Building A Beauty Business, With Natasha Cornstein
Ready to dive into the wild and wonderful world of the beauty business? J.R. Lowry’s got you covered with an explosive conversation with Natasha Cornstein, the unstoppable CEO of Blushington! This isn’t just talk; we’re getting a front-row seat to the magic behind Blushington, the ultimate beauty haven where makeup, skincare, hair, and retail dreams come true. Natasha’s spilling all the secrets on how Blushington transformed from a simple idea to a franchise powerhouse. Think TikTok trends, the booming mature beauty movement, and the insider scoop on finding the perfect franchisees – we’re unpacking it all! Plus, hear Natasha’s jaw-dropping journey from the high-pressure Fox Newsroom to the strategic realm of sports management, and how she’s crafted a leadership style that empowers her team to shine. If you’re craving real-deal business insights, inspiring stories, and a sneak peek into the future of the dazzling beauty industry, buckle up – this episode is your VIP pass!
Check out the full series of Career Sessions, Career Lessons podcasts here or visit pathwise.io/podcast/. A full written transcript of this episode is also available at https://pathwise.io/podcasts/natasha-cornstein/.
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Building A Beauty Business, With Natasha Cornstein
CEO Of Blushington
My guest is Natasha Cornstein. Natasha is the CEO of Blushington, a premier beauty destination offering makeup, skincare, hair and retail services. In this episode, we’re going to be talking about Blushington’s business, trends in the beauty industry, Natasha’s broader career journey, and her thoughts on leadership. Let’s get going.
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Natasha, welcome and thanks for doing the show with me.
JR, thank you so much for having me. It’s a pleasure to be here.
I’m looking forward to hearing your story. I always love hearing stories about small companies in growth mode, and it seems like that’s your story. Tell us a little bit about Blushington.
Blushington’s Origin Story: From Beauty Insecurities To National Expansion
Absolutely. Blushington was created in 2011 by sisters Stephi and Nicki Maron in Los Angeles, and was really created out of a need for dealing with some insecurities at a young age. Dealing with acne, playing with makeup, and really trying to find ways to make themselves feel better. Fast forward, Drybar was invented where blowouts were happening day in and day out, and our founders had this incredible thought that said, “After you have a blowout, where can you go to get your makeup done?” That was really the genesis. Blushington was born.
I know you came in 2015, if I’m remembering right. How did you meet them? How did you come in to be leading the company?
I had one of the most serendipitous meetings you could probably ever hope for. I was in Los Angeles. I’ve worked my entire life. I’ve always loved what I’m doing, and at the time I was working for a global jewelry brand, opening new office in Los Angeles, and our PR firm said, “You’re getting a little old for us to send iPhone pictures, so come on, let’s get a real headshot done.”
I was always a little bit nervous, I guess, and intimidated by makeup and had some unpleasant experiences where I said I felt like I was in witness protection by the time I came out of the chair. I went with a little trepidation and she took me to the very first Blushington and I opened the door and it was love at first sight. I had this amazing, very personalized experience. That’s something I definitely want to touch on, just how important listening is and personalization with your customers.
The very next day, I was having breakfast as a courtesy to someone in New York, and I raved about my Blushington experience, and she said, “I do their PR.” I said, “I can’t believe this.” She introduced me that day to the founders. We spent three months getting to know each other, and then they flew to New York, hired me, and the rest is history.
That is pretty serendipitous.
Yes. I say for all of your readers to really be open to everyone you meet. You never know where something will take you. I always say your next hello can be your future because I’ve lived it and I’ve seen it happen when people really have an open mindset towards life.
I think I’m about 150 episodes into this show, and I’ve heard enough of these stories where people will say, “I picked up the phone, I happened to have this conversation. I fell into it.” It happens but you’ve got to be looking for those opportunities or at least have your mental energy open to them.
I think so. I think it’s that open mindset. I talk with my son about it. I talk with my friends and colleagues. I’m not a huge fan of the word networking. I find that very transactional. “I want to meet you so that I can get X or Y from you.” I find that the most successful collaborations or throughout my career, something magical may happen from a chance meeting from three or four years prior or a friend made an introduction to a friend. I don’t go into meeting people with the mindset of what can I get from this person, as much as what can I do for this person? I get very excited about what other people are creating and doing. I love mentoring and in that generous, open mindset is when the magic happens.
Blushington’s Reinvention: Franchising And Flagship Stores Post-COVID
Where is Blushington now? How many states are you in? How many locations?
Blushington has really gone through a reinvention. Prior to COVID, we make applications only, and we had locations in Los Angeles, New York, and Dallas. The original real estate strategy for Blushington was to co-locate next to Drybars with very smart set of real estate guidelines that if someone’s getting their blowouts, they’re likely wanting to have their makeup done.
Beauty Business: In today’s world, time is our most precious commodity. We work closely with our artists on timing to deliver outstanding service in a reasonable amount of time, without sacrificing quality. Time and excellence go hand-in-hand.
Ultimately, when our customers were clamoring for blowouts and makeup all under one roof, the real estate strategy was holding us back. We made a very painful short-term decision during COVID to close our locations, regroup, become a franchisor, and open a flagship in New York City where we offered makeup, blowouts and skincare under one roof. In 2025, we’re a franchisor, which is an incredibly exciting industry to be in. We’re meeting amazing people. We’ve sold our first three franchises. We have our corporate headquarters in New York City, and we’re opening in Boca Raton and in Houston and many locations on deck.
I look at so many companies that had to make transitions, pivots during COVID. My stepdaughter had literally just taken a job working for a functional health company that was in startup mode. I think they had one location in New York City. They were looking to expand. She’s an architect by training. One month into COVID, she was out of a job and they pretty much had abandoned the whole business model because it was clear that it was going nowhere for a period of time. It was a tough period.
It was a tough period and for all the loss and devastation. It was incalculable the loss and devastation. It was also a time, I’d say, of tremendous innovation. We went into survival mode and had to think very quickly, “What do we have? What are our resources that we can adapt during this time period where everything we offered was no longer needed?
We were brick and mortar, we were touching your face, you were wearing makeup because you were going somewhere. We re-platformed the business in 30 days to a digital platform. We adapted our training curriculum to a digital training curriculum, and we trained makeup artists around the country. We have this tremendous digital platform that’s built and that’s running that we never would have had. While our focus right now is on the brick-and-mortar franchise expansion, that was something very positive for us that came out of COVID. We’ll be nurturing this digital platform in parallel path.
Are you selling beauty supplies online too?
We are. We currently retail third-party brands. They’re really independent brands founded by women. I think what a lot of our customers love about Blushington is we’ve curated, tested, and edited down the assortment because if you go into shop, you can be met in, again, wonderful brands and different settings where there are 14,000, 20,000 different SKUs.
We work with our makeup artists to really pair down