Today we’d like to introduce you to Bella Rose
Hi Bella, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
When I first starting Bella rose Passion, I was all over the place with no business strategy, no plan, and no focus. I just knew I wanted my own business and that’s what I did but had no idea how I was going to scale and grow, I believe that is 80% of small business owners. But I started with Bella rose Passion Women’s Boutique which was unsuccessful because I knew nothing about fashion or marketing in 2011, I scaled back and closed my retail store to open a online beauty store selling lip gloss and lipstick, again with no direction just promoting yellow, white, blue lip gloss not knowing those are not colors that represent our skin well and I was not focused on what my audience would be pleased with.
My online beauty website was lacking so much so I started becoming my own street team, and walking billboard, going to the right beauty events and approaching makeup artist to use my products on their clients to promote, once I started to see that working I took my brand a bit more serious by sitting down and restructuring my idea. Its nothing wrong with going back to the beginning, as long as you start with a different focus and I was able to create a MUA agency sourcing the artist I met to connect them with the celebs I met to do their makeup with my products and scale back the color palette I offered and focused on the natural colors that enhanced our daily look or our dramatic look for photo shoots etc.
I believe that is what helped set me apart from other brands, and is what caught the attention of other celebs, I got approached to be on the Steve Harvey Show and that segment boosted my ability to sell to my audience, I learned so much working with that team , my advice is when you are able to get a room like that be a sponge. After that segment our services went crazy it was a lot for just me to handle and I had to learn allow people to do what they get paid for, so I hired a marketing team and launch my body lotion and body wash wash with Walmart in 2018. since the launch with Walmart we currently have 40 products with Walmart selling internally.
The sales was not immediately selling, so I started to focus on other sales channels in Sept. 2018 I got a invitation to a trade show where there was buyers and I pitched to a Target Store buyer who informed me Bella Rose Passion just was not ready, so I went back to the drawing board and again restructured my business plan. This time I had resources and marketing knowledge, so I implemented everything I learned and pitched again and agin over the next few years. in 2020, I pitched again with new packaging, a exclusive collection that was not sold anywhere else, with retail experience from Macy’s Retail and Walmart E commerce. Once the buyer saw the progress of the products and the growing sales at my price point they were very intrigued and offered my a contract with Target.com it was during the pandemic so the stores were not open and I knew I could dominate online so I accepted the offer. I was faced with a injury that forced me to have to get immediate surgery on my spine which was life threatening and the day after surgery January 2021 I signed my Target contract in my neck brace.
I expressed this journey because in 2016 I created a vision board with my goals which had meeting Oprah, ( I met Steve Steve Harvey and had a full segment on his daytime tv show ) and went to a Oprah event and sat close enough to feel her energy..lol, another goal was to get into Sephora ( I got into Beauty Supply Stores, Macy’s, Walmart and Target on my own, no distribution or agent another goal was t be in Forbes ( I was featured twice ) and I realized my vision that I put on paper just was a blueprint and was not big enough for my goals God had planned for me.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I am from Trenton, NJ and moved to ATL in 2010, with my husband and 3 young children, we had nothing but our savings but I knew we would make it in ATL, no jobs, and no help. I started out wanted to be a business woman with no experience, since I dropped out of high school in 10th grade when I got pregnant with my daughter, my only focus was to create a better life for her, because at the time being a teen mom was not the challenge it was being in a emotional and physical abusive relationship as a teen girl and I had no idea how to be a parent or how to be a strong young lady.
My mother worked 2/3 jobs most of the times, I am a only child but my mom was a provider taking care of everybosy and always had too much pride for help so work was her outlet, she raised me on survival. My dad has always been very present in my life but he was also a big time hustler the streets/jail and his other children got a lot of his time. But the amount of love I received from my mom made me feel like I didn’t miss out on much, but every girl looks for the attention from somewhere if they don’t have that consistent father figure, so I did become a teen mom at 16 yrs. old. but that didn’t make me a victim, if anything having my daughter changed my life for the better and put a battery in back to be a strong young lady and I always knew I had to do better for my daughter, so when we moved to ATL my daughter was 11 yrs. old and I knew I didn’t want her or anybody else to look at this move as a waste of time.
That is where my O.D. hustle came in and I created Bella Rose Passion with no backup plan, through out the year life started lifing, my mother had a stroke and a brain aneurysm and was living in NJ, I felt horrible living way in ATL so I signed my kids out of school and stayed in the hospital with her for weeks until she was healthy enough for rehab, and then my dad stepped in to nurse her back to great health, as she survived that traumatic experience, I wanted to change my health because I started dealing with Hypertension, and I didn’t want to be stuck on meds all my life so I had to change my lifestyle and it wasnt easy, I remember being hospitalized and my makeup staff didn’t know but they were hired to do makeup for a Jackson 5 and friends event they was complaining and arguing so I checked myself out the hospital got them breakfast and went to monitoring grown women on set..
I made my health a priority and added it to my daily lifestyle to not allow other people problems affect me, I started therapy and started taking much needed mental health breaks. Unfortunately we loss my mother Jan. 2024 just before her birthday but she was very strong and I believe its just too hard to continue to fight against your health, We created a product together which is now selling very well with Walmart, and I am most proud that My mom got to see my success, and that my daughter is now 25 and is my marketing director working side by side with me on all my projects.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know?
I had to teach myself about marketing, and marketing is not a easy thing to educate yourself on, I tried to follow the trend to hire influencers to promote Bella rose Passion and I paid a influencer $800. to get ( 1 sale ) and the I paid another influencer $350. to get over $30k in sales all in the same year, that is when I educated myself of Influence vs. influencer and I started to filter my audience and get selective on the ppl who I chose to represent my brand. I continued influencer marketing but I would just ask them to do 1 video post and I would run that post as a ad on my platforms to drive the traffic to my website and build my own audience and ask my customers to post to grow sales from their audience as real customers would share their experience it was real and free, instead of continuing to pay influencers thousands, I was gaining my own community and audience.
Before we go, is there anything else you can share with us?
I believe its so beneficial to have multiple streams of income and multiple sales channels, I thought once I opened my website I would just be rich well it was months where I got no traffic, no dales so I had to pivot and do pop up shops, ask other business owners can I sell in their boutiques etc. When I was able to sell with Walmart, Macy’s and Target I promoted the products that is on their platforms more because ppl know those brands and are likely to shop with them and get to know Bella Rose Passion through my retail partners and has helped grow my brand.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://bellarosepassion.co/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bellarosepassion/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/people/Bella-Rose-Passion/100087409422554/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZW-DqYcE9sx-sRyIfY5CUA
