Julian Addo, founder of Adwoa Beauty, looked to address an unmet need within the clean hair care category when she launched Adwoa Beauty in 2017. Here, the Beauty Creators Awards Ambassador spoke with CEW Beauty News about her brand’s latest launch, her thoughts on the current state of the clean hair care category, and upcoming plans for Adwoa Beauty.

Adwoa Beauty, the five-year-old clean hair care line, entered the beauty scene in October 2017 on a mission to redefine what clean hair care means to consumers. With scalp care as the backbone of the brand’s ethos, founder Julian Addo proved she was ahead of the industry in terms of treating hair care as skin care.

“We always try to focus on a problem,” said Julian on what it takes to create new products for her line. “It’s naturally built into our brand ethos, as we focus on scalp care. All our formulations focus on a healthy scalp with antibacterial and antifungal ingredients. Our Baomint collection has mint oils and pumpkin seed oils, which are dihydrotestosterone (DHT) blockers that prevent hair loss. Our ingredients aren’t used just because they’re natural, but because they make the formulas super effective, and we lead with a scalp-first approach.”

In the long run, Julian wants to expand into more categories, such as skin care and body care. “We want to go in many different segments. We’re Adwoa Beauty, not Adwoa Hair Care. So, we definitely want to add other key beauty items to our brand.”

Thanks to $80,000 of her own money, Julian was able to launch her brand. She remains self-funded and counts as one of her biggest accomplishments landing her 11-item line in Sephora, which happened in May 2020. The brand is sold in more than 450 Sephora locations in the U.S., as well as on their website. This fall she will launch another item, one specifically formulated for consumers with fine hair.

“We have really new products which I’m super excited about, catered to more of our fine-haired girls and boys,” Julian hinted. “It’s juicy and yummy is all that I can say.”

In the meantime, Adwoa Beauty is focusing efforts on its social media campaigns and adding more in-store support across multiple Sephora locations.

“We’re working on an enhanced influencer strategy to add more brand awareness and visibility and beef up our in-store support. With Sephora, we’re adding sales representative training in about 100 doors [starting in fall 2022] on a regular basis to provide more customer support. So, I’m looking forward to all the action, seeing how it benefits the brand, and making us more of a household brand than we are today,” Julian said.

Commenting on the current state of the clean hair care category, Julian said that she felt the industry was headed in the right direction.

“You have brands like Adwoa Beauty now on a prestige stage at Sephora. I’m really liking where it’s going and it’s only growing… I like that hair is having a moment right now, I think it’s the right time. I anticipate it [the clean hair care business] getting bigger and less niche.”