed it. And I think that's the thing with entrepreneurship or anything is like even your own career, right? You do something. You see what works. And then you keep following the cookie trail. And that's in the end I think where success comes from. Yeah.

It's just paying attention. That's genius. And you actually were sending to essential workers, not like influencers or anything. In the beginning, it was essential workers. We also sent to influencers too, but it was like a lot of it is again paying attention. So it's like-

I know like one of the very early people we seeded was Nicole Guerrero. And she's an OG beauty influencer. And we had seeded her like back in the day people used to just put their addresses. They don't do it as much, but they just left their addresses on their YouTube pages back in the day. Crazy. If you just looked at the info, like they would just say like for mailings. I think that this was six years ago or five years ago. Yeah.

And so we would just send people packages. I didn't know her. And she opened the product. She tried it on. And then she screenshot herself buying, I think like five or 10 more, like a bunch more. And we were like,

Oh, my God. And overnight, I thought like the website broke. Like people started buying product and people – like our follower count went up. And even today, I am not friends with Nicole Guerrero. Like we tried sending her flowers. She didn't seem to, you know, care. Yeah. But I was so grateful and I think there is something to like people who have influence. It's just like anything else. If something's good, word of mouth happens. And even better if it's somebody who has a megaphone. But like –

It just takes time. But overall, that's what happens. And now we have a quick break to share the tip of the day presented by Amazon One Medical.

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Now back to our show. That's amazing. So social media is like this combination for us of it's trying to just amplify the things that are already happening, whether it is showing before and afters. But it's also like I think we have a vantage point that is very like it's fun, too. We're trying to make it fun. One of the most viral social pieces we've ever had was when we opened up our end cap at Sephora. So the first time we got our own end cap for shelves. Yeah.

My team was so nice and genius about this, but they – I didn't know this, but they put like a sheet over the end cap.

And then they had me come in, but they took my kids out of school and had them stand. And they were the ones who unveiled the end cap. And I very genuinely started crying when I walked in and I saw my end cap. It was like all four of my babies. You know, it's like my three kids and the brand. And I started crying. And that piece of content, like I think I just looked at our TikTok the other day. I think it has like 3.3 million followers.

views and it's 100% organic. So authentic. Because it's so authentic. And I think at the end of the day, like social is about either you're educating someone or you're entertaining them. And I think the more people relate to people, right? They want to know what the stories are. They want to understand...

what they're buying. And I think people really at the end of the day vote with their wallets. Yeah. I think that's so, so powerful. I want us to switch gears. Yeah. Because you gave me some really good advice in our last therapy session. And I think we both agreed that hiring the right team is probably one of the hardest parts. For sure. Of building a business. Yeah.

You said that the first three women who joined you at Tower 28, one of whom was your nanny, they're still there with you to this day. And they've been there through thick and thin. Like what are you looking for when you are looking for employee number two, three, four? What are you looking for for that star talent?

I think in the beginning you really need like Swiss Army knives. You need people who are able to do a lot of things, to do them without ego and to do them well and to be like sponges. They have to be so curious. I mean the girls on my team – so those three girls had not had jobs before when they first started working with me. And I am –

I've had a lot of experience. And so I, on the other hand, had not been used to working with people who did not have experience. And it's funny because they would tell me afterwards that they would like literally Google the things I was saying because they didn't understand. I was like, good thing you didn't tell me that at the time. But they were like, what's COGS? What's like a whatever? Oh, no. They didn't know. And it makes sense now that I think about it that they didn't know. But it's a little bit like sink or swim. Yeah.

And I think you just have to – you don't have to know everything. Those people don't have to know everything. But they have to be curious. And I think –

They have to believe in what you believe. They have to believe in you and they have to believe in what you're trying to do. And I think that's really important. I believe a lot in energy too. And if you don't feel the right vibe from someone, I think you'll know too, especially in those early days, it makes a big difference because –

There's always voices in the room and you need to make sure that you're listening, but like you don't want the wrong voices in the room. Yeah, definitely. Another great piece of advice you gave me, and this was like kind of a contentious one. And I like took this one and I went home and like sat in the dark and thought about it.

