What inspired you to create Glow + Flow Beauty and how did your background in luxury and fashion influence this venture?

Black women deserve better.  Beauty Supply stores are such a staple and cultural icon in our communities.  However, we have been plagued with stores that are dirty, bad customer service and environments that make us devalued for the amount of money that we spend on beauty and hair care products.  Black women deserve to be respected as the valuable consumers that we are and we should not have to leave our own neighborhoods to find this.  Glow + Flow is a place where black women can feel at home and that is what Glow + Flow Beauty is about.

Can you share some of the unique elements or features that make Glow + Flow Beauty stand out from other beauty supply stores?

Some of the special features of Glow + Flow Beauty include:

+ Photo Content Studios

+ Champagne Bar

+ Small Cafe

+ Loyalty Rewards Program that has given back over $100k in discounts

+ Awards for local unsung heroes that are the backbone of our neighborhoods

+ Training for young black girls to help them understand how a career in beauty can be developed and nurtured with us.

+ An opportunity for black beauty founders to find shelf space for their products.

What challenges did you face when entering the beauty retail space, and how did you overcome them?

 

Capital and cash flow.  It is a huge undertaking to launch a national product and requires so much capital, hard work and good luck.  We are still currently self-funded and juggling all of our responsibilities to make it all work and create something magical.

 

How did your recent launch of SLAYYY Hair contribute to the expansion of your brand and what has the response been like from national retailers such as TJ Maxx and Marshalls?

The launch of SLAYYY Hair cemented our entry into the industry as Beauty Founders.  We started developing SLAYYY during Covid when all of the salons were closed and my hair was a wreck, so I wore braids consistently.  The itching, scalp irritation, and scabbing were unbearable and I wondered, “why are black women so conditioned to suffer in silence?”  I could not understand why braiding hair was so popular, yet none of the manufacturers had done anything to address the problems.  That’s when I realized it was a white space in beauty.  My frustration turned to anger and that is how SLAYYY Hair was born.

We entered T.J. Maxx and Marshalls as their first textured hair product and they have been great partners.  As a new product category, they have been very supportive of our brand and have increased their orders and our footprint with every order.  Our customers are thrilled because we created a special 6-pack exclusively for these stores so our customers get a better value when they find it in one of their stores.  We are now in the process of expanding the SLAYYY product line thanks to this partnership and will be releasing new SLAYYY products in the Fall through their stores.

 

The launch of Glow + Flow was a week-long extravaganza with master classes and collaborations. What can customers can expect from the new Glow + Flow Beauty location?

 

+ A Champagne Bar – We offer champagne, sparkling and flat water to all of our customers as they come in for their beauty needs.  Glow + Flow has become a staple in the community and our customers are not rushing to get in and get out.  We find that they are hanging out a bit longer with us.

 

+ We also designed this location to be more like a content studio so there are lots of Instagrammable moments throughout the store that gets our customers excited.

 

+ I am a 90’s baby so our customers are also discovering lyrics from 90’s hip hop artists that have been edited to represent beauty throughout the space.

 

+ We are preparing to BETA test a small cafe as well.  We are still in the process of obtaining our Food & Beverage permit but will be offering salads, sandwiches and light snacks in the near future.

 

+ We have introduced the SLAYYY Braid Bar and have two SLAYYY Certified Braiders that service their customers within our location.  They book their own appointments but we love being able to offer this convenient service to our customers as well.

 

How does Glow + Flow Beauty support and celebrate black and brown communities through its product offerings and store environment?

Glow + Flow Beauty was created as a place where black women can feel at home.  We are black, loud, and proud and we want black women to know that when they visit our stores, they are coming home. We offer these women assistance, dignity, and love as they shop for their beauty products.

Can you elaborate on the concept of “a fantasy fun factory” that Glow + Flow Beauty embodies and how this vision translates into the shopping experience?

Glow + Flow offers great beauty products in an environment that values women, their business, and their well-being.  Glow + Flow’s luxurious store design offers a fantasy feel for customers making the shopping experience fun, enjoyable and memorable. 

 

What are your future plans for expanding Glow + Flow Beauty, and how do you envision the brand evolving over the next few years?

 

We are already searching for our 3rd location and are working to secure four locations in Southern California and then expand to other states both by corporate ownership of these locations as well as through Franchising.  Our vision for Glow + Flow Beauty is to also be a business opportunity for black women to own their own retail locations so that we can start taking back the community that WE built.

 

What do you want your legacy to be?

I want people to remember me as someone who was always about the business of black women.  I am a champion for us and I want people to know that I was a voice and a force for US.  We deserve so much more respect than we naturally get in beauty as consumers, so I need to build an empowering brand that help change the trajectory of business ownership in our communities.  As the great poet Jay Z said, “…over here, we measure success by how many people are successful next to you.  Here we say you’re broke if everybody is broke except for you!”

How can readers connect with you? 

Instagram @diannvalentine