Amanda 00:02 Welcome to the purpose power brand, a podcast for leaders and brands transforming business into a force for good. I'm Amanda Stassen, business and brand strategist, social justice advocate and founder of BIZU Innovation Group. I'm speaking with leaders who are proving that not only does purpose drive profit, but the future of our world depends on it. If you want to grow your business, increase your brand loyalty and not get left behind in the ever-changing marketplace, this podcast is for you. Today we're talking with Jenn Harper, founder and CEO of cheekbone beauty cosmetics, a Canadian indigenous owned color cosmetics brand known for creating clean, vegan and sustainable color cosmetics using indigenous wisdom. Welcome Jen to the purpose power brand podcast, super excited to have you joining us today.

Jenn 00:49 Really excited to be here. Thank you for having me.

Amanda 00:52 Oh, thank you. So, before we dive in, we believe that whatever powers you becomes the core that drives everything you do, whether you're just an individual or a business or a brand. So with one word, I'm going to challenge you a bit, how would you answer the question? I am powered by blank, and then share a little bit about how that impacts your life or comes to life in the work you do.

Jenn 01:16 Yeah, the one word part is hard, but I'm gonna say giving, whether personally or through business. And I think to explain it a little bit better. It's that feeling you get when you give, and it's really indescribable that you are, it feels really selfish in some ways that I do this for that feeling. But it is a wonderful feeling to know that the work that we do is about giving back and I, I want to be able to pass that on to other people like and for them to understand there is the joy, the happiness you feel when you're giving back.

Amanda 01:57 I love that it is the spirit of reciprocity that makes what we do so important and so worthwhile. So thank you for sharing that. Let's start by setting some context to where the idea of Cheekbone came into being. Take us back maybe to 2015, what was happening in your life at that time. Maybe take us behind the scenes to the genesis of Cheekbone beauty.

Jenn 02:20 Yeah, for sure. So not your typical, I think entrance into entrepreneurship or social entrepreneurship. I was working selling seafood at the time. But I was also going through this huge personal change. So for me, I was new in sobriety. And in January of 2015, I have this crazy dream about Native little girls covered in lip gloss and I literally grabbed my laptop that night and started writing out what is the foundation of our business to this day. And it was like, create this product lip gloss and use a portion of those profits, to give back to the community. And specifically, our give back has always been focused on Indigenous education, so supporting indigenous youth with educational opportunities. And, and we have been so fortunate to be able to make that a big, big part of our brand.

Amanda 03:15 Wow, wow, I love how you know what you've really hit on is that ideas for whether it's business or passion, they literally can come from anywhere. In your case, it came from a dream, but it could have been an inspiration from a movie or other things. And I think how important it is for us to trust, when you get that spark when it grips you to act on it. You know, the world is filled with lots of ideas, what we what we are low on are the people with the courage to actually take those ideas into inception. So you really, you know, you took that idea, you trusted it and you ran with it. And it's just that's so powerful, it makes you who you are today. Having said that, considering how saturated and competitive the cosmetics and specifically color cosmetics market is plus, you know, not having a specific background in cosmetics and as you said, you're new to being an entrepreneur, were there moments where you felt like giving up where you struggled with maybe even the imposter syndrome. What kept you moving forward?

Jenn 04:26 Absolutely, all the time, I still recognize that I am definitely not an expert in this industry and nor do I ever feel like I do I know what's happening or I know what I'm doing. But it's amazing, this power of passion like when you believe in something and you're so passionate about pushing forward an idea or a like or a product then that you kind of would do anything to see that succeed. And you know, I think of this in sort of two different ways, I think I hadn't such an incredible mother sometimes I don't give her enough credit. But ever since I was a small baby, she has always made me feel, she was a single mom, she worked many jobs to support and put food on the table for us. And I just recognize now she spent so much time empowering me, telling me that I'm capable, I can do anything. And I don't think we understand the power of feeding children that kind of information. And then at the same time, overcoming alcoholism was a massive feat for me. And it was this huge mountain-like obstacle that I have overcome, literally. And so there are times when I'm like, I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know, if I'm gonna figure this out. And I literally just go, yeah, you will figure it out. You know, I'm really fortunate to have a team now of people to help me figure things out, and then I'm not doing this alone. And that it is truly possible for anyone with enough hard work and passion to truly figure out how to make something happen and, and when they're add passion to that that's just like more fuel to that fire. And so I'm really grateful that I've had these life experiences that otherwise sometimes, you know, for many years, I can perceive that as negative. But now I truly I try to reframe how I look at growing up in poverty with a single mom or being a, you know, someone who struggled with alcoholism, that those have really become my power,

