WHERE BRAINS MEET BEAUTY

For Dr. Marnie Nussbaum, becoming a dermatologist traces back to childhood. After losing her grandfather to melanoma and later seeing melanoma affect both her mother and husband, she developed an early fascination with medicine, science and skin health. But her career took an unexpected turn during dermatology residency, when cosmetic dermatology was still dismissed by many in academic medicine as frivolous. Marnie saw something different. She recognized aesthetics as an emerging area of innovation, sought out conferences and education on her own, and eventually went from being discouraged from studying cosmetics to teaching it at Cornell.Marnie joins Jodi and co-host Dawn Hilarczyk, COO of Borghese, for a conversation about the intersection of beauty, medicine and confidence. She explains why her approach to aesthetics is not about telling patients what is “wrong” with them, but helping them look on the outside the way they feel on the inside. That same philosophy eventually led her from physician to entrepreneur. During COVID, Marnie saw patients overwhelmed by complicated routines and bags filled with skincare products, so she taught herself the fundamentals of business, developed a plan and launched Dr. Marnie Skincare around a simpler idea: consumers do not necessarily need more products, they need better, more effective ones.The conversation gets especially candid as Marnie talks about putting her own family savings into the business, facing rejection while fundraising and learning an entirely new language of entrepreneurship. She also shares what her patients are telling her about the future of skincare, including demand for effective multitaskers, simplified routines and science-backed peptide technology. Then, in a rapid-fire look at today’s biggest skincare trends, Marnie weighs in on LED masks, microcurrent devices, gua sha, makeup at the gym, retinol irritation and one trend she would like to see disappear: injectable salmon sperm. It’s an engaging look at what happens when a doctor, beauty expert and entrepreneur approaches skincare with science, curiosity and a willingness to challenge convention.This episode is presented by Beauty Connect. 

Noah Bricker’s path to becoming General Manager of BaBylissPRO was anything but traditional. After beginning his career at Deloitte, he moved into private equity at American Securities, where he embedded himself inside portfolio companies undergoing major transformations, often working directly alongside CEOs. Noah joins Jodi and CEW President Elana Szyfer to talk about what it takes to earn a CEO’s trust, why careers can be made during a crisis, and how his years advising businesses ultimately showed him that he was an operator at heart.Now running BaBylissPRO, part of Conair, Noah is taking a professional heritage brand and pushing it toward its next phase of consumer growth. He gets candid about competing with powerhouses like Shark, Dyson, T3 and Bio Ionic, dramatically shifting the brand’s media investment toward social, and obsessively studying everything from Amazon reviews to competitor products. He also digs into one of the biggest challenges facing the hair tools category, delivering the performance consumers want while responding to the growing focus on hair health and the “skinification” of hair.The conversation also explores Noah’s intense but people-focused approach to leadership. He believes careers are built by getting as many experiences, or “reps,” as possible, and that leaders have a responsibility to challenge, support and develop the next generation of talent. Then Jodi and Elana get personal, uncovering Noah’s highly disciplined 4:30 a.m. routine, including coffee, email, the gym and a protected morning window he calls his “intense thought” time. It’s a conversation about ambition, transformation, leadership and what it really takes to turn an established professional brand into a modern consumer beauty business.This episode is presented by Beauty Connect. 

Ron Gee’s career has taken him from chemical engineering and Kraft Foods to senior leadership roles at some of the biggest companies in beauty including L’Oréal, Coty and Shiseido. Now an Industry Luminary Advisor at Accenture, Ron joins Jodi and CEW President Elana Szyfer to unpack the unexpected career decisions that led him from engineering to finance, M&A and ultimately beauty and why learning the language of finance became one of the most important building blocks of his career.The conversation offers a rare insider’s look at beauty M&A: why major companies continue acquiring emerging brands, why some acquisitions fail to meet expectations, and why a brand’s relationship with its consumer can be every bit as valuable as its products. Ron and Elana revisit examples including BECCA, Prescriptives and Clarisonic while exploring what can happen when an entrepreneurial brand enters a much larger organization and why timing, corporate culture and preserving the people behind a brand can make such a difference.But the conversation ultimately becomes about what comes after a big corporate career. Ron shares why he’s increasingly drawn to helping smaller and middle-market companies grow, rather than simply taking another major operating role, while Jodi, Ron and Elana explore the rise of fractional executives and experienced leaders choosing work based on joy, relationships and impact. And in a revealing look at the next generation of beauty consumers, Ron shares what his 20-year-old twin daughters are actually buying, experimenting with and prioritizing from devices and nail art to NARS and Drunk Elephant.This episode is presented by Beauty Connect. 

Shane Evans, CEO and co-founder of Heights Wellness Retreat, turned one disappointing spa experience into a business that has endured for more than two decades. After starting her career selling fitness memberships and later moving into medical sales, a frustrating birthday massage sparked an idea: what if high-quality massage could be professional, convenient and affordable enough to become a regular wellness habit? Four months later, the first Massage Heights opened and nine months after that, Shane opened location number two.Today, Shane is transforming that original concept into Heights Wellness Retreat, evolving 100+ locations from a massage-and-skincare model into a broader destination for wellness, longevity, technology and community. She joins Jodi and co-host Lindy Firstenberg for a fascinating conversation about the changing wellness consumer, the rise of peptides and compounding pharmacies, the importance of making wellness part of a routine, and why the future may belong to destinations that bring multiple modalities from red light and cryotherapy to sauna and vibroacoustic technology under one roof.But Shane’s story is also about entrepreneurship, leadership and knowing when to reinvent what you’ve already built. She shares why she returned to lead the company she founded, how she thinks about franchisee profitability and staying independent, and why her definition of success has shifted from money to something much more meaningful: freedom. It’s an inspiring look at what happens when an entrepreneur refuses to let a successful 22-year-old business stand still and instead asks what the modern wellness consumer will need next.This episode is presented by Beauty Connect. 

Michelle Lee has built a career around seeing where culture is headed next. From Editor-in-Chief of Allure and Nylon to a global leadership role at Netflix and now CMO of Landing International and K Beauty World, her path is anything but conventional. Michelle opens up about feeling intimidated when she first reached the top ranks of publishing, learning to take bigger creative risks, and recognizing early that the traditional media model was about to radically change.Together with Jodi and guest co-host Lindy Firstenberg, Michelle explores what the modern beauty experience actually looks like as the lines between beauty, health and wellness disappear. They dig into personalization, the growing “pharmification” of beauty and wellness, and what Michelle learned overseeing global editorial and publishing at Netflix, including watching Squid Game become a worldwide phenomenon and seeing firsthand how culture can travel across borders.Michelle also gets candid about stepping away from an intense full-time executive career, building a fractional career through relationships and side hustles, and the three résumé bullet points she believes everyone should be intentionally building. Then the conversation turns to K-beauty: why its first U.S. wave faded, how TikTok Shop and Amazon helped fuel its resurgence, and why succeeding in the U.S. requires far more than simply bringing a successful international brand stateside. It’s a conversation about reinvention, cultural fluency and building a career and a brand that’s ready for what comes next.This episode is presented by Beauty Connect.