Off The Shelf with Susannah Dellinger

Susannah Dellinger
  • 5.0 (2)
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Updated Weekly

Beauty is a $650 billion global industry — and it's still largely misunderstood. Off the Shelf with Susannah Dellinger goes beyond the product and into the power: the economics, the culture, the relationships, and the decisions that shape who wins and who doesn't. For beauty founders, executives, and anyone who knows this industry is worth taking seriously.

  1. 6d ago

    018. The Worst Business Advice I Ever Got (And Why I'm So Glad I Ignored It)

    Send me a text 💌 Everyone's handing out business advice. Most of it is wrong. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger breaks down the four pieces of business advice she was given, ignored, and is so glad she did — from five-year business plans to the myth of removing yourself from your own company — and shares what actually built a multi-million dollar agency from zero. In this episode: Why she scaled from zero to $5 million in 48 months without ever writing a business planWhy "stay true to your vision no matter what" is some of the most dangerous advice a founder can followHow listening to brands who couldn't afford her agency led to launching the Bright Beauty Connect Talent NetworkWhy staying invisible as a service provider cost her years of growth — and what she'd do differentlyThe truth about "building a business that runs without you" — and why she thinks it's one of the biggest traps in entrepreneurshipWhy the people making the least in beauty retail are the ones generating the most revenue — and how she's changing thatWhat she learned about leveling the playing field for female-founded, BIPOC-founded, and LGBTQ-founded brandsWhy if you're still in your business after 10, 15, 20 years — that's not a failure. That's the point.00:00 The Business Advice Nobody Should Be Taking  00:40 Why I'm Answering This Question Backwards  01:31 I Never Wrote a Business Plan. Here's What I Did Instead.  04:00 How Listening to the Market Changed Everything  04:50 Why Staying True to Your Vision Can Actually Destroy You  05:44 How Beauty Field Teams Actually Work and Why Agencies Are Broken  07:29 Why I Launched the Bright Beauty Connect Talent Network Against All Advice  11:30 The Four and a Half Years I Stayed Invisible + What It Cost Me  15:01 Stop Trying to Get Out of the Business You Built  18:13 These Conversations Matter Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    19 min

  2. May 18

    017. Give Women Their Names Back: The Beauty Industry's Name Trap Nobody Is Talking About

    Send me a text 💌 When you sell your beauty brand, you might also be selling your name — forever. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger breaks down the Jo Malone lawsuit, the contracts that stripped female founders of the right to use their own names, and why the beauty industry's name trap is yet another system quietly designed to keep women from building twice. In this episode: What happened when Estée Lauder sued Jo Malone in 2026 — and why printing your own name as a founder on a bottle was enough to trigger itWhy naming your brand after yourself is one of the riskiest business decisions a founder can make — and why nobody told them that in the 90sHow Bobbi Brown ended up driving down a street called Jones Road — and what that story really says about what she lost when she soldWhy the founders who built the first wave of celebrity beauty brands couldn't have predicted what signing away their names would cost them decades laterThe name trap — why some female founders are staying in companies they want to leave because they know they can never use their name again if they goWhy this pattern is hitting women in beauty almost exclusively — and what it has in common with every other system stacked against female foundersFemale founder funding at an all-time low of 1.3% — and why the name trap is one more barrier on top of an already impossible climbWhy Estée Lauder has a golden opportunity right now to rip up those contracts publicly — and why doing it on TikTok would be worth more than any campaign they could buy01:24 She Sold Her Brand. They Kept Her Name.  02:18 Why Naming Your Brand After Yourself Is a Trap  03:14 How Bobbi Brown Ended Up on Jones Road  04:16 Jo Malone, Zara, and the Lawsuit Nobody Saw Coming  06:15 How Signing Away Your Name Became Standard Practice  07:38 Why This Keeps Happening to Women — and Not Men  09:49 Rip Up the Contracts. Give the Names Back.  10:46 The Brand Confusion Argument — and Why It Doesn't Hold  13:54 These Conversations Matter Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    14 min