Amanda 06:32 Wow. First, you know, I want to do a, a shout out to moms who make that investment in our lives, and, and so, so much into us and and the fathers and how important how that how important that sowing into our children is. So thank you for that, for sharing that. And also for the transparency of just sharing that you know what the story didn't start, maybe as some business stories started, but it started with you know, overcoming an obstacle. And as you overcame that obstacle, you got clarity. And as you got that clarity, you know, you had an idea that you've brought into fruition and overcoming all those obstacles to achieve what you've achieved. I love that what you just described, it's so critical to what purpose is. In our business, we describe purpose as the foundation and the fuel of any business, brand or person. It's foundational, because it's where we derive our meaning. And that's exactly what you described, it answers that question, what is the point of where we're going, or what we're doing. And it's also the fuel because exactly as you said, every person, every organization goes through challenging and uncertain times, and knowing your purpose. And you know, even who is depending on you is like that jet fuel to keep you moving forward. It is, it's what burns in you to to make you keep going. Even when you feel insecurity when you feel like all the odds are against you. It just it's that peace that motivates you onwards,

Jenn 08:12 and that happens regularly.

Amanda 08:15 Yeah, exactly. To this day, I couldn't agree with you more. And it brings me to Cheekbones purpose, which is not only to make a difference in the lives of indigenous youth through, as you said, through donations into educational funding, but this part I'm absolutely in all of which is to create a space in the beauty industry, where indigenous youth feel represented and seen. Talk a little bit about that.

Jenn 08:43 Yeah, so really important was the to me and I know so many people in our community is just that, that idea of seeing yourself and you know, mainstream media, for so long, has left many groups out of marketing media. And so as a brand, that was certainly our big, big focus in the beginning and I think that whole idea of when you see yourself like it's almost like the, the opportunities then become endless. And you know, I only have like stories I guess as a way to explain the power of this but most recently, so in June, we did this incredible campaign with Sephora, Canada, and I would go visit the stores and we have this big event, the Eaton center location. And this little girl she's an indigenous little girl, she was about 12 or 13, and she came to the store to visit us and share with us like she was her experience with her Tik Tok account and just was trying out and she just had the most wonderful, like spunky little personality. And I drove home that night after that event there in the Eaton center, thinking about my childhood and at that time, we had no joke like a massive billboard inside the center saying Cheekbone beauty now available at Sephora, and then we're in the Sephora that's in the Eaton center. And why when I was a little girl, my dad lived in Toronto, and I would go visit him and one of my favorite things to do was to go to the Eaton center. And never I can tell you honestly, in a million years, did I ever even think or dream up of owning a brand, being in the Eaton center. But I drove home that night, and I'm like that little girl now only can see her potential through our brand. And people like her, a CEO founder like me, who looks like her who comes from a community like her. And I think I never thought of those things for myself as a kid, because I never saw anybody else look like me doing big, big business moves or so to speak. And I think that it's incredible that for her, she now only can just imagine what is possible for her life. And I think that's what representation is, right?

Amanda 10:56 Oh my gosh, this is so powerful. This is where transformation through business comes from. This is where there is so much good and so much runway that we have before us to actually make a difference in this world. And you're doing it through cosmetics, you're doing it through being a female business owner showing girls not only can it be done, but here's a roadmap, here's a way here's a, here's a an opportunity and a risk that you can take. Talk a little bit about Cheekbone’s, business purpose versus individual purpose and how Cheekbone’s purpose is being now carried on by your employees because it's gone beyond you now hasn’t it Jen, like it's moved beyond you, the brand is bigger than Jen Harper. Now, what does that mean to your employees? And how have they made it their own?

Jenn 11:47 Yeah, it's really interesting, you should say that because so many times I'll meet people in public and I'd never get called Jen Harper, I get called Cheekbone beauty. I think that's funny, because there's more more people here than just me there, there's 10 of us that are here full time. And obviously, all of our agencies and partnerships along alongside our core team, but they're, you know, hiring people is probably one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. But it became easy when you know, in that gut meeting in that first few interviews, where you could really see people's passion for the things that we cared about as a brand. And number one being this idea of representation. And number two being this concept of sustainability and understanding that we're you know, there's no perfect path to that but we're they wanted to join this journey with us. And I am in awe of the incredible people that are that are surrounding themselves in work for cheekbone beauty now that have such passion for the same things and they really matter to them. And so many times, you know, we I think about my own career and jobs I've taken and of course, you know, you love the job, but when there is the this feeling of that you have a bigger purpose surrounding just your regular going to job role, it really does have so much more meaning and so I'm honestly, I'm grateful that I get to wake up every day and come here and feel like okay, this to me has more meaning than just going to a job every day, it feels really good. Like I said, that feeling of giving back, it feels so good. And we're a whole team now that that gets to read DM’s and emails from people that feel represented and feel good about wearing our products and their products are doing things for them that they love and have not seen happen before. And then that whole concept of representation. I know, our whole entire team feels so good about being a part of

Amanda 13:50 That's fantastic. That's so good. So good. You're becoming a tribe that shares a voice. And it continues to build momentum for you as a business, as a brand, but as a people, right and it's not just the indigenous people, it's all people coming together and moving forward in this in this purpose that you have. Let's shift gears a little bit. Let's dive into some of the principles with which you know, you've built Cheekbones business model, you've described it as creating cosmetics using indigenous wisdom. Describe indigenous wisdom and can you share a few examples just so we can get a sense of it?

