The beauty executive-to-investor pipeline is bursting.

A week ago, Jane Lauder, the former president of Clinique who spent three decades at Estée Lauder, the company founded by her grandmother, announced she’s starting TAW Ventures, a firm investing in pet health, wellness and longevity startups that’s named for her Goldendoodle Thaddeus Alistair Warsh. Lauder’s announcement follows Vasiliki Petrou, former CEO of Unilever’s prestige division, forming Veralis Group, an advisory and investment firm aiming to take significant stakes in founder-led brands.

On LinkedIn, Kristin Odegaard, former head of U.S. merchandising strategy and business development at Sephora, revealed she established Kajro Ventures, an early-stage fund focused on differentiated and innovative consumer brands, last year. Debra Perelman, former CEO of Revlon, joined InviNext Growth Partners as managing partner in March.

In 2021, Moj Mahdara, ex-CEO of Beautycon Media, founded Kinship Ventures with Gwyneth Paltrow, and Michel Brousset, former president of L’Oréal USA, opened Waldencast Ventures in 2019 to back emerging beauty and wellness companies before the broader Waldencast platform, owner of Milk Makeup and Obagi, launched in 2022.

InviNext Growth Partners

Debra Perelman

Plenty of beauty brand founders have jumped to the other side of the pitch, too, often after brand exits. Nancy Twine, founder of Briogeo; Carisa Janes, founder of Hourglass; Nikki Eslami, co-founder of Bellami; Laura Lisowski Cox, co-founder of Oars + Alps; Ju Rhyu, co-founder of Hero Cosmetics; Huda Kattan, co-founder of Huda Beauty; Jaime Schmidt, founder of Schmidt’s; and Monique Rodriguez, co-founder of Mielle Organics, who’s planning to launch a venture fund, are among them.

While operationally talented, unlike beauty entrepreneurs, many beauty executives haven’t built brands from the ground up, at least not without substantial corporate support. And a bit like actors and influencers trying to become beauty brand founders, the skills that helped executives rise at beauty and retail corporations don’t necessarily guarantee success as investors. Still, as seasoned beauty executives look to their next chapters, transitions to the investor class will undoubtedly accelerate.

To explore the beauty C-suite-to-VC phenomenon, for the latest edition of our ongoing series posing questions relevant to the beauty industry, we asked seven beauty investors and entrepreneurs the following: What should beauty executives know about what it takes to get a fund off the ground? How do you view the role of investor as distinct from the role of executive? What are your predictions about the future of the executive- and entrepreneur-to-investor pipeline?

In terms of a traditional fund, launching a first-time fund can be challenging, regardless of background. Traditional LPs tend to back managers with proven, repeatable track records. While a strong success story as an industry executive carries weight, most LPs also want to see evidence of discipline, process, portfolio construction skills and track record. To address this, many executives opt to partner with a seasoned investor.

Regardless, fundraising can take much longer than one expects based on market conditions and level of diligence required by LPs. Because of this, many executives and founders are opting instead to invest their own capital or raise money on a deal-by-deal basis from their personal networks. This still requires a clear thesis and a disciplined process, but it is far less rigorous than raising from institutional LPs.

The key to success in any model is deal flow. One of the greatest advantages beauty executives have is access. Their networks and industry insight often give them early visibility into emerging brands and category shifts that most traditional investors can’t easily replicate. Also, for founders, there is a sense of confidence in partnering with an investor who has sat in their seat, someone who brings not only capital, but firsthand operational experience and a deep understanding of what it takes to build and scale a brand.

Executives and investors play complementary yet distinct roles in building and scaling companies. Both are focused on value creation, strategic growth and leadership, but they typically approach these objectives from different vantage points. Executives are deeply involved in the day-to-day translating vision into execution, leading teams, driving performance and optimizing operations. Investors, by contrast, operate with greater altitude.