  3. May 11

    016. Christine Morrison: The Calvin Klein VP Who Dismantled Everything to Figure Out Who She Really Was

    Send me a text 💌 She was a VP at Calvin Klein during one of fashion's most mythologized eras, left it all behind for marriage, twin babies, and a new city — and had to completely dismantle her identity to rebuild it. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger sits down with Christine Morrison, author of Clothes Minded, to talk about ageism in fashion and beauty, why the word "anti" needs to be retired permanently, and what it actually means to dress from the inside out. In this episode: What it was really like inside Calvin Klein — the black paperclips, white orchids, constantly repainted walls, and why Christine felt like she'd come homeWhy the Love Story portrayal of Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy gets a lot right — and one thing very, very wrongHow leaving a high-powered fashion career, getting married, having twins, and moving cities all within a year forced a complete identity dismantlingWhy fashion becomes manipulative the moment you give it the power to permit you to be someoneThe one word Christine would remove from beauty and fashion marketing forever — and why it's doing more damage than any single product claimWhy women over 50 represent 15 trillion dollars in purchasing power, 95% of household purchases — and still get 5 to 10% of marketing budgetsWhat "age appropriate" dressing has always really meant — and why the turtleneck kept getting higherWhy your style gets sharper, more personal, and more joyful after 50 — and what the industry is terrified of admittingHow fashion and beauty can become tools for feminism — but only when they shift from prescribing to giving women permission to evolveConnect with Christine Morrison:  Instagram: @writinginblackandwhite Website: writinginblackandwhite.com Book — Clothes Minded: Order on AmazonChapters: 01:44 What It Was Really Like Inside Calvin Klein 04:39 Black Paperclips, White Orchids, and a Minimalist Culture She Never Wanted to Leave  07:19 Ryan Murphy Got One Thing Very Wrong About Kate Moss  10:16 Marriage, Twins, a New City — and a Complete Identity Dismantling  14:57 When Fashion Stops Being Expression and Starts Being Manipulation  17:16 The One Word That Needs to Be Removed From Beauty Marketing Forever  21:30 Can Fashion and Beauty Actually Be Tools for Feminism?  24:05 Don't Ask What You Can Change. Ask What You Can Celebrate.  24:39 Where to Find Christine and Clothes Minded  25:20 These Conversations Matter Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    26 min

  4. May 4

    015. Beauty Retail Strategy: What Actually Moves Product Off the Shelf at Sephora and Ulta

    Send me a text 💌 Getting into Sephora or Ulta isn't the finish line — it's the starting gun. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger breaks down what actually moves product off the shelf, why most beauty brands get retail wrong from day one, and what it really takes to build the kind of in-store presence and community strategy that makes a brand impossible to ignore. In this episode: Why most beauty brands aren't profitable for up to three years in retail — and what that means for your launch strategyHow line-switching actually works on the floor, and why your marketing budget won't save you without a field teamThe difference between digital brand education and in-person retail education — and why only one actually drives sell-throughWhat the co-founder of Dibs did by flying to all 50 states in one year — and what that level of commitment signals to buyersWhy in-store ambassadors, cupcakes, and pizza parties outperform most brand marketing strategiesHow Goop turned a free yoga class at Nordstrom into a brand moment nobody forgotThe 2008 recession strategy that generated over a million dollars in home parties — and what it reveals about where your customer actually wants to shopWhy winning in Columbus, Ohio matters more to your retail buyer than winning in Manhattan or LAHow to build micro-communities on a national scale without a rinse-and-repeat playbook01:21 Getting Into Sephora Isn't the Win — Here's the Reality  03:38 The Line Switch: How Your Customer Walks Out With a Competitor's Product  06:00 Digital Education vs. In-Person Education — Only One Actually Works  07:31 Why Donuts Beat Most Brand Marketing Strategies  08:39 What a Goop Yoga Class Teaches Every Beauty Brand About Community  11:26 Why Winning in Columbus, Ohio Matters More Than Winning in Manhattan  13:44 The 2008 Recession Playbook — and the Empty Neiman Marcus That Changed Everything  15:23 $1M in Home Parties, 10% Back to Charity, and What It Taught Her  17:54 Show Up Where They Are — Without Expecting to Sell  18:50 These Conversations Matter Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    19 min