You told me – and I'm paraphrasing. You said the team that gets you from zero to one million is not the same team that gets you from one to five, is not the same team that gets you from five to 25. Yeah. Can you explain to me and everybody listening what that means? So I don't think it means that you have to shed people necessarily. But I do think that it changes and it morphs. Yeah. Right? So it depends. If those people – like I said, the first three people –

That started with me are still with me. Yeah. But I think they're with me because they're able to understand and they're able to like reshape how they think about the business and that they've also have – you have to have like a growth mindset around it, right? So like I said in the beginning, you want like Swiss Army knives and you need breadth because you need someone who's willing to like –

do social and then turn around and talk to Sephora and then turn around and make sure bills get paid. And there's so many things that need to get done. And then as you get bigger, you need depth. You don't need breadth. You need people who really can start focusing on and picking a lane and then going deeper into it. And then you need functional people.

like experts. You need ninjas who just really know what they're doing. And so one thing I always said to the girls on my team who were younger is I was like, listen, at some point we bring someone in above you. If we're all doing a great job and we're all doing the right thing and this goes the way it's supposed to, we'll bring someone in above you, but you'll understand it. You'll say like, you'll be like, that person's awesome and I can learn from them. Ultimately, I really do feel like every job needs to have this tension of like,

You need to feel like there are some things that you can go and do and you're so good at and you're like, easy, I got this. And there has to be a little bit of tension where you're like, I'm learning, I'm uncomfortable, I need to figure this out. But if you don't have either of those, you have to have both a little bit. If it's overweighted in one way or the other, you're uncomfortable. And ultimately a business is like that too. Like you can't have so much that like

there's no domain expertise. Somebody has to steer the ship and I don't know everything. And so I'm constantly looking at the business and thinking like, where are my biggest leaky buckets? What is, how do I fill them? Who do I fill them with? Am I ready for, you know, a person at this level or whatever it is? And it's investment too, because you're investing in

There's nothing else. It's just, like, the team and the product. Like, there's – that's the most important thing. But you can't have the right person in terms of expertise that is also, like, going to kill the culture. The culture is so important. Yeah.

So it's always been important to me that even if we bring someone in above, it's not just because they're domain experts. It's also because they have the mindset of teaching and they have the mindset of being like servant leaders and being part of an organization that wants to like grow and do things together. Servant leaders. I love that phrase. Yeah.

Yeah. It's something I really believe in. Yeah. I mean, I think like part of the reason I started my own company is because I wanted to choose the people I worked with. I wanted to have fun doing what I was doing. I've always loved the work, but I think politics and that kind of thing can really – especially when you talk about all women. And frankly, I don't really know. I haven't worked with all men before in a long time. But I think it has to be more complicated with all women. Yeah. Yeah.

And we've heard, you know, some really, really amazing wisdom from you. But I'd like to ask you to be vulnerable for a second. Yeah. What is the biggest money mistake you've made either in your business or in your personal life? Oh, such a good question.

Um, I think it's probably just not, uh, investing ahead probably. Trying to hold on to those dollars too tight? Yeah. Like I think there's definitely been moments where I was like too reluctant, too scared, too, um, nervous. I think coming into this, I, I just, I have a little bit of that. Um, even like honestly buying a house, it took us a long time to buy a house. And if you look at that, like the market got away from us and we ended up, and it's,

Whatever. In retrospect, you'd be like, you did fine because we still did buy, you know, six years – eight years ago now. So it is – it's fine. But like at the time – it always feels hard and I think buying a house is probably a good example of that. Like no matter –

where you are, I think everybody wants like 20% more than they can, what their budget is. And I remember one of my best friends, they bought pretty early. And I was like, how did you know to do that so early? And she was like, Amy, we bet on ourselves. And I think there is something about that where like early in my career, I think I bet on other people a lot too. Like I would always want to join

I was trying to always join the better company and even like I had started – I don't talk about this a lot but I had actually started three other companies before this with other people. And they didn't work out. And they didn't work out. But I did it because I was like, well, they're smart. And it was always their idea and because I thought really well of them and that I would join them. And I wasn't betting on myself. I was like, oh, I can just do the work. I'm really good at like being a number two and being a hard worker. Yeah.

