Nina Zilka, Co-founder & CEO Alder New York
Nina Zilka, Co-founder & CEO Alder New York, shares how she and her best friend started a skin care brand with no background in skin care. She talks about the journey of taking their formulation to small batch manufacturing, where sustainability plays a role in their brand, and why skin care doesn’t have to be complicated.
PS. I use their skin care and LOVE it!
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00:02 Hi, everyone. Welcome back to a new episode of Emerging Brands with Kelly Bennett Podcasts. I have a very special guest I was sharing before I hit record how I found this person first on TikTok, then on Instagram, and then I found their brand and then I found their brand IRL and purchased it and now 00:22 absolutely a devoted devoted fan of their skincare line Nina, Zilta. Oh, did I pronounce it right? Zilka, Zilka, yeah, we need a Zilka, okay. 00:35 I'm is on the podcast today and I'm so excited to have you here, Nina. I'm so excited to be here. 00:44 Thank you for having me, Kelly. You're so welcome. So let's talk about your skincare brand because you're doing things differently. 00:53 I've been following along on Instagram and on TikTok. And I just really appreciate your fresh take on skincare. But before we actually touch upon what you're doing differently, I would love to hear more about your background because like I said, I originally found you on TikTok talking about design 01:12 and then I found your skincare brand. So give me a little bit more of like your background and then we'll dive into the brand's background. 01:19 Yes, okay, yes. I have two very particular passions which are design and skincare a bit all connected. So I met my business partner, David, who was like my sole brother when we were at Pratt Institute for fashion design about 15 years ago. 01:35 We met, I met my freshman year, his sophomore year, he had started in Fine Arts and we met as fashion design students and we like immediately connected. 01:44 We always joke we had this like really weird class that would never exist now, but it was like our teacher had been like friends with Andy Warhol and she had a loft in Soho and she didn't like going to Brooklyn where Pratt's campus was so we'd all go to her Soho loft to do classwork with her and she 02:01 had us doing like large scale sculpture with fabric, it was weird. But I designed a very, I did a very failed project where I wanted to cover a mirror in lace and make a room divider out of it and it didn't work out. 02:15 But David for like David was like, it was as if he were working with me on this project, even though he had his own project. 02:21 Like he was so committed to helping me get it right and I remember when we'd be in the dorms just like trying to get this mirror laced. 02:27 And I think we've just always really vibed on working together on projects and have a shared aesthetic and point of view and I think a shared love of the flow of designing and figuring out complex issues which is what I think design is. 02:42 So we graduated from Pratt and we'd already been working together. We had a clothing line and this was sort of in the like early internet days when I think things were still largely independent. 02:53 You could kind of DIY stuff and so we had, Yes, we were selling to some boutiques in the Lower East Side and we got awarded this studio space in the Navy Art that was, I kid you not $25 a month which is just hard to wrap that around, that doesn't exist anymore but like that was possible and so it felt 03:11 like let's try to make this work, we're kind of given this insane gift of like really trying to do this, you know, very, Yes, so we did that for quite a few years and then on the side I read a book in 2010 called no more dirty looks that I'm sure super dated. 03:28 I need to like find that book and reread it now because it is why I started my company, but it was about the lack of FDA regulation in the cosmetics industry, which has not actually changed in about 15 years. 03:39 It will change this year very, very incrementally, but up until today, anyone can put a product on a shelf, and that's actually something really scary that people don't think about. 03:49 There is literally no regulation. I could today go, I'm putting this jar of chemicals on a shelf and there's nothing stopping me in the U.S. 03:57 From doing that. And at the time, I was reading about formaldehyde in products, synthetic fragrance, which is still in products that is a known hormone disruptor. 04:07 The amount of chemicals that are in our products or aren't regulated in products is really terrifying and like they're not allowed in Europe, they're not allowed in Japan, they're not allowed in most countries, not in Canada because they are known to cause cancer and we just have, you know, extreme 04:22 capitalism in this country above safety. And that just scared me so much. And so I was like, I'm a maker, I'm going to try to make my own products. 04:31 Just, just didn't my kitchen for fun. Like not at this. The same way I do my little design things like just a hobby. 04:38 And then David being David was like, this, I think I made a dry shampoo and like my room may want it in. 04:42 And then all these people started asking for it. And he was like, let's put to look a little bottle and sell it with the clothing line for the holidays. 