  5. Apr 27

    014. The Wharton Grad Who Rage Quit Wall Street to Build the Beauty Brand the Festival Generation Actually Needs

    Send me a text 💌 Jenny Qian spent three years on Wall Street, rage quit, landed at two of indie beauty's most talked-about startups, and then built a viral TikTok brand out of a personal problem — she just never learned how to do makeup. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger sits down with Jenny, founder of Astrobabe, to talk about skill-level inclusivity, joy as resistance, and why the beauty industry's next frontier isn't skin tone — it's accessibility. In this episode: Why Jenny rage quit Wall Street — and what three years in finance actually gave her as a founderWhat it was like to be one of the first employees at Versed and Merit — and what building from the ground up at both taught her before business schoolThe gap nobody in beauty was talking about: inclusivity of skill level, not just skin toneHow Astrobabe was born out of a personal problem — and why millions of other people had the same oneWhy joy is an act of resistance — and how that shapes every product, every campaign, and every handwritten note Jenny sends with ordersThe TikTok formula Astrobabe cracked: posting twice daily, finding the hook, and why the peel-off moment changes everythingHow a festival collaboration led to a Buffalo Bills partnership — and why live events and female fandom are Astrobabe's next frontierWhat Simone de Beauvoir has to do with clean beauty marketing — and why being the subject of your own life is the most feminist thing you can doWhy female-founded companies outperform — and why they're still only getting 1.3% of venture funding00:29 Meet Jenny Qian — Wharton Grad, Wall Street Refugee, Beauty Founder 01:55 Why Beauty Was Never the Plan — Until It Was 03:04 What She Learned Being One of the First at Versed and Merit 04:36 The Rage Quit Heard Round Wall Street 06:21 The Inclusivity Gap Nobody in Beauty Was Talking About 08:53 Astrobabe as a Love Letter to Her Inner Child 12:17 From Festival Stages to Buffalo Bills Tailgates 16:21 What It Means to Be an API Founder in the Beauty Industry 18:12 Why Astrobabe Isn't in Major Retail Yet — and the Strategy Behind That 19:53 The TikTok Formula That Cracked Virality 22:06 Why She Wrote a Handwritten Note With Every Single Order 24:07 Can Beauty Be a Tool for Feminism? Jenny and Susannah Go There. 28:32 Where to Find Astrobabe — and How to Support Connect with Jenny Qian:  Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jennyyy_bean__  Astrobabe Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hey_astrobabe  Website: https://heyastrobabe.com Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    30 min

  6. Apr 20

    013. The 2026 Beauty Community Playbook: What Actually Builds Loyalty Beyond the Shelf

    Send me a text 💌 Everyone's talking about building community in beauty. Almost nobody is doing it right. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger breaks down exactly what she'd do right now to build real, lasting brand loyalty — from the simplest fix nobody's trying to roller rink parties, farmers markets, and the brand trip model that CocoKind is getting exactly right. In this episode: Why the disappearance of chairs from Sephora and Ulta is costing brands more than they realize — and the stat that proves itWhy strawberry ice cream carts and food crossover activations are table stakes — and what actual community building looks likeCooking classes, book signings, and why your customer in Boston needs something completely different than your customer in LAHow empty mall parking lots could become beauty's most underutilized community assetWhy roller skating nostalgia is the activation nobody has tried yet — and why it would go viralCollege campus pop-ups, Rush week partnerships, and why showing up on a day that matters creates loyalty that lasts decadesThe difference between an audience and a community — and why brands that don't know the difference will never win long-termWhy CocoKind's community brand trips are a best-in-class blueprint every beauty brand should be studyingSusannah's dream for 2026: what happens when a brand trip becomes a mission tripCHAPTERS 01:17 Everyone's Talking About Community. Nobody's Actually Building It.  02:33 Bring Back the Chairs — Seriously  05:54 Why Gimmick Activations Are Table Stakes in 2026  06:29 Cooking Classes Are the New Makeover 07:43 Book Signings by City — and Why Local Always Wins  09:40 Empty Mall Parking Lots Are Beauty's Best Kept Secret  10:13 The Farmers Market Activation Nobody Has Tried  11:26 Why a Roller Rink Party Would Break the Internet  13:11 College Campuses, Rush Week, and Showing Up When It Matters  14:34 Stop Selling at Community Events. Seriously. Stop.  16:54 Audience vs. Community — The Most Important Distinction in Beauty  17:23 Why Most Brand Trips Are Getting It Wrong 19:16 How CocoKind Flipped the Brand Trip Model on Its Head  21:47 What If a Brand Trip Became a Mission Trip?  22:34 These Conversations Matter Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    23 min

  7. Apr 15

    BONUS. Glinda Isn't Coming. The Power Was Always Ours.

