Makeup by Mario has come a long way since it started in the teeth of this epidemic.
“The first thing I really think about is scrappiness,” said founder Mario Dedivanovic of the start-up days, when he spoke with Jenny B. Fine, editor-in-chief of Beauty Inc, at the LA Beauty conference. “We were in a bad situation that you can’t imagine. A situation that I don’t want to experience again. I’m a very conservative person. I come from very humble beginnings, so I can bear it, right? But at that time, there were no traditional playbooks, so we had to be very careful about where we distributed resources.”
With a 22-piece collection about to launch exclusively at Sephora, the small but mighty team based out of a tiny WeWork room is set to do a lot of work themselves.
“I just remember when we gathered a team and put a light box in a small room, and we literally created Master Mattes palettes ourselves and took photos of ourselves, and it was the material that we used throughout Sephora, on makeupbymario.com for maybe two years,” said Dedivanovic. “But when I think back on that time, I think the constraints we were under were good, because they forced us to be creative and focus on solving the problem.”
When the brand launched exclusively at Sephora, Dedivanovic, a former Sephora salesperson, credited her former beauty colleagues for the rise in brick-and-mortar sales at a time when most people were not going out.
“I’ll never forget Sephora contacting us and saying, ‘You guys are in a brick and mortar, and we don’t know why.’ It turned out that it was all the beauty consultants across North America who were actually buying the entire product. They were my people, because I was one of them,” he said.
Almost six years later, the brand continues to go from strength to strength and expand internationally with Sephora. “The brand has evolved, but we are always based on our core values, which are education, art, translating my methods into the products we make,” said Dedivanovic.
Her advice to win over the seller is still in its army of beauty consultants. “Never underestimate the power of a beauty consultant,” she said.
As for focusing on art when he has so many other jobs like running a business and hosting master classes, it’s always primary.
Dedivanovic said: “I will always be doing my art. “But for me, it’s about being disciplined about where I direct my time and especially my energy, and for the past few years, it’s been about makeup and my name,” she continued.
“So working with art, creating a product, working with product development teams, with art teams, that’s where I had to put my energy,” said Dedivanovic. As for outdoor makeup artistry, I’ll still do it once in a blue moon, but more often than not because I miss my clients properly.
He sees his role in the business as leading and shaping the business, rather than an operation. “I have an incredibly talented leadership team that is doing an amazing job operationally. I am very focused on building the brand DNA and protecting it as we scale and grow, carving out that brand DNA.”
In 2024, the brand has hired bankers to evaluate sales options. Asked for an update, Dedivanovic said: “We are a growing brand, and we are always exploring opportunities and options.”
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