04:48 And this was 2012. And then it kind of took off like fellow barber. We are still, we still are, they carry us at all their stores now, but they were think ordered some and then Urban Outfitters reached out. 05:01 And again, this is like the internet. So I think they might have even called us or like found, you know, it was like, it's like, whoa, this is a thing. 05:08 And then by 2015, I was a little burnt out on the fashion industry and really was like, I think there is a place for making a real skin care line, you know, not stuff in my kitchen. 05:19 I think that like there is no brand that is appealing to me aesthetically that doesn't feel hypergendered. That is making truly clean formulas at the time. 05:27 It felt very crunchy granola. What was out there? Or a very goop, which to me felt very like affluent white woman and that's the only customer at the time. 05:36 And David and I were like, where's the brand for us? Like where is the brand for, you know, cool design people who don't define themselves by their gender and just want like products that work and feel safe and are beautiful. 05:48 And maybe aren't skin care fanatics, like people who just want good skin care so they can do all the other stuff in their life. 05:54 And so we launched Alder in a soft launch in 2016, I say, hard launch in 2018 with the full line of products by them. 06:02 We had partnered with a factory. It's a family on factory after in Jersey we still work with today, sourced the raw materials we wanted to use, really honed in on our formulas. 06:12 And I would say hard launch in 2018. Incredible. Okay, so there's so much there. I love that. So going from testing a product to actually finding a manufacturer, what was that process like? 06:32 Because this podcast is really shining a light on those like awkward in between moments of building an emerging brand and like figuring it out like I started making this thing in my kitchen and now I'm building a brand to this next level to get on retail shelves or to sell on my website and to have 06:57 a more sustainable practice in my business. How did you go about that? Because it's, again, it's beautifully executed such stunning design. 07:11 I could totally tell you all come from a design background just like the small little details. And the formulation, it's a beautiful product. 07:19 So how did you start on that journey? I would love to hear that. Yeah, that is so I love that that's the vote for your podcast because I think that exact in between those jumping points are so challenging and like we're in one right now, you know, it's on the level, but it is that thing of like we're 07:36 still on the smaller scale. I love to keep it on the smaller scale, but there's a little more demand, but then we're like, okay, we're making, you know, it's just like I feel like so much of running a business, especially as a maker is like the in between and trying to figure out the scaling. 07:48 Absolutely. Yeah, I wish it was an exact science. Unfortunately, I think there's a lot of awkward points, but when it came to like going from our kitchen to a real place, it really started with the formulations and I don't know if everyone knows this, but David and I still do all the formulating ourselves 08:05 . So we became skincare chemists and actually someone tried to hire me out recently one of our factories. He was like, your products, your formulas are great. 08:14 Would you do it for me? And I was like, oh, I don't have a degree. I don't feel comfortable. I feel like I've been foster syndrome doing that. 08:20 But like, yes, our formulas are, I mean, at this point, we like, you know, we test them. There's stability tested. 08:24 They're molded at like, we know they're good. But it did start with that. So like David and I had a little, we got a little place in Bushwick, a little R&D studio, again, for like a dollar that wouldn't happen today. 08:36 And like started with really basic equipment. Like now we have, now for R&D studio, we have, you know, that a couple thousand dollar pieces of equipment. 08:44 But the time we were using a KitchenAid mixer or to try to recreate formulas and a burner with lab equipment to try to get the chemicals right. 08:52 But it really, because we're makers, and I think I really think that if you can make a garment, you can do anything, making clothing as hard. 08:59 It's pattern making, it's fabric, and unlike skincare, the pattern is constantly changing per season. So I feel like we had a really innate skill for problem solving. 09:12 So with the cleanser, for instance, which is an award-winning cleanser that like, as you said, like people go crazy for it, we've tried to- Upsessed. 09:19 Like, I really am, I'm sold. It's like unbearable. It is. I know. I think we had this advantage of being overly confident and not knowing that much. 09:30 So like, David was like, I really like like colleague acid, but I don't like these cleansers that are out there that are stripping my skin. 09:36 And I know it's a really good greeting coming you so that a little amount. And there was no, nobody was telling us you can't, we didn't have this formal education to say, no, you can't do that, you know? 09:45 And we actually like won a formulation award for two years ago from like, I think it's like the cosmetic skilled of America and they were like, it's an innovative formula. 