After nearly eight years as CEO, Berkowitz is “semi-retiring,” she said, but will also transition into an advisory role at Famille C, the Courtin-Clarins family’s investment firm and majority owner of Ilia Beauty. Berkowitz has been key to the clean beauty brand’s growth, helping Ilia Beauty scale from $2 million to $200 million in revenue.
“Ilia’s moments of greatest growth were when we went against the norms of the industry and followed the pathway of the brand DNA,” said Berkowitz.
They released a sheer coverage product at a time when full-face makeup was the craze, for example. “It was completely unexpected, and I would say the retail partners were a little apprehensive, because it wasn’t part of the trend,” she went on.
That product would end up being Ilia Beauty’s hero, the Super Serum Skin Tint, which helped the brand triple sales early on.
Sasha Plavsic and Lynda Berkowitz
Founder Sasha Plavsic’s mission from the start when she launched Ilia Beauty in Laguna Beach in 2011 was to formulate products that were gentle for the skin but provided long-term benefits, with “clean” ingredients fusing makeup and skin care and sustainability in mind. With Berkowitz as CEO, the company grew nationally in the U.S. and in Canada (where Plavsic is originally from), with Sephora as partner. The brand, which recently launched at Ulta Beauty, is found internationally in the U.K., France, Australia and New Zealand, and looks to continue to expand with Schiraldi at the helm.
“The best decision I ever made was to actually bring on a CEO when we were only at a few million in revenue and pass that title over to somebody who was a true operator,” Plavsic said of Berkowitz. “Lynda is very strong in North America with Sephora and Ulta, and she comes from a sales background. Paul has a lot of strength in understanding international, and he also has strength in North America with the retailers, especially Ulta, but I think it will bring a different perspective to the brand that is probably needed at this time.”
Schiraldi, who has more than 20 years of experience in beauty, most recently served as CEO of Murad under Unilever Prestige.
“The fact that the brand still has so much white space internationally I think is super interesting,” Schiraldi said.
His focus is on the brand’s recent launch into the Middle East. When it comes to future expansion, it comes down to “understanding how the brand translates internationally, understanding how you leverage the core market and the strengths that have been built on the success in the U.S. and North America,” he said. “Given the success that the brand has had in the U.S. and given the clean beauty positioning and the products, I think there’s so much opportunity internationally. I’m really looking forward to diving into that and understanding how to build that out as we go forward.”
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