DANESSA MYRICKS DIDN’T SET OUT TO BUILD A beauty empire.

She set out to solve a problem.

As a working makeup artist, she struggled to find products that were high-performing and inclusive, which inspired her to create her own line. Danessa Myricks Beauty was built with just $500 and years of bootstrapped growth. The brand’s secret ingredient to success? Word of mouth via a trusted and carefully curated community. Along the way, Myricks’ mission expanded beyond products to something deeper: using beauty as a way to connect people across cultures. Even as the brand scales rapidly, she remains focused on authenticity, inclusivity, and pushing the industry forward.

Read about Danessa Myricks’ journey in her C&C 100 interview below.

What is your earliest beauty memory?

My earliest beauty memory is sitting watching my mother powder her face with those big powder puffs from back in the day and apply red lipstick.

When you created Danessa Myricks Beauty, what was your original mission? And do you think that mission has been completed based on where the brand is now?

My “why” has evolved over time. When I first started my brand, I was a makeup artist and there were so many things that I couldn't find to do the work that I needed to do. So the mission was twofold: filling gaps in terms of shades, but also making things that made doing makeup easy. I needed [products] that can do lots of things, and that really was the baseline for how the brand started. Later, it evolved to be a lot more. When you realize the impact that things that you do are having, you reevaluate. When I started to travel to different parts of the world and see how people responded to me, these were people who I would have never met or had an opportunity to share a space with if it were not for their excitement about the product and them bringing me over to their country to engage. Those products changed the way I saw the world, and also it changed the way the world saw me. I realized I was doing more than just creating products—it was about connecting hearts and minds through beauty.

Did you raise capital to launch your brand—and if so, what surprised you most about the process?

I bootstrapped the business for 23 years. I started the brand with $500 from a gig. [I was] deep in the community, doing a job, earning some money, and then using that money to buy a product or to take a trip to meet a supplier. It literally was week to week, month to month. That's really how the brand grew. It also grew through a lot of support from the community: this one telling their cousin, their friend. It was all word of mouth and pre-social media. We eventually were funded, but the funding that we received a few years ago was really about scaling. We were profitable from day one and built, slow and steady, a strong foundation. But you reach a point in your growth that you really can't take the next level of growth without an inflection of cash. We were fortunate to seek funding when we didn't actually need it to run the business, and that there was a fund available that was interested in founders who look like me building brands that look like mine.

“I bootstrapped the business for 23 years. I started the brand with $500 from a gig. [I was] deep in the community, doing a job, earning some money, and then using that money to buy a product or to take a trip to meet a supplier. It literally was week to week, month to month. That's really how the brand grew.”

Your hero products are constantly selling out—what does managing that level of demand look like behind the scenes?

There's really no way to predict it. We're always doing the work, but you don't know what that is going to manifest. We didn’t have excess cash to spend on advertising. We were very much reliant on the community. The more time we spent there, and the closer I got to people who are rooting for the brand, the faster the brand grew. It took off like lightning, and it's nothing that you can predict. With social media, you can go from 0 to 100 and back to 0 again. It looks beautiful on the outside, and yes, it's positive to sell out. But it's not positive to stay sold out. You’ll go from exciting your community to disappointing them when they don't have access to the things they need. What’s been the wind beneath our wings has been new leadership that we were able to bring on in every category: finance, demand planning, et cetera. So now we have strengthened processes and better forecasting, but there’s also a lot of risk taking, to be honest. At some point, you never know how high is high enough, and you have to just make a bet to invest in areas or in products that you believe in. I do a lot of those gut bets.

We've made the right ones at the right time, so now you'll see us getting better with that. We're at an interesting phase in the business because so many new people are learning about the Danessa Myricks Beauty that it’s completely unpredictable to know how much investment we should make into a new launch or an existing SKU. We've had 2x, 3x, even 4x growth over the last few years, and I'm very grateful for that. But now with a solid team, we can get better and hopefully make deeper investments. But I'm very, very grateful that people are really finding things of value, they work, and they want more of it. And not only that, they're telling a friend about it too. That's been the magic behind the growth of the brand.