    Send me a text 💌 Can beauty be a tool for feminism? It's the question Susannah Dellinger has been asking every guest, every LinkedIn essay, and even Gloria Steinem. In this bonus episode, recorded while traveling, she makes the case that it's completely the wrong question — and proposes the one we should actually be asking instead. Want to go deeper? Read Susannah's full essay on what happened in that room — and what it means for the industry HERE. In this episode: Why "can beauty be a tool for feminism" is the wrong question — and what we should be asking insteadWhy the beauty industry doesn't need outside validation to know it's a powerful force for goodHow the shadow side of beauty — the weaponization, the correction, the "fix yourself" marketing — doesn't define the industry, and never hasWhy beauty as identity is as old as humanity itself — from ancient Egypt to powdered wigs in European courtsWhy telling a 10-year-old girl who loves makeup that she should want to be president instead is its own form of erasureWhy makeup is fine art — and dismissing beauty is dismissing artHow a half-trillion dollar industry is already funding reforestation, neonatal centers, and female empowerment globallyThe Wizard of Oz moment: why Glinda isn't coming — and the power has been ours the entire timeChapters: 00:49 Can Beauty Be a Tool for Feminism? I've Been Asking the Wrong Question.  02:12 Stop Waiting for Permission to Say Beauty Matters  03:31 Yes, the Beauty Industry Has a Shadow Side. Here's How We Hold Both.  04:17 Beauty as Identity — From Ancient Egypt to Now  05:59 It's Not About Equality. It's About Equity.  06:26 Stop Telling Girls Who Love Beauty They Should Want to Be President Instead  06:58 Makeup Is Fine Art. Ask Pat McGrath. Ask Laura Mercier.  08:04 The Question We Should Actually Be Asking  08:35 How a Half-Trillion Dollar Industry Is Already Changing the World  09:27 We're Done Waiting for Outside Validation. The Power Was Always Ours.  10:15 Glinda Isn't Coming. We Have the Power Within Us.  11:38 How Do We Amplify What's Already Happening?  12:05 A Personal Note — and a Rally Cry Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    13 min

  8. Apr 13

    012. Pamela Anderson's Skincare CEO Built Her Career Fixing What Beauty Gets Wrong

    Send me a text 💌 She started a recycling club at 16, launched a clean beauty brand into Sephora, sold out her launch — and nearly went out of business because of it. In this episode, Susannah Dellinger sits down with Kailey Bradt, CEO of Sonsie Skin, to talk about what it actually takes to build differently in beauty — and why the industry's biggest gap isn't innovation, it's access. In this episode: What happened in Gloria Steinem's living room — and what shifted for Kailey walking out of that conversationThe high school recycling drive that filled an entire gymnasium, canceled gym class, and required tractor trailers to clean up — and what it taught her about impactHow Kailey launched Sansci into Sephora in 2021, sold out the launch, couldn't restock fast enough, and got pulled off every marketing calendarWhy the Sephora Accelerate program prepares you for the pitch — but not for what happens after you're inWhat "speaking seven different languages" means in beauty — and why that skill is rarer than any ingredient innovationHow Syndeo was born to give indie brands access to biotech, sustainability, and product development infrastructure they couldn't afford aloneWhat Sonsie Skin is building for women over 40 who are tired of being sold to — and why Pamela Anderson asking every question nobody else would answer changed everythingWhy female founders are still locked out of the funding conversations that matter — and where Kailey sees the next gap to close 01:34 Can Beauty Be a Tool for Feminism? What Gloria Steinem's Living Room Taught Her  04:14 The Recycling Drive That Canceled Gym Class and Changed Everything  06:45 She Sold Out Her Sephora Launch — Then Almost Lost Her Brand  09:37 Why Scientists and Founders Can't Talk to Each Other (And How She Fixed It)  13:24 How Syndeo Is Giving Indie Brands Access to Biotech They Can't Afford  14:42 Building Sonsie Skin for Women Who Are Done Being Sold To  18:07 Is Retail Next? What She Learned the Hard Way About Timing  20:14 Female Founders Are Still Last in Line for Funding — Here's the Data  21:41 Where to Find Kailey CONNECT WITH KAILEY BRADT Instagram: @kaileyraee  Sonsie Skin: SonsieSkin.com | @sonsieskin  Syndeo Accelerate: SyndeoAccelerate.com | @syndeoaccelerate Off the Shelf is a podcast about the people, brands, and behind-the-scenes forces shaping the beauty industry — money, relationships, risk, and what it really takes to scale. CONNECT WITH SUSANNAH Instagram: @brightbeautyconnect LinkedIn: linkedin.com/susannah-dellinger

    22 min
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About

Beauty is a $650 billion global industry — and it's still largely misunderstood. Off the Shelf with Susannah Dellinger goes beyond the product and into the power: the economics, the culture, the relationships, and the decisions that shape who wins and who doesn't. For beauty founders, executives, and anyone who knows this industry is worth taking seriously.

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