Jenn 14:35 Yeah, so indigenous wisdom are like teachings or stories that were traditionally passed down orally from generation to generation. And what is really interesting is we built our entire brand based on my Anishnaabe teachings of the seven grandfather teachings and they are just these principles that I think you know, I, when I was doing this, I thought, wow, imagine we could really build a business using these tools or these character traits, these values, if you will. It would, what kind of, how much better of a place would that be to work, how much better of a community could we create? And that's what we set out to do. And they're very simple. It's like love, respect, bravery, truth, honesty, humility, wisdom, just these seven simple words. And we dive into them a bit as a brand sometimes, but one of our favorites is definitely humility, just because of that whole idea we don't always know what we're doing, and then really stopping to listen to what others have to say, and being humble enough to reflect and take feedback. As organizations, it's really, really important and unfortunately, I think we live in a world where humility can be frowned upon. But I believe that that's what makes our entire team stronger is understanding what we don't know.

Amanda 16:07 That's huge. You've twigged me on the notion of what I'm hearing a lot in my circles, which is this idea of seven generation thinking. And, and the way that we've looked at it, but I would love to hear your take on it is, you know, think beyond today, if I kind of put it simply think beyond today, think about how your product, your service, your company, your story, your book, whatever it is that you're doing, what the impact will be, not just on the next generation, but on the world around you. How would you, how do you think about it?

Jenn 16:44 You know, there's many teachings that we've incorporated into the brand, new business and this seventh generation teaching is something that we've incorporated into our product development plan. And so when you think about organizations, and they have product development plans, it generally the outcome is, It's probably revenue base, like how many of these can we sell? But but we always start with, okay, that whole idea of how and what we do today, what we put into the world, how will that actually impact the next seven generations. And so then we marry that with another teaching, which is called 2-eyed-seeing where you take the concept of Western science partnered with indigenous wisdom. And so using a concept called lifecycle thinking or lifecycle analysis, when you think about the harvesting from the raw ingredient, so how a human could possibly impacted negatively or positively, to the end of the life of a product, meaning will it end up in a landfill, the componentry, or the box or, or the actual, the raw gradients, when we wash our faces at the end of the day, and all of the things are going down the drain, is that affecting an ecosystem? And so thinking of every step throughout the process, is really, really important to us. And so we've done the best job that we can to try to eliminate things from ending up in a landfill and only use biodegradable ingredients. So that if anything that is hitting an ecosystem will eventually biodegrade. And I mean, there's so much more to think about. It's truly an opposition to way Western business runs today or business globally, for that matter. Many times we're talking about stakeholders and filling, you know, making stakeholders more wealth, we're not, which is really short term thinking, right? That's not seven generations, that's one person's lifetime, and one person's wealth, versus the next seven generations of human beings. And so it is truly one of the concepts that I think we struggle with, and we try the hardest, because when you're in this world of CPG business, you're like, is it possible to create a product that really does have not have an end of life? And and how can we surround ourselves with the kind of community which is what we call our customers, that that wants this and understands that there the it will come to add a little bit of a greater cost at the moment, but what you feel over the lifetime of a customer when you're actually supporting something that is so much more about money, it really does feel good to be building this kind of this kind of organization.

Amanda 19:27 Yeah, it's huge. It goes beyond certainly traditional business. Traditional business models are being challenged, you know, to say the least today, Milton Friedman's business model approach, which is you know, the purpose of business to primarily maximize profits for shareholders is being challenged because there's so many things in the world that people are looking at and saying something needs to be done. Cheekbone isn't just described as a social enterprise, you guys actually go one step further. And you're redefining what success metrics are, what your key performance indicators might even be by saying things that it's not based on just what we attained for ourselves, but instead, what we give back to our community - Share a little bit about what being a social enterprise means in Cheekbone’s business model, and how it actually guides your success metrics.