The focus shifts from managing a single business to managing a number of investments, requiring the ability to recognize patterns across companies, evaluate risk and opportunity with objectivity, and think in terms of long-term value creation. Of course, this also demands the financial acumen to structure investments, manage risk and allocate capital effectively across a portfolio.

An investor’s role is not to run the company, but to identify and empower the right leaders to do so. The best investors act as strategic partners guiding founders and management teams through inflection points, supporting sound decision-making and stepping in when an investment requires course correction.

An executive-turned-investor ideally brings the empathy and operational understanding that come from having built and led teams firsthand as well as the objectivity and strategic distance required to evaluate opportunities and guide growth at scale. This blend of experience allows them to connect more deeply with founders while maintaining the discipline to challenge assumptions and protect long-term value creation.

I think we will continue to see more executives and founders transition into investing. The most successful models will combine deep operating expertise with disciplined investment acumen. The marriage of these two skill sets creates a distinct competitive edge. Capital alone is no longer a differentiator. Founders want partners who truly understand how to build a brand and can add value beyond funding. They are looking for hands-on strategic guidance rooted in real-world experience.

A lot of beauty executives see investing, especially after a successful exit or long career, as a kind of victory lap. The thinking goes, “I did the hard work as a founder, now I’ll just deploy some capital and help the next generation.” But starting a real fund, not just angel investing, is building a business all over again.

You have to find the right partners, build diligence processes, fundraise, manage investor relations, establish reporting, and define and differentiate your thesis. Most underestimate how operational it really is. The backend isn’t glamorous, but it’s what separates a real fund from a hobby.

The biggest difference is knowing when to walk away. That was always difficult for me early in my VC career. Operators are wired to keep a company alive at all costs, to find a way through, pay vendors, keep shelves stocked.

Investors can’t behave that way. Portfolio management requires detachment and focus. You double down on the few positions that can materially move returns and let go of the ones that won’t. That discipline runs counter to an operator’s instinct, but it’s essential if you’re managing capital responsibly.

The biggest differentiator for these new investors will be the operational depth they can bring to founders. Founders have always wanted investors who understand manufacturing, supply chain, claims, regulation, distribution, not just people who write checks. But many of these executives-turned-investors won’t be leading deals right away because they’re not as comfortable with structure and terms. Until they get that experience, they’ll have an edge on operations, but won’t yet be winning deals over traditional VCs or mid-market PE.

Over time, as they combine real operating depth with financial sophistication, you’ll see the next generation of standout beauty investors emerge. We are building toward that future, investing in and acquiring brands with both sides of that expertise in mind.

I actually started my first fund back in 2014/2015 with three other operators. It wasn’t beauty-focused —it leaned more into apparel—but the experience of raising a first-time fund is the same across categories. And I’ll say this plainly: It was really hard, even then when early-stage consumer investing was far less crowded than it is today.

Fast forward to now, and the landscape is meaningfully more saturated. There are many groups whose sole purpose is to invest in early-stage consumer brands. So, for any beauty executive considering the move into venture, the first question I’d ask is: What space are you uniquely occupying?

Category experience alone is no longer a differentiator, it’s simply the starting point. The real distinction is in the specific ways you can be helpful. What doors do you open that others can’t? What patterns can you see earlier? What calls do founders make to you first?

A lot of early-stage investors describe themselves as “hands-on” and “value-add,” but founders know very quickly who is actually in the trenches with them. The work requires showing up when the situation is murky and momentum is fragile, not just when things are going well.

It’s also important to understand that the investor role is structurally different from the executive role. As an executive, even at the highest levels, you are operating inside an existing system with teams, budgets, structure, etc. As an investor, you’re stepping into a dynamic where third-party capital is involved, where fiduciary responsibilities and governance considerations exist, and where alignment of interests may not always be perfect.

You may not hold those responsibilities directly unless you’re on the board, but you’re now operating within the ecosystem where those forces are present. If you haven’t previously interfaced with investors or boards, that can feel new.