09:54 And I'm like, it's innovative because we didn't know what we were doing. So when we met, so then with reaching out to factories, that again was really old school and comes from the fashion thing. 10:05 Most of the people who own factories are not millennials, you know, like it's the same in fashion. Often men, they're older, They tend to do things with faxing, which we were very used to from fashion. 10:16 So I googled factories, and luckily a lot of cosmetic manufacturing happens in New Jersey. Like L'Oreal makes a New Jersey, which we lucked into. 10:27 I guess it's East Coast, a lot of manufacturing happens here. So I called a bunch of factories, and we met with a couple of them, and we took the path to New Jersey, met in person via phone call. 10:39 And then the company we ended up working with. We really liked them right away. They were family owned business. We met the son and his father, and now we work with their daughters as well. 10:49 But they really gave us the run around. And he has admitted it since. He was like, oh yeah, like we were kids. 10:57 I mean, we were in our early 20s and I think he was sort of like, oh, you made these formulas, okay. 11:02 So they were like, they really made it hard for us. Like, they wanted me to like get all the ingredients myself, all of them batches, but then it worked, you know? 11:11 And I remember being like, so we'll obviously have you guys reformulate. Like these are our base formulas, but like you know what you're doing, you work with Lori Al, we'll trust you. 11:20 And Anthony, the son actually was like, these are really good formulas. Like if you were able to do these, like he's like, I have no notes if you're able to do these on your own, you on that IP, I'm gonna tell you you shouldn't be paying us to own that IP, which was very generous of him. 11:34 And that's why we work with this company. They've been so they're like family at this point. I feel like we have a lot of trust eight years later. 11:42 So that's how it happened and and and then and they were willing to start small with us. They took a real risk on us. 11:47 I think in doing the amounts that we wanted, which was like a couple thousand, which you know, a lot of factories we talked to today. 11:52 It's like still like 20,000 units is the minimum, which is still about for us. We don't we don't we we do 10. 11:57 We don't do 20. That's a lot. We're at that weird pain point now of being like, okay, do we just you know, do we jump to the next thing? 12:04 But that's how, sorry, that was a very rambling answer. No, it was a great answer. And I think it shows the importance one of reaching out, Google, making a phone call, jumping on a train, following up, kind of going with like, okay, you kind of have this weird checklist. 12:28 Okay, I'll go along with it. And I think that is such a huge part of entrepreneurship. Like that is so much a part of it. 12:39 Like, yes, you need good branding and a website and cool content like all of that. But what you just shared to me is really like the heart and soul of being an entrepreneur. 12:50 So thank you for generously sharing that because I think we need to talk more about those weird random trips on a train, you know, like, I don't know how this is going to go. 12:59 I think this is a factory or maybe it's not even anything. I don't know. Let's just go see. I feel like that is such a big part of being entrepreneur, right? 13:12 It's just like those are those awkward moments of like, let's just see what happens. So you got to the factory. 13:19 They ended up taking a chance on you. Now you are there. You're building out your products. How did you start finding your story as far as sharing on content? 13:32 Because you've done a really great job in being a content creator myself. I really admire. And like to me, I like collect pieces of content, like how other people collect art, like really good piece of content. 13:45 I have a little folder in my Instagram and so many of your videos are saved there. I'm like, this was a great video and I'll send it to clients to them. 13:53 Like, this is really good storytelling because you're able to connect with people and storytell your brand, but you're also talking about grand differentiators, right, from ingredients that you use, being gender inclusive, being sustainable. 14:09 I knew the story about your formulation winning award because you had a really great piece of content of like, we're not chemists. 14:19 We didn't have this background, but this is actually an advantage now because we figured it out and found something that no one was doing. 14:28 To me, that is awesome brand storytelling. So how did you find that rhythm to express those points but also make sure that it felt aligned with your brand? 14:41 Well, I would say we're still doing it. Like I feel like it's easier. Like certainly in the TikTok space, I think we're very much still figuring it out. 14:49 And I think for us right now it's about consistency. Like we basically said like I'm going to try to make a piece of content a day for our TikTok. 14:57 And that has sort of helped to me to feel a little less limitation to like it doesn't have to be good. 15:01 It doesn't have to be amazing. Most of the time it's not going to get eyeballs, but I just need to be consistent. 15:06 And I think that's really helpful because then you start building a rhythm, you know. Right. I think my first couple ones were really awkward. 