Usually, the reaction to face blemishes is to cover them up or make them disappear.Starfacewent against the grain, building a successful business that aims tohighlightimperfections, not hide them. The brand’s popular star-shaped acne treatment patches make a fashion statement on the faces of customers everywhere.
Since launching in 2019, Starface has sold more than 77 million acne stars to date. That’s 49 sold every minute! One of the ways the brand scaled so quickly is throughpartnershipswith properties like Hello Kitty and SpongeBob SquarePants, allowing Starface to reach new customers and change their skin care attitudes.
Kara Brothers, president of Starface, shares how these incredible partnerships came to be, and how integral team culture and positive work environment are to the company’s success.
Defining communications styles and tools
Kara was the seventh employee to join the team, and at the time, Starface had already foundproduct-market fit, but the company was still missing something.
The internal organization was so new and fresh, Kara explains, that it was her responsibility to define the company’s communication styles. “What that means was bringing out some very bare bones communications practices, so things like all-hands [meetings], Slack, Dropbox, and Google Drive,” Kara says.
Her overall priority was clear from day one—to organize a set of systems to make everyone’s job a little bit easier.
Hiring intentionally
Finding people with strong communication skills is vital to the continued success of Starface. Kara has found it best to hire slowly and intentionally, with yourcompany’s valuestop of mind.
Kara asks a lot of tough questions during the hiring process to ensure she’s selecting the best candidate for the job: How do you manage teams? How do you like to be managed? How do you work well with peers? How do you work through disagreements?
This intentionality results in her employees staying with her for longer periods of time, and reaching their goals quicker and with less stress.
Embracing transparency
In many workplaces, it’s common for staff to guess what their leaders and peers are thinking, and what their goals are. This adds a lot of unnecessary anxiety.
Kara leads with transparency so people can feel at peace and understand what’s being asked of them at all times. “As much as possible I try to speak the truth and the facts as they stand today, reiterate goals, explain why certain decisions are made, where we need to be, where we aren’t right now, and that helps provide context for a lot of the decisions,” Kara says.
When her team is on the same page as her, they feel better—and ultimately perform better too.
Having a clear vision others can follow
Approachability and playfulness are two of Starface’s core values that determine the right partnerships for the brand. “You can’t get a more iconic character who exudes those same values as Hello Kitty,” Kara says. Because of this alignment, the process to create a product with Hello Kitty parent company Sanrio was a huge success.
“To have a clear vision, it takes a lot of daily intentionality even going into specific projects or meetings, [so you can] keep your core values in mind,” Kara says. But the payoff is worth it every time. Because the Starface community loved the Hello Kitty collaboration, the team was inspired to partner with other playful characters, like those fromSesame Street.
Asking for support in order to lead fearlessly
Kara doesn’t shy away from asking for help. “Whether it’s paid help through career coaches or reaching out to someone I admire on LinkedIn, building that community of people who are there for [me] has been really helpful,” Kara says.
In order to lead the company as best she can, Kara continues to dedicate her time to furthering her leadership skills and learning new techniques from othersuccessful entrepreneursshe admires.
Creating a product that stands out is amazing, but giving your team the tools to market and sell your products can be the thing that takes your business to the next level. No company can thrive without a healthy and happy team of employees. And, finding ways to grow as a leader and a collaborator will help you not only grow and expand your brand awareness over time, but alsogenerate more salesand revenue.
Listen to the fullShopify Mastersepisode to discover more details on Kara’s team-building strategies, and different ways you can guide your company to success.