Women over 40 have major purchasing power, and they spend with the brands that make them feel seen. Most wellness and beauty brands still market to a customer who is 35. Lesley Holmes, Founder of Beneath The Gloss and former Chief Marketing Officer of Crème Collective, has spent 23 years building brands across beauty, fashion, health, and wellness. This episode is for the wellness and beauty owners, founders, franchisors, and franchisees who want to know what their customer is actually buying and where she is going next. Today on The Owner Seat Podcast, host Albert Ramos sits down with Lesley Holmes, who was on the founding team at TYRA Beauty, the cosmetics and skincare company founded by Tyra Banks, and goes behind the brand and the customer: - Why women over 40 are the most overlooked opportunity in wellness and beauty, and what brands keep getting wrong about her - The thing beneath the thing: how a founder finds what the customer is really buying, and what changes once they know - Why acquisition can buy customers but cannot manufacture resonance Lesley Holmes has built brands, products, businesses, and teams from early-stage startups to companies exceeding $250 million. She came up through Dermacia, Dermstore, and JustFab, led brand and marketing on the founding team at TYRA Beauty, and scaled the marketing and creative team at Smashtech, a health and wellness brand incubator, from 3 people to 20 while launching three new brands. At two companies, colleagues nicknamed her The Oracle for spotting patterns others missed. At 40, she stepped away from that career, rebuilt her life around identity and purpose, and returned to the C-suite as CMO of Crème Collective. Today she runs Beneath The Gloss, advising brands, operators, and founders, and coaching people at a turning point through her Internal Rebrand framework. She is a member of WE ARE THE BOARD, an ICF Certified Professional Coach, a Human Design Practitioner, and a certified Lagree instructor. This episode is for wellness and beauty owners, founders, franchisors, and franchisees who are tired of: - Marketing to a customer who stopped being 35 a decade ago - Competing on ClassPass credits and discounts instead of a reason to choose you - Spending on acquisition and watching customers leave anyway - Selling the product instead of what the customer is actually buying Top topics we cover - Women over 40: the overlooked customer, and the opportunity in muscle, strength, and women's health - The thing beneath the thing: why a bank isn't selling a loan, and what your brand is really selling - Dividing demand: what happens when nine reformer studios share one street, and how she chooses - Seen-with brands: what Stanley, Celsius, and Ulta Beauty understand about identity and the whole woman - Social wellness: run clubs, gathering in real life, and how a small brand can be part of it - The values exercise: a tool to run with your team on Monday and at the kitchen table that night How this episode helps you win If you're a wellness or beauty founder: how to find the thing beneath the thing and build the brand around it. If you own a studio, spa, or clinic: how to earn loyalty when every competitor is offering the same thing at a discount. If you're a franchisee or multi-unit operator: how to make a location feel personal to the woman who walks in, not just consistent. If you're a franchisor or emerging brand: how to read a real consumer shift early, and tell it apart from a fad. Work with Albert, Fractional CFO for Fitness and Wellness I'm Albert Ramos, Founder of STRATEGO Intel Consulting and host of The Owner Seat. 16+ years of P&L ownership at Life Time Inc. (NYSE: LTH), Gold's Gym, and 24 Hour Fitness. I help fitness, wellness, and longevity brands ($500K to $30M) build cash visibility, unit economics, pricing and utilization models, and capital planning so every decision is clean and defensible. Book a CFO Strategy Call: https://calendly.com/albertramosjr-strategointel/youtube-podcast Subscribe to The Owner Seat newsletter on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7288029005239267328 Website: https://www.StrategoIntel.com Connect with Albert on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/albertramosjr/ More from The Owner Seat New episodes every Monday and Friday at 8:00am CST. Full library: https://www.youtube.com/@TheOwnerSeatPodcast STRATEGO Intel: https://www.StrategoIntel.com