What I love most about early-stage beauty investing is how collaborative the ecosystem can be. I invest alongside other institutional funds frequently, and I value the differentiated expertise others bring. For example, I invested in Everist in early 2023. By year-end, I became an advisor, and in 2024 made the introduction to Sandbridge, who ultimately led the series A.

They brought in Kristin Odegaard, whose depth in merchandising and retail acceleration has been incredibly valuable as the brand scales. That is precisely the kind of complementary skill set that strengthens a cap table. The best investor groups aren’t collections of identical profiles, they are mosaics.

And, yes, this work can be financially rewarding, but it is also long tail and high variance. Some outcomes take years. Some never materialize. I’ve celebrated meaningful exits, and I’ve also lived through the long, slow middle. I suspect we will see many executives and founders move into investing in the coming years. The ones who stay will be the ones who genuinely love building alongside founders and not just the idea of identifying “what’s next.”

So, my prediction is this: the pipeline of operators, founders and executives moving into investing will continue to grow, and I think that’s a net positive. But the ones who thrive will be those with a clear point of view, real value to contribute and the willingness to remain present in the uncertain chapters long before the narrative is polished enough to be told.

Early-stage investing is ultimately not just about deploying capital. It’s about conviction, endurance and the willingness to sit in the messy middle while something great is still being formed.

Outside of the corporate governance and reporting structures attached to a fund, launching a fund is entrepreneurial, not corporate. It requires building a playbook from scratch just like founding a company. There’s no established infrastructure, no guaranteed deal flow, and no team running diligence for you.

You’re raising capital on vision, assembling a complementary team that can build alongside you in an imperfect system and validating investment ideas through real-time market reactions rather than traditional focus groups. It demands making high-conviction decisions with incomplete information.

The executives who excel in venture will embrace founder-style agility, leaning into risk with conviction, pivoting when needed, accepting imperfect systems and teams, and developing their own perspective on white space long before any focus group or corporate template would validate it.

Corporate executives optimize what exists, investors bet on what doesn’t yet exist. The role of investor is fundamentally different from that of a corporate executive. Executives optimize what already works, using proven models and generally relying on data, resources, large budgets and established systems to drive performance and scale within an already established network of channels.

Investors operate at the opposite end of the spectrum, evaluating unproven ideas, backing founders before traction and navigating risk without the safety net of certainty. It’s not about operational mastery, it’s about pattern recognition, emotional intelligence and the ability to support founders as they pivot, test and build in real time. The investor lens is fundamentally forward-looking and possibility-driven, not always process-driven.

In early-stage venture, judgment and instinct matter as much as analysis. You’re assessing a founder’s vision, drive, passion and expertise—their why—and whether they can inspire others to join them, from top-tier talent to early capital partners. You’re looking at how they think and move, their ability to navigate ambiguity and whether they can carry a category forward rather than simply fit into one.

Investors aren’t there to run the operation, they’re there to steady the founder, sharpen the strategy and empower/help them build the systems that don’t exist yet in the zero-to-one stage. It’s less about directing and more about supporting, challenging and unlocking as much potential as possible.

The next wave of investors will be those who think and operate more like founders. The transition from operator or founder to investor will continue to accelerate, especially as entrepreneurship becomes a more widely embraced career path, but the individuals who excel will be those who can recognize white space early and act on it with conviction.

Corporate deal flow is largely reactive. Opportunities surface once a brand has scaled, risk has diminished and data supports a move. In early-stage venture, the opposite is true: You win by identifying unmet needs before the market validates them, spotting emerging shifts in consumer behavior and backing founders early, when the signals are still faint.

The next generation of standout investors will be those who are comfortable navigating ambiguity and taking calculated risks long before a category becomes obvious to larger players. Those who bring a founder-first lens and the conviction to move early will have a real edge in this next chapter.

And, importantly, the investors who truly support their founders, not just with capital, but with perspective, clarity and steadiness will be the ones who see the strongest outcomes. When founders are genuinely supported as people (not just operators or “business deals”), they stay healthy, passionate and resilient, grounded through the hard moments, able to make sharper calls and keep the business moving forward. That’s what ultimately protects the investment and unlocks the real upside.