15:13 Like I hate scrolling back to the beginning when we were doing TikTok. It's like, I think it's ugly. I hadn't figured out the lighting, you know, it's just not good. 15:19 But that's okay because that our goal was not we're going to make a TikTok that takes off. It was like we're going to consistently do that. 15:26 And we do try to do that with new, you know, TikTok's only going to have a lifespan of whatever and then we'll have to do it with you. 15:32 Right. But we do try to be like on top of that stuff because I, because we're a small brand, we don't pay, we actually don't do paid advertising. 15:40 It's all organic for us. And so we really try to be like, how can we connect with the customer as much as possible? 15:48 So yeah, that's, that's been it with Alder and then with little design things. That was again, just like a little side project that I started for myself. 15:55 I think I was feeling a little creatively uninspired and this was I think I started a little design things about a year and a half ago, but what I what I realized is like I wanted to have more of a presence online, but I don't love sharing really personal stuff about myself. 16:11 You know, like a lot of and like that is the nature of social media is like you have to share your life, you know, a day in the life or something. 16:19 And I that just felt a little tough for me just with who I am. I wouldn't say I'm I also think that I didn't want to be filming myself all the time. 16:29 I probably wanted to enjoy going on a hike without filming it. And I was like, well, I love, I've always loved diving into similar to you, other brand stories, other creators I find it really inspiring. 16:41 And I was like, I already kind of do that. I'll make a little video about it. And and then took on a life of its own. 16:46 And I would say at this point, I'm having kind of kind of actually scaling back because I'm like, I'm not getting paid to do this. 16:52 And I, I'm not going to become a slave to that either. But that's how that wasn't started as well. And I think that has helped me to be more conversational with Alder. 17:01 I think in both cases, just being conversational, talking the way I would talk to a friend is really a valuable thing. 17:07 Because I think people notice the author. They know they know when something's authentic. I felt that from you when I, because I first found you from little design things, that series. 17:18 And it felt very conversational, very much like I was sitting with a friend who is really cool and creative and I was really enjoying listening to their perspective and that's what it felt like. 17:31 So are you also sharing in the sense that it's practice just to like get the almost like the cobwebs and I find this from so many content creators and myself included even if you don't create content almost for a week and you try to do it again, you like it just feels so awkward. 17:51 And so is it more so just to help you like stay within a rhythm that feels that conversational just so that you feel comfortable expressing ideas, how your personal brand and your own series just became a way to experiment and test so that you can then leverage that for the brand? 18:14 Yeah, I think I think I wish I'd been that strategic in it. It's less conscious stop it in, but a hundred percent at this point, I feel like it's exactly the cobweb thing. 18:24 It's like, you know, like certainly on Alder, I know I'm both on both on both, on both, sorry, both what are they called profiles? 18:33 On both Alder and little design thing, it's like, I do have very little control over what takes off, right? Like on Alder, we like a face mask one I did that's like doing well and then almost everything else I do is like nobody sees and so I think it really because I'm like that's not what's making 18:48 me do it. It's the cobwebs that's doing it every day, so it's the practice. It just takes up pressure off and makes sure I just do it. 18:56 And yeah, I think you could feel a little silly talking to camera by yourself in a room. You know, it can start being like, what am I doing? 19:02 But that was a percent. I appreciate you sharing that because that's something that I come across almost every single day while I'm working with founders of emerging brands who maybe aren't necessarily content creators or come from a content creation background but now building a brand includes content 19:26 like it's it's it it's a non-negotiable at this point unless you have a team that you can delegate it to or a large budget that you could do lots of paid but you still need organic content, right? 19:41 So I think the days are gone when people could kind of just like scoop by and not really have to pay attention to it. 19:49 Like it was back in the day but now it's like you're gonna have to build the skill and the only way you build the skill is by actually doing it. 19:58 No exactly. There's no other work around and I wish there was. There truly isn't. I exactly and I do think you know there have been times when I think David and I have felt resentful of like that is not why I started a brand to become like rock stars you know and like create content and what has helped 20:18 me and this goes back to what you're saying is that I'm like but what I do want to do is is tell the story of why I created why I created like as a maker as a designer I do want to connect with my customer and explain this is why I made this product. 