FAB Austin. A new place to be for Beauty Founders. 2024 Perspectives.
LEARNINGS FROM A FAST-MOVING ECOSYSTEM.
“Austin Texas. One month, including the SXSW conference, is not enough to discover the fast-moving ecosystem. Still so happy to make it and thrilled to have hosted the second 2024 FaB meeting here with Shaz Rajashekar and Kiku Chaudhuri, the founders of Shaz and Kiku. Let’s share the takeaway of our meeting and some information about some of our guests participating in “the Founders and VCs ‘conversation”. Odile Roujol founder of FaB community.
AUSTIN:
“We are really excited to be a part of the burgeoning number of Austin-based beauty brands. Austin has always been more of a tech startup city, but we’ve started to see more and more CPGand beauty companies and investors in recent years — and have started to form more of a tighter community. This Austin FaB meetup was a perfect example of this and we were thrilled at the opportunity to see some old friends as well as be connected to some new ones!” Shaz
“At SHAZ & KIKS, we are also incredibly lucky to be able to build our supply chain and operational ecosystem within Texas — almost all of our partners and vendors are here in Texas and it makes for a much stronger partnership when we can have that in-person regular touch point.” Kiku
A FEW PEOPLE COMING FROM the BAY AREA and LOS ANGELES:
And Austin treats them well!
In Miami, we were impressed by the number of founders and VCs coming from California, but mostly from NYC close to Florida, or successful international founders wanting to lower their taxes.
Here in Austin, let’s be clear: there are a lot of LPs. Meaning people investing in the funds. There are PEs, family offices, and wealthy individuals enjoying life in the city.
It’s a healthy ecosystem, with new tech companies accepting employees to work remotely and the big platforms (Google has big offices downtown).
Coming from the Bay Area as a pioneer in Austin, we were excited to see in person Kathryn Cavanaugh, CapStar, an iconic investor in companies such as SuperCircle (closed loop supply chain), and ThirteenLune (the BIPOC brand’s destination);- I’m a proud investor too! -, and Bravo Sierra.
Coming from L.A. after a few years in San Francisco, our friend Alexa Binns, ex-VC in consumer tech (Halogen Ventures), is now co-hosting a fab podcast, guest speakers being investors. Don’t miss their latest episodes, whether you are an emerging fund or a founder trying to catch the trends for the coming years and new rules for funding.
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/swimming-with-allocators/id1713183207
A FEW HOT SPOTS IN AUSTIN:
South Market, of course, has vintage clothes stores, all D2C brands (All Birds, Warby Parker…), and even Hermes luxury brand.
MORE ABOUT SHAZ AND KIKS:
Odile Roujol is a proud investor in the company, and their products are now available at Sephora.
Shaz and Kiku are sisters and co-founders of SHAZ & KIKS, a hair wellness brand building foundational hair health with high-performing formulas rooted in Ayurveda.
“We spent our childhood summers in the lush, green foothills of the Himalayas in India, where we learned how to holistically take care of our hair by harnessing the powers of the natural ingredients indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. Ancient rituals passed down by generations of Indian women, rooted in Ayurveda, the world’s oldest holistic healing system. As we got older we had less access to these ingredients and handmade products, and we realized how much we missed them and how much our hair needed them. Kiku loved the power and history of Ayurvedic rituals, and Shaz wanted to modernize them. With Kiku’s passion for tradition and Shaz’s eye for innovation, we created SHAZ & KIKS, to celebrate our roots and create Ayurvedic haircare for all.”
“”We launched in 2020 on our own DTC channel with our first product as more as a proof of concept and were surprised and delighted at the level of interest from a diverse group of customers, high repeat purchase rate, incredible community engagement and organic love from the media. That provided us the confidence that there was a market opportunity there and we continued to develop an create this market and launch new products — the seventh product will be launched this year. Last year was also a big milestone for us as we launched in Sephora and started to grow the team.” Shaz and Kiku
Prior to SHAZ & KIKS, Kiku worked in the tech and media industries for 10+ years, leading digital strategy across Conde Nast brands such as Vogue and GQ. Shaz is a chemical engineer by trade and after getting her MBA, has worked in corporate strategy, product innovation, and general management for Fortune 500 companies in diverse geographies and industries, including consumer goods and medical devices for 20+ years.
https://www.shazandkiks.com/pages/our-story
MORE ABOUT FAB (Fashion and Beautytech) COMMUNITY:
We founded the movement in 2018 in San Francisco. We are about sustainable fashion, conscious beauty, and new commerce. Purpose and data-driven founders and VCs.
There are now 19 chapters and cities, in America, Latam, Europe, Asia, and Africa! We have 3900 subscribers, founders, s. It’s free, and we publish it quarterly. We believe in the pay-it-forward culture; join the next meetings and expand your network!
Next meeting? February 19th in San Francisco! With Chloe Takahashi, Elsa Jungman PhD, and Anastasia Bezrukova, founders in the beauty and wellness space. Don’t forget to subscribe to the newsletter to have access to the takeaway!
MORE ABOUT FAB CO-CREATION VENTURES:
Because what we miss is the ecosystem, it’s more seed stage funds to help grow companies from 0 to 100.
Odile Roujol founder of the FaB community, lives in Los Angeles, after many years in San Francisco.
And as she’s French, she loves multicultural leaders, and tries to support founders with introductions and insights when not able to invest. Let’s keep in touch! Fund II is now actively investing.
https://www.fabcocreationstudio.com/
Thank you all, talk to you soon!
Odile, Shaz and Kiku.
