When co-founders and partners Matthew Herman and David Kien started developing Boy Smells, they weren't exactly sure they had a brand. In fact, Herman said the process of making candles in their living room in 2016 was a side hustle. Both Herman and Kien were working in fashion at the time; Herman was a designer at Nasty Gal and Kien worked in production at The Elder Statesman.
"We didn't have a ton of high aspirations for the brand when we first started it because we really wanted it to be a recreational little side hustle. It was in years two and three that we really started to get serious. We left our jobs. We were running the entire business out of the living room, then it was the living room and kitchen, and then the living room, kitchen and sunroom. All of a sudden, there was inventory in the hallways," said Herman on the latest episode of the Glossy Beauty Podcast.
While "genderful" Boy Smells launched at Sephora this month, it first launched into retail via independent stores like Boy George in Austin and now closed Barneys New York, positioning the line as for a fashion savvy person but sold at a more accessible price. Equally thoughtful is the brand's perspective on collaborations. After the runway success of Boy Smells' Slowburn candle with singer-songwriter Kacey Musgraves, it would have been easy for the team to take a rinse and repeat mentality to other partnerships. But Herman said whoever Boy Smells works with has to represent what Boy Smells is all about, which led the brand to its latest work with Grace Jones.
In essence, Hermand said, "[We asked ourselves], 'If we could choose one person that represents our genderful values and who we are as a brand, who would we want to work with?' And we went after that person, who is not the person that the digital people who want to inform every decision about ... audience reach or whatever [would choose]. We went after the person that we really felt represented our brand values," said Herman.