20:32 And when I stopped being, we never, we don't really do meme content stuff, which is totally worth it works. But like, what I have found makes me feel satisfied is when I can share stories about why we're doing what we're doing. 20:44 And so then I find value in it. And so I think if you're not naturally someone who is like, I want to share online, but that's not often why someone starts a company. 20:54 I think if you can start it more as like, this is your pitch, this is your chance to explain what's beautiful about your product. 20:59 This is your storefront, you know, a virtual storefront. I think that's a really for me, been really helpful of how I think about it and any less resentful of this like need to create. 21:09 Absolutely. And I'm going to send this podcast interview to clients, founders who are in the emerging brand incubator and be like, listen to this interview. 21:20 This is going to help shift a new perspective around content. So I'm totally going to quote you and like send this out many anytime. 21:28 So thank you for that. You're gonna really help a lot of people. And the next thing I want to ask you is through telling story telling and through creating content. 21:38 I think you've done a great job positioning your brand that you are doing things different as far as being gender inclusive and also sustainable. 21:48 So I would love to hear a little bit more of like why was that so important to you, logistically, what did that look like to make sure you were covering those bases? 21:58 And then the storytelling piece of that. Yes. So I think in both cases, what I think is really important is that those are pillars of the brand. 22:08 And so it was never truly was never even a conscious choice. When it came to this sustainability component, David and I were already the Navy ARD space I'm sorry, Matt was part of a sustainability incubator. 22:21 That's where David and I really, okay. Yes, and like a real driver for me as a human. And so David and I've always shared like, both of us I remember connecting when we were young. 22:30 Like I remember having nightmares that's 16 about climate change. So and it's all kind of coming to fruition now, but like, also always been very conscious of that. 22:38 So our clothing line was very focused on sustainability and using dead stock and things like that. And part of why I left fashion is that I could not find a way to make it less wasteful. 22:47 And making things as inherently wasteful, like that's the definition of design, but it fashioned was hard for me to square with like who I was as a person. 22:56 I just felt a lot more like I was creating something that had purpose. For me, I think there's plenty of designers doing it really well at fashion designers. 23:04 I just wasn't able to really nail that. So when we, and so when we created our skincare line, it was inherent that like we're gonna use materials that are more sustainable, which I'm not, I've got many TikToks talking about, we use recycled plastic, which we did multiple life cycle analysis, and that 23:22 is the more sustainable option than glass or aluminum, but the consumer sentiment isn't there. So we do have some, we're almost like, should we go to glass because consumers think it's more sustainable and there's pros and cons, but that is why we made that choice. 23:36 And then Environmental Working Group, that has been my north star since I read that book about products. So it was always my goal that we would be in Environmental Working Group certified. 23:47 So almost all of our products are verified that anything that isn't just in the process of being verified, it's our newest products, our lip balms, the fragrance ones, essential oils are always a tricky one with percentages to get the test everything. 24:01 So that is a whole different thing. And then with the gender-inclusive thing, that was just, we never thought about it. 24:08 It's like the brands I liked, like, I think some nice people refer to us as a millennial ASAP, which I'll take, that's a great compliment. 24:14 Right. ASAP is gender neutral. Like to me, good, well-designed products do not have a gender and skin care inherently is not something that should be gendered. 24:24 You know, as soon as we started learning about skin care chemistry, we learned that skin has nothing to do with your gender identity. 24:29 Like truly like it has to do with your hormones, it has to do with your DNA and it has to do with your environment. 24:36 So, you know, are you an Arizona or are you in New York are bigger differences for your skin than any way of whether you identify as a man, woman or non-binary. 24:45 So we really started working with ingredients that are bringing all skin types to this healthy balanced place, things like niacinamide, glycolic acid, hyaluronic acid that are known to be great for a range of skin types. 24:58 And then the packaging was like, well, why would we? What does it even mean to do, you know, pink? And I don't know what I, and also like, why is pink dundered? 25:05 So it felt so innate to our brand. Weirdly when we launched it felt like that was really radical for people. 25:12 I know way that like, I think being on the coast and being part of my little art bubble, I just didn't realize would be as radical as it was. 25:19 What was the feedback that you were feeling like, oh wow, I didn't even realize this was going to be a radical notion of like being gender inclusive. 