Strong brands are built through vision, creativity and the guidance of leaders who know how to bring them to market. This conversation, “The Billion Dollar Blueprint,” explores the journey of creating a brand with the executives and partners who position those companies for long-term success and ultimately acquisition. Speakers included Anastasia Soare, founder and CEO of Anastasia, Beverly Hills, a beauty empire; Marne Martin, CEO of Emburse; and Sahara Lotti, founder of the beauty brand Lashify and moderated by Anna Magzanyan, President of LA Times Studios.
ON GETTING STARTED IN BUSINESS
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Anastasia Sun: “I grew up in Romania. My grandparents and parents emigrated from Macedonia to Romania. In Romania, I had a great art teacher that introduced me to the golden ratio. He always said, ‘If you want to draw a portrait and you want to change an emotion, you change the eyebrow shape.’ I never thought that I would use that, but when I came to the United States, I started working as an aesthetician. I went to the library to revisit the theory that Leonardo da Vinci used golden ratio to study the human face. Based on that, I fixed my eyebrows, and then I was excited to share with my clients doing facial and body waxing. So that was the beginning.”
Sahara Lotti and Marne Martin
(David Arellanes)
Sahara Lots: “It was an obsession. I had just gotten lash extensions in 2004, and it’s somewhat life-changing. I was addicted to getting these lashes done, and one time I was going to Hawaii, and she couldn’t get me in. I was irate because my self-esteem was on the line, and I thought there must be a way. I’m a DIYer. I started searching for lash extensions and found nothing. I searched eBay and found nothing. I started to see the solution, and so I started making it. It was a solution to something that I personally needed.”
Marne Martin: “I grew up on cattle ranches. I didn’t want to be bossed around by my father, and I had a view I could go do international business around the world. Technology was really kicking off in 1996 when I came out of school, and there was so much opportunity. Every single industry was being reinvented with technology, and that’s never stopped. I’ve been privileged enough to work all around the world. Our current company does business with users in 140 countries. We’ve launched AI solutions in more than 200. Learning how to be independent on the ranch definitely helped me when I was working around the world to drive change in male-dominated societies, including places like China and Saudi Arabia and Japan.”
ON LEADERSHIP
Martin: “Leadership enables you to bring people along. When you lead people to accomplish outcomes that make them feel better about themselves, make them proud, that is actually how you change the world. To be a good leader, you have to be inspiring. Then you have to develop teams that are capable of building that brand because it is built first in your heart, mind and soul. Find the people that can activate it to be successful at scale. You need to have some organizational discipline to make sure that you’re bringing people along that add to your brand as you’re moving through the stages of growth.”
Sun: “I came here without speaking the language. I didn’t know anything about business, but I found a solution to a problem. I believed in it 100 percent. I didn’t have a business plan or people to invest in my business, because not even the landlord wanted to rent me the space. You can’t pay rent in Beverly Hills doing eyebrows. Whatever you want to create, you need to sell it. And what could be better than beauty? You have to be really authentic, and then you work.”
Anastasia Sun
(David Arellanes)
Lots: “In the beginning, I was untrained. I was in the movie business, and I pivoted to the beauty business. It’s about finding a team that believes in everything that you’re doing. Find a group of people that believe in your vision and that believe that you are the one that’s going to take them to the finish line. In order to scale, you need a lot more than that.”
ON SCALING A BUSINESS
Lots: “Scaling was one of the hardest things. It’s about finding leaders that are better at doing something than you are. You need to find people with experience. You need to find people that are also scrappy. They can create the process because scaling is about process. It’s about cutting and pasting and doing it again and again. Figure out what works, and then repeat it.”
Sun: “When you start with shaping eyebrows in a small little salon, how do you scale? Well, you go to department stores, and at the end of the day, you have to believe in whatever you are doing. Second, you have to be the best. I wanted to be the best in what I did to create the best product and listen to my customer. I scaled slowly so that I could cater to my customers. When I was everywhere domestically, I needed to move internationally, which is when I brought on a partner to help me operationally. I also work with my daughter. She pushed me into new products, like makeup. We probably have 50 projects right now. We don’t launch a product if we don’t really believe that it is going to be extraordinary.”
