scented candle with Wilson’s name on it. “You’re not going to get an award necessarily for doing that kind of work,” she says. Still, with a decade of her own company under her belt, Wilson gets to be picky about who she works with. “I love putting something out in the world that’s affordable to people, and that makes them happy and that gives them a moment in their day to just enjoy,” she says. “But anything I work on, there has to be a reason, it has to be really well researched and be very strategic.” Some of Wilson’s new clients include Billie, which started as a woman’s razor company and recently expanded into body care, and Virtue Labs, the first haircare brand that uses pure human keratin, not plant or animal keratin, and that has been embraced by celebrities such as Jennifer Garner, Vanessa Kirby, Charlize Theron and Kristin Stewart. Working with Virtue Labs, she helped coin what’s called “functional fragrances”—fragrances that contain essential oils, extracts and aromatic ingredients that, in this case, not only benefit each type of hair type— if there’s cypress in it, it’s to smooth hair strands while lemon helps to strengthen them—but also address what more consumers are demanding nowadays, ingredients and company practices that are sustainable and aligned with their values, what they call being “virtuous.” “Traceability—where the oils come from, how the farmers are treated—is very important,” Wilson says. “I only work with suppliers who I trust and know that they have those
relationships with the growers and also, they have a supply chain they can guarantee.” Driven in part by Gen Z consumers, “clean” beauty has become one of the fastest-growing categories in personal care, according to Fast Company. According to a 2022 survey conducted for the Environmental Working Group (EWG), a Washington, D.C.– based nonprofit consumer advocacy organization, a typical adult uses 12 personal care products—shampoo, soap, conditioner, deodorants and more—every day, and 10% use more than 25 products daily. The survey also found that a typical adult is exposed to 15 fragrance chemicals a day. Since fragrance is an “umbrella term,” potentially hiding nearly 4,000 chemicals, the EWG notes, transparency is essential. Wilson believes that, too. “People will say, ‘Oh, I want all organic’—and then when they find out it doesn’t smell as good and you can only manufacture it in a certain kind of facility and that’s very difficult to do. So usually they say, ‘OK, let’s look at the next tier down,’ which may be all natural, but in the West there’s no kind of standard. What does that mean?” she says. “So, I look at the European Union, where there are different kinds of standards that we can at least tie to, so we are transparent to what we are using. As long as you tell your consumer what you’re doing, let them make the choice, that’s what I believe is the most important thing to do. Consumers are smart. They’re taking the time to do the
THE BEST IN WINE COUNTRY GOLF t
44 NorthBaybiz
June 2024
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