Where, if at all, do you think the industry is still falling short when it comes to inclusivity?

Well, it's hard for me to speak for any other brand, but I can speak from my interpretation of what I see. I think it's very difficult to gain traction or to really serve when there's not a specific intention from the beginning. You can't check an inclusivity box off in a PR way. It has to be from the heart. It has to be from your deepest desire is to serve. In order to capture that, it has to resonate through your entire organization. It has to be from day one, from the inception. If everybody is not in mind from the beginning, you can't fix it at the end. It just will never work, and people can really feel whether it's authentic or not. You know, so many people have leaned into, “Now I'm going to make 100 foundation shades.” But then there's still hundreds of shades that aren't really curated strategically, so it's like a waste. And then maybe you did get it right. Maybe you made so many foundation shades that more people can find their shade. But then when they want to discover another part of your brand, all of the other products don't support that shade that you threw in at the end. Customers can feel immediately that the intention is not there. When you lose the trust of your community, it's really hard to get it back.

As you think about the future of your brand, what is a goal you have that both excites you and scares you?

If it exists already in the world and it's working, I don't need to jump on that bandwagon. I want to be new. I want to be differentiated. I want to be future-thinking. I want to move the industry forward. I want to move conversations forward. Innovation is always top of mind. But what's scary is that things are happening so fast right now. You know, when you think about the development timeline of a product, it's usually one to three years, depending on what you're making. But with AI and the way technology has sped up, by the time you finish a product, it's old. So right now, what's scary and exciting is asking myself the question, “am I thinking further enough into the future?” I can't develop products now thinking about the next year or two or three years. I need to be using my imagination and thinking about what we are going to be doing in the next 10 years. So that's the space that I live in right now. But it takes longer to live in that space. It takes a lot more research.

What is a goal you have that both excites and scares you?

I know that I work very hard. Anytime I say that I’m going to do something, I’m going to do it. I’m very, very favored. God loves me. With that being said, I know this may be where I’m at right now, but I’m going to take over the world.

What’s one piece of advice you’d give to an aspiring beauty founder? What do they need in order to stand out?

I would say they should decide who they want to be in this space and be clear on why they're here, because there are a lot of different ways to participate in beauty. Now, there's so much saturation. There's no shortage of beauty products or skincare products. Customers are just more discerning with how they want to spend their money. Outside of what the product is and what it does, they really want to spend money with people who share their values and who they can believe in. It's just a different energy right now. So right up front, be very clear on who you are. How do you want to be seen in the industry, and most importantly, who are you here to serve? Do it with the fullest intention and don't forget about them. I think that's the key.

What is a product (whether from your own line of products or another) that has changed your get-ready routine for the better?

The blurring balm powder is a product of my dreams. I designed it so that whether you're wearing makeup or not, you're gonna look better. I could just put on some skincare and put on universal bomb powder, no color, and I feel better about the way my skin looks. My fine lines are softened, and I just feel more confident. And, it's easy—I could put it on with my eyes closed.

What does advocating for inclusivity mean to you?

We do exist. We deserve these opportunities and these spaces. We deserve the spotlight, the front row, the campaigns, the cameras, and everything in between. And I think that goes for all Black women. We go through a lot. We carry a lot and are often at the forefront of every movement. The most important thing for me is not just reminding myself that I belong in these spaces, but making sure every Black girl after me can enter them with ease.

What’s one product that never leaves your purse?

I’m very committed to a brow. I know how brows would change the look of your face, the shape of your face, and how old you look. So I love a brow. One of the products that I worked with in my lifetime, that I worked on was the Benefit brow collection; precisely My Brow Pencil. There's multiples everywhere.

What’s one piece of advice would you give to an aspiring content creator? What do they need to stand out?

Exist unapologetically for yourself. If you’re not doing this in a way that makes you feel good, and you’re just performing for the internet, you’re not going to have any fun. This industry is already such a hard industry to be in. If you’re going to be in it, at least be in it unapologetically.