25:28 Well, like Target really wanted a career line for a while for a lot of reasons it didn't work out around price point and kind of the formulas being at the value that they're at but they were like, we love you guys, we just don't know what I'll be put you in. 25:44 And I was like, what are you for men or are you for women? And I'm like, right, right, right, that's a thing still. 25:52 Like men's skincare, women's skincare, which is again so silly. So like, just from a retail perspective, certainly with the bigger retailers, these more mainstream retailers, like little boutiques don't have that problem. 26:03 But yeah, that's been a thing with mainstream retailers of like, well, where do we put you? And then we did a very small round of friends and family funding when we launched. 26:14 And I was truly just friends and family, but it's like a lot of older family members who were just so perplexed by the gender inclusive thing. 26:23 Like they just, I just remember my dad being like, oh, it's like Calvin Klein, it's like CK1. And I was like, sure, if that's how you need to think about it. 26:31 Like if that is what your brain needs to do is like reference a 90s fragrance to get it, then like go for it. 26:36 I don't think this is a great concept. That's really interesting. And I think only now 2023, three that there's more conversations about gender inclusivity. 26:48 I was just watching some videos from the brand August, the period care brand. And they're really on the forefront of being gender inclusive for a period care brand. 27:00 And again, you could see when they're on, they were just on a morning show and the anchors were like, what? 27:06 Like, what is this? And I feel like it's it was only just now having these conversations of like the importance of it and what that really means and like skincare not something that needs to be gendered. 27:20 So I really love how that was like baked into your brand from the beginning and it's only been story told more and and really made more normalized over the years of what you've been doing. 27:36 Let me ask you this, how are you selling to customers? I know I found you at a really great market in upstate New York. 27:48 One of the most impressive markets I've been, I used to curate markets and that one, field and supply, shout out. 27:54 They've done a great job. It's the best. It's the best. It's the quality of product there. I was really, really impressed by. 28:03 Are you doing more markets? Then I also shopped your brand on your website. So like what does that look like for you all? 28:11 And what's kind of that rhythm that you've found of actually selling your product? Yeah, so we're in about 300 boutiques across the country and amazing. 28:21 Yes, and that has been organic growth through the years. I do most of the reach out. And I would say the majority of these like, I would say I always feel like we're in the coolest store of whatever city we're in. 28:31 You know, like, if you're in Marfa, you're going to go to apartment F. If you're, you know, like, you got it, we've got it covered. 28:37 If you're in, you're going to go to club du-cat in Alabama. So it's like these cool boutiques that I think just are taste makers who own the, who own them and get what we're doing. 28:46 And it is truly like, it's not women's boutiques, it's not men's boutiques, it's like a wide range of different places. 28:52 And then like, as I said, we're in fellow barbers, which like, they're a wonderful, they're, I don't know if everybody knows them, but they are a barber shop, a non-binary barber shop that's also now across the country, and we've really grown with them, and they've been just an incredible partner to 29:06 us. And then we're at a couple of bigger places like ShopBop and Urban Outfitters online as well. And then we sell on our website, and we sell on Amazon, and then we're doing markets. 29:19 So we try to be really diversified in terms of how we sell. And that's, I, from the beginning, had been very focused on that. 29:25 We came up at a time when DTC was like the thing I was talking about. Right. We're not VC backed, but that was the brands that were around us. 29:34 And there was this idea that shopping online was going to change everything. And everyone was only going to shop online. 29:38 And now we see, you know, Harry's razors is now a target. Casper is now at, I don't know, one of the mattress companies. 29:45 It's like that didn't work. People shop all different ways. I shop all different ways. Like absolutely. Yeah. So we're very diverse to fight in that. 29:53 And we just started doing the field supply market. And like you said, it was so fun. I again, love meeting with our customers in real life. 30:00 It did make me crave having a physical space. Really? Yeah. I was like, this feels so right. That's a whole new can of worms that involved. 