ON RESILIENCE AND GRIT
Sun: “At the beginning, at least, I got so many rejections. Doors closed, because nobody believed in doing eyebrows. You know what kept me going? Celebrity clients validated my work, but everyday clients cameback for their eyebrows and believed in me. That kept me going.”
Lots: “We usually do our own distribution, but I’d hired a VP of supply chain who implemented a third-party logistics company. They didn’t integrate correctly, so we shipped $2 million worth of double shipments. I was horrified and embarrassed. I was on a live tutorial, and I just burst into tears. Next thing you know, we had about 20,000 packages returned to us. I do what I do for the customer, and they’ll thank you all the way to the end.”
Martin: “Typically, when women are hired, there’s some complexity or challenge that leads them to give the woman a shot. Women are very good at understanding customer needs. I led my first company at 27. There is inherent resiliency that you have as a successful woman. It has to be inside of yourself, because there will be many times that it might be easier to give up, but you have to keep competing. I have a pursuit of excellence. The commonality among successful women is that you keep showing up and competing.”
ON INNOVATION
Lots: “I naturally wanted to move into nails. I was up one night and saw an invention online, and it turns out it’s by an 18-year-old girl who has a brilliant invention. I got in touch with her and brought her to Lashify, and now she’s our innovation apprentice. We have a new nail product, because the idea is to empower other women. It’s coming soon, and it’s called Nibble.”
Sun: “I’m launching new products for eyebrows, believe it or not. Technology allows me to go back and fix my old products [that] couldn’t perform. For instance, in 2000, I launched a brow product that wasn’t waterproof. We had to pull it back. The lab can now create waterproof products and the right brush to apply it perfectly. We can use social media to demonstrate how to use it.”
Martin: “You have to figure out how to continue innovating to build longstanding big businesses. People are at the heart of anything that can come next. If people aren’t following your lead, then it might be the best idea in the world, but it’ll fail. What keeps me motivated is figuring out how to weave together what people want with how technology evolves.”
Sahara Lotti
CEO & Founder | LASHIFY
Sahara Lotti, the visionary CEO and founder of Lashify, is a trailblazer in the beauty industry, renowned for her disruptive innovations. With an impressive and ever-expanding portfolio of over 750 global patents, Lotti has revolutionized the lash market by pioneering DIY lash extensions and introducing the groundbreaking Underlash Technology™. Her leadership has not only redefined beauty standards but also carved out an entirely new market segment, cementing Lashify’s position as a global leader in the industry. Lotti is also the first woman to combat counterfeits and dupe culture by successfully suing Chinese manufacturers for infringing on her patents, setting a precedent in the fight against intellectual property violations.
Marne Martin
Chief Executive Officer | GET DAMNED
Marne Martin is the CEO of Emburse and has more than 25 years of leadership experience in the technology sector, driving growth and innovation across both public and private software companies. She has led organizations through IPOs, mergers and acquisitions, and other strategic transformations. Before joining Emburse as chief strategy officer and president, she spent over five years on the leadership team at IFS and previously served as CEO of ServicePower PLC and CFO of Norcon PLC.
Anastasia Sun
CEO & Founder | ANASTASIA BEVERLY HILLS
Anastasia Soare is the founder and CEO of Anastasia Beverly Hills, author of Raising Brows and a pioneering force in modern beauty. After immigrating from Romania, she introduced the now-iconic “Golden Ratio” brow-shaping method in 1990, revolutionizing the beauty industry and creating a new category. Today, she continues to lead ABH’s global expansion across prestige cosmetics with a focus on innovation and customer connection. Her artistry and vision have earned her a worldwide following – including celebrity clients like Jennifer Lopez, Kim Kardashian and Sofia Vergara – and features in top publications worldwide. Soare also champions young adults exiting the foster care system through The Anastasia Brighter Horizon Foundation.