And I think it is, at the end of the day, it is like just learning how to bet on yourself and taking the risk on your own is really the biggest thing. Mm-hmm.

So I want to wrap us out with two kind of great questions and great topics. You recently called me and asked me for a quick favor. I was more than happy to oblige, but I ended up really falling in love with this initiative that you are running. I spoke at the Tower 28 Clean Beauty Summer School, which is a program that you started that essentially just gets together people

Women, people of color, LGBTQ founders, creators, people in the beauty space, and just gives them almost like a crash course in both beauty, content creation, marketing, I mean, finance. Like you had somebody from everywhere come and talk. That is.

That costs you money. Why did you do that? So the – it actually doesn't cost us that much. I mean, it does in terms of, like, I have people who help on the admin side. But everybody volunteers. Oh, nice. So thank you for doing it. Yes, of course, of course. So it is a virtual program. So let me back up. So the Clean Beauty Summer School is a mentorship and education program.

program. Every year we take applications in this year. We have two different tracks. One is for influencers and one is for, this is the first time we've ever done the influencer track. So micro influencers. And then this is our fifth year of doing beauty founders. And the concept around it is really like

I don't know, coming into this, I didn't see women who looked like me at the top. Never mind women of color. I didn't see women. And the women I saw who were like on the cover of Forbes were really masculine back then. So you felt like, okay, if I was going to be a successful woman in business, which I never wanted to be like a celebrity or there were very, I never wanted to be an actress, a model, like none of those things. I always wanted to be a woman in business.

But it looked different. It was like back in the day when like, I don't know, it just like it felt harsher and more masculine. Yeah, they would put them in oversized pinstripe suits. And like it was if you – this was like essentially the girl who was best at cosplaying the male CEO versus being proud of being of like a woman CEO. Yeah, and they didn't look like mothers. They didn't look like my friends. They didn't look like –

They didn't look feminine. And so I really – I think about that a lot today and I think about it specifically in beauty because –

Beauty is this industry where we are literally defining aspiration every day. We're defining what it looks like and in a lot of ways self-confidence. And the people at the top, if they're – you cannot help but look at the world through your own lens, right? Even myself. Like I'm only able to put out images and things that I think are cool and aesthetic. It will be through the lens that I see the world and the people I hire. Yeah.

the way they see it. And so like if everybody looks the same at the top, then that's when we don't have diversity. That's when we don't get to see ourselves, right? And so to me, like if I can change, if I can help

impact the probability of success for some of these BIPOC or minority founders in general. That is the way that we will ultimately see the face of beauty, the face of aspiration, our own self-confidence changes. And so that's a huge thing to me. And that's what the program is. So for anyone who is interested in starting a beauty brand, um,

We open it up every year and we take 10 people for the virtual program and also for beauty founders and also for the creators. And we have this really great community. And then the people who, once you're in it, you're in it, you can come back every year. But we teach all these great classes. And the only reason it happens is because of people like you who volunteer your time. So it's literally like you teaching a class on finance. Nancy Twine taught a class on fundraising. We had...

you know, Danessa Myricks taught a class on product development. Like, so it is kind

kind of like the best of the best in every vertical I can think of. And then this past year, we actually did our first In Real Life Summit, which was amazing. We had, I think it was 150 people come together and we had like breakout sessions and we called it like our homecoming because it was like Clean Beauty Summer School. But it is something really special to me. I think a lot of people worry, a lot of people think about like,

I'm going to wait until the end of it when I sell my company, when I'm really successful, then I'll have the bandwidth and then I'll turn around and give back. And to me, like,