Getting a fund off of the ground is an enormous undertaking. This is particularly true in the consumer space today, when LP dollars are highly concentrated in established megafunds and tend to be more focused on technology investments, especially in AI.

In this group of talented, experienced individuals that you mention, some will undoubtedly have access to private investor capital such as family offices through their networks, which may be more available to these types of funds compared to traditional allocator capital. Even so, building a true institutional investment firm is a multi-decade commitment, in my opinion. Being an emerging manager is extremely challenging, and one must know what they are getting into.

I think that being an emerging manager is completely different from being a corporate executive. Both are hard work, to be sure! But the typical emerging manager in consumer brands is scrappy and pulled in a zillion directions every day. Resources are limited, and the manager is doing a range of important tasks themself.

I am sure that some of the individuals that you mention will be able to tap into resources (for example, financial and operational support) that the typical emerging manager does not have the means to access. That will lighten the load meaningfully, but it’s still a huge amount of work if one is building an institutional quality firm.

My biggest concern on this topic is unrelated to the professional backgrounds of the investors who are launching these funds. It’s the simple fact that, as an ecosystem, we need to develop more paths to exit for brands in order for all of this investment capital to make sense.

I say this from a place of humility. I love being an investor, and I am incredibly honored to have been an early investor in many outstanding brands. But today there is a massive imbalance between the supply of great brands and the demand from acquirors. This is unsustainable, in my opinion. I hope that some of these talented individuals will help our industry to explore and develop new structures (for example, hold cos) to create a healthier ecosystem.

Rachel ten Brink Co-Founder and General Partner, Red Bike Capital

Moving from executive to investor feels natural, but requires a real mindset shift. As an operator, you are used to driving outcomes directly and getting quick feedback. As an investor, your role is to identify outlier founders, to guide and support rather than control. Ultimate feedback is DPI (dollars to paid-in capital), which could take years to prove out.

Launching a fund is not just about access to capital. It is critical to get the five S’s right: source, secure, select, support and sell. You need to build trust and have the discipline to focus your energy where you can create lasting value. Fund management is building a complex business, one that requires patience and relationship-building, as well as financial acumen.

Beauty executives bring strong brand instincts, network and deep operational experience. The challenge lies in seeing early-stage potential beyond your own experience and showing LPs that operational insight can be a true source of alpha.

There are two major roles as an investor: Find LPs trusting you to invest their money for the seven to 10 years to come and have the relevant pipeline. All the people you mentioned have their own network, and when younger potential venture capitalists ask me, I mention that being the CEO of a billion-dollar global brand with a P&L helped me tremendously, to be fair.

As an operator, you can add skills to the investment and help founders build their companies. The market is evolving so fast, though, and you need to be learning for life. As a VC, having developed products, managed a brand, understood data and its value and retail in different formats, that’s a unique help for founders. Too many VCs come from financial backgrounds in the beauty space with no clue about what is a healthy business and a virtuous circle to grow and have a path toward positive EBITDA.

Many “VC wannabes” underestimate the first part. Having two partners can help raise a fund with different communities and superpowers. The agenda of an investor is different from the agenda of an executive at a corporation.

As a VC, your schedule is closer to the one of an entrepreneur. You have periods where you raise your fund, then when you invest the capital, take care of your founders, and report to your LPs with annual meetings and steercos and prepare for the next fund after a few years. By comparison, an executive has a yearly schedule that depends on the executive team and CEO, and, of course, meetings planned very much in advance such as those involving the marketing plan, budget, retailers and travel.

We need more operators, especially at seed stage! It’s good news for the industry and pretty much what we initiated in 2019 when creating Fab Ventures, with already some successful exits as early investors like K18.

*If you have a question you’d like Beauty Independent to ask beauty investors and entrepreneurs, please send it to editor@beautyindependent.com. *