30:09 And locate so like, we'll see. But I really was like, oh, especially over the pandemic, getting to like meet people like you. 30:17 Like, I was like, dang. Absolutely. Absolutely. And what are some boutiques that you're shops that you're in in New York City, just so I can personally know? 30:29 Yes, so we're at modern chemist. There's a couple locations where all the fellow barbers were at Prima Yoga, which is around the corner from me. 30:39 We're at a lot of places, but those are the big ones. I know that Barbara has all of them, and they're in Soho, they're in Williamsburg, they're in Chelsea Market, you know, and they've got I think the full line. 30:49 So perfect. Okay. That that was just a personal act. So just to wrap up, I could talk to you honestly for hours. 30:58 I appreciate your generosity and sharing your story so much. What is one piece of advice to wrap up this conversation that you would share with someone who is a founder of an emerging brand who's in those beginning awkward, amazing, but terrifying years of like like, what the hell am I doing? 31:17 How am I going to figure this out? What is something that you would share with someone who's in that space right now? 31:25 It's amazing, counterintuitive, but I would say stay as small as you can for as long as possible. I think you got that. 31:31 Tell me more. Well, they were coming out of a time where everyone was parading this idea of like hockey stick growth and extreme growth and spend, spend, spend. 31:40 I think we are seeing that crumble. You know, we work with the first one, but like that doesn't work. And like companies weren't making money and you can only not make money if you're really heavily busy back and that, if you want to go that route, if you want to go that route great, but it does mean 31:55 that you basically have a boss, which I don't think is why most people start out having a company or trying to either own things. 32:01 So I think the slower and steadier you can grow the better and the longer that you can be making things in-house and really conscious of when like we just talked about those awkward growth steps. 32:12 And those are really, you know, sometimes you need to leap. That is going to happen if your company is growing. 32:17 But like get to the point where it's getting really uncomfortable to ship things yourself before you move to fulfillment. Get to the point where you are like, I can't handle this low. 32:25 Do not do it when you're like, but when I get to there, it's going to be hard. Get to their first and be a little awkward because if you can pay yourself first, if you can get your, you know, your self paid and and be doing it, that I think is really valuable. 32:39 And all We've had to let people go over, you know, we never had full-time employees, but we did start outsourcing stuff and realized like we didn't need to outsource as much as we thought we did. 32:50 And now we're kind of taking it back and I think that I feel happier having done that and kind of looked back at certain things and think, oh, we could have stayed smaller for longer. 32:58 That would have been okay. That is such awesome advice Nina and I appreciate your again transparency and authenticity because that's not necessarily the sexy advice that we hear on the internet and it really resonates with me as well because that's how I feel the breast approach of building an emerging 33:19 brand is start small start local do everything you can until you can't do it anymore so that when you do higher and you do scale, you also know what you want, right? 33:32 And you're able to communicate what you want so that other people can support your vision. And again, that's not usually the most popular piece of advice that you hear. 33:43 But to me, it's the realest of like how I've just seen and built brands over the years. So thank you for sharing that. 33:49 I think that will really resonate with so many people and give them like that deep exhale, be like, I am doing it. 33:58 This is happening. Okay, cool. And so I just appreciate you sharing that. Yes. Oh my gosh. Of course, I'm happy to share. 34:07 I love getting to share all my mistakes with other people. No, it's so good. So what is the website where people can shop, follow on social. 34:17 So again, I'm telling everyone the face wash, hydration oil and gouache, I'm just gonna put it out there. It's a must. 34:27 I couldn't agree more. And you've done it all. It sure is. Yes, it's aldernewark.com. Very simple. ALDER New York spelled out. 34:35 It's all there. We do a lot of bundles. So like if you wanted to get the cleanser and the brush and the soap together, you're gonna get a big discount. 34:42 So I highly recommend you do that. You sign up for the newsletter. You get a discount, you know, all those fun things. 34:46 And you can also get us on Amazon, which that's the way people shop, so I get it. But yeah, the everyday cleanser, we cannot keep it in stock. 34:53 So if you see it in stock, get it. I love that so much. Thank you so much again for coming on. 35:00 This was such a great, great conversation. I'll be sharing it with all of the members of my incubator because I know that this is going to be that, like I said, deep exhale, but they're on the right path. 35:13 And thank you again, Nina, for all you do. And my skin also thinks you're skin looks flawless yeah I really am a big fan so thank you so much I was really in the need for good skin care and it was kind of stressing me out so finding you and finding your brand has been like a genuine game changer for 35:33 me so just thank you on that personal note thank you and thank you for everyone who's listening this was an awesome conversation and I'll I'll see you next week on Emerging Brands with Kelly Bennett Podcast.