Maybe it's because I'm older, but I really do think like there's nothing like right now. And so I'm trying to live my life in a way where I'm able to do everything I want now and I just won't have any regrets later. And I'm not just going to wait until the end for dessert. I'm going to like do the things that I want to do now. I'm trying to celebrate more. And that's why I love so much of what you talk about because it's not just about like

struggling and like saving every dollar, which is the way I was raised. But you also talk about like thriving, not just surviving. Right. And I think that's so important for people to hear because yeah, like it's YOLO. You only live once. You really do. Yeah. And so you have to be happy today. You can't just keep waiting until the end. And part of it is like,

What makes me happy is being able to like create a community and give back a little bit too. Yeah. You are inspirational. Final question. Yeah. Speaking of you only live once, YOLO, is there a personal mantra that you'd like to share with all of the BFFs listening on how to level up their life and achieve more richness, more success, and joy? Oh, yeah.

I will tell you one thing I'm just trying to remember more regularly is just to not take things personally. I bought this book – I buy this book probably more regularly and give it to people than any other book. I gave it to everybody on my team the other day. I also gave them your book. But I recently bought everybody on my team The Four Agreements.

which I don't know if you know that but the one that always stands out to me the most in that is the don't take things personally because it's the thing that I have to remind myself about the most. I think so often we go through life and we think of like

oh God, this thing happened to me. And I'm like, maybe it's happening for me, right? Like if this person needs to like quit and go do their thing, like I hope you find what you're looking for and having grace and looking as opposed to like, oh, now what happens to me? Yeah. And taking things personally. Doesn't have to revolve just around us. Yeah. And I mean, listen, I also think like

comparison is the thief of joy, which people talk about all the time, but it's really true. And like, even for you, it's like, what, what does it mean to be rich? Right? Like, I think a lot of times, um, I know a lot of wealthy people now too. And I think the people who feel

actually like wealthy are the ones who the goalposts at some point has to stop moving. Yeah. You know, like there's always someone who's going to be richer than you. Better, smarter, hotter. All of these things. Right. So it's like, what is, what is that version of it for you? And like, I don't know, like I've, I've been interested in this idea of like, I went on my first like private jet recently. I've never done that before. By the way, I didn't pay for it. Someone else, I went on their private jet.

And I was like, oh, what – is this like – and I was like, this is actually like – it's so nice, but it's like I don't know that that's like the goal for me, right? Like I don't know that that's the lifestyle. Yeah. It's nice if somebody else wants to take me there. But like you like see things and you're like, is that what I actually want or not? And I think – I'm just talking about books, but there's another book that I love called The Second Mountain by David Brook. And it's basically like the first mountain is –

In society, we're told like it's, you know, how much money you make. It's the job you get. It's the title. It's all these things. It's having a kid, getting married, all these things that we – society tells you that you should need and want. And the second mountain is like once you've achieved those things or you've kind of figured it out, you're like, wait, but now what? Now what? And so I think like I think a lot about that. And for me, I think it is community and I think it is meeting interesting people that I like and

and doing things that I care about.

Amazing. Amy, thank you so much for being here. You are filled with wisdom. I'm so grateful you've shared it with us. Can you let everyone at home know where they can find you and find Tower 28? Yeah. So you can find me personally at Amy Liu, A-M-Y-L-I-U underscore T28 on Instagram. And then also our company, Tower 28 Beauty on both Instagram and TikTok. Amazing. And Sephora. Yeah. Guys, go get these products. All Sephora's, US and Canada. Wait, can we get like a Your Rich BFF discount code?

Sure can. Yeah. Okay. Well, we'll put the discount code in the show notes if you guys are dying to get your hands on some of these products. It'll be something really funny and unique like Vivian is the best. Sure. Let's do it. Done. Perfect. Thanks for having me.

Thanks for tuning into this week's episode of Net Worth and Chill, part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. If you liked the episode, make sure to leave a rating and review and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Got a burning financial question that you want covered in a future episode? Write to us via podcast at yourrichbff.com. Follow Net Worth and Chill Pod on Instagram to stay up to date on all podcast related news. And you can follow me at yourrichbff for even more financial know-how. See you next week.