Jenn 20:27 Yeah absolutely. And, you know, in the early days of building, I didn't realize this wasn't indigenous teaching. But this concept of success within our indigenous communities is about actually how much you give back to community versus what we're attaining for ourselves, again, in opposition to Western thinking. It's like, how many houses can I have, how many cars how many cottages, boats, all, and so within our communities, it is truly about what we're doing to support and I feel like as a business, you know, there was so much room to be able to give back, like, it's not an impossible feat, that that it is possible to create jobs, everyone's making a living wage, and that, you know, getting benefits and having time off and vacation time. But at the same time, you know, we're not about stakeholders, and I think it's kind of interesting that this has to be a new way forward. And for big organizations. I don't know if it's possible, I honestly don't know if I have the answers, but I as long as I'm the leader, I felt like there's an opportunity to challenge the norm of how a business is built, right?

Amanda 21:47 Yeah, yeah, no, exactly. And someone has to lead, someone has to be the challenger to say, guys, there's a better way, there's another way to think about business and business as a contribution to society, giving more than it takes. You know, I want to take a minute and just honor you, Jen, because in the in the six years since you've launched Cheekbone, you've won a number of awards from Chatelaine’s Woman of the Year for 2019, to more recently, Bay Street Bulls 2022 power 50, Canada's most impactful businesses. And on top of that, you've been on Dragon's Den, you face the dragons, but you said no to an offer for a stake in the company. And I've seen that episode, it's pretty powerful. But you stood firm on your beliefs. share a few things you've learned along your journey on how to scale a business while staying true to your mission.

Jenn 22:41 Yeah, and I don't want to pretend that it's been easy for sure. Because as an entrepreneur, we were always like, where's that next chunk of money going to come from? And there's probably opportunities where we could get more money, but would we be selling out, would we be partnering with an equity partner that has the same value system? So those are some big serious questions. We've been so fortunate that our investors are also indigenous led, Raven capital, Inc, out of Vancouver, Canada. And gratefully we share the same value system, and they are a social impact investor, which I had no idea existed. But to have an equity partner that believes in trying to create a new business model as which much as we do is huge, like that it feels almost like we truly we got really lucky won the lottery on this one, because I have had so many friends in business that don't have the same wonderful investor experience that we're having. And so I think it's values aligning, and we're fortunate that values do align. And you know what, in the early days to I want to really be clear that you don't know what you don't know. But as we've grown, I certainly realized that giving up your business for a certain amount of money to somebody who you don't really know, was not it would never have been the best idea. And Arlene, and I believe it was Michelle gave the best advice, they kept just saying no, don't do this. Right. And they weren't, you're too early and they weren't they weren't wrong. They were absolutely correct. And it's got to feel good. And you have to, again, have those values in alignment for this to work.

Amanda 24:31 Yeah, it's so important those partnership decisions, who you align yourself with, whether it's the early days of business, or even as the business matures, partnership is, is so powerful, but it could either make or break you. It can either grow you exponentially, and that's really what we look for in relationships. It's not just a one plus one. It's actually we're looking for multiples in that relationship. Multiples that make both you and the partner, better and your impact more. So that's truly, truly a critical piece. So thank you for sharing that. Listen, Jen, it's been a privilege and an honor diving into your story today. Thank you for taking the time. But before we sign off in every episode, we want to leave our listeners with two practical purpose tips that they can apply today to power up their business and brand. What two tips would you share?

Jenn 25:28 Well I think one of my favorites to share is consistency. I don't again, when you don't know or feel like you don't know very much about what you're doing, showing up every single day and knowing that you want to do something to work on your idea, that brand, the business, and I feel like that's what's made us successful. I’ve just showed up every day for the last five, seven years, I don't know how many years it is now, and done something to work on cheekbone beauty, and I think consistency is underrated.

Amanda 26:01 Wow. That's awesome. It's so true. It's just the just the act of showing up starts to divide those who succeed and those who don't - the effort that you put in even when you don't know what you're doing, it's so powerful. Just showing up. Keep going. Don't stop even even when it looks like you're not making the strides that you want to. So thank you for that. Thank you so awesome. This has been awesome. Where can people find you learn more about Cheekbone? purchase some products? What's your website? Call out?

Jenn 26:33 Our website is cheekbonebeauty.com. And there's tons of information about us the brands but if you have any more questions, reach out to our info@cheekbonebeauty.com We're happy to answer any questions.

Amanda 26:45 Fantastic. Jen, thank you again for joining us today. It's been an honor and a privilege. Thank you for sharing your story and your pearls of wisdom and thank you most of all for all you're doing in and through cheekbone beauty to make the world better for all. Thanks for listening to the purpose power brand Podcast I'm Amanda Stassen. If you liked what you heard, be sure to share and subscribe on your favorite podcast player. We'd also love to hear what resonated with you or if you have a guest suggestion, drop us a line at info@bizu.co Special thanks to Mark Salam for original music and lead podcasting for production. Lastly, if you're ready to purpose power, your brand to grow when and impact at scale, let's talk visit www.bizu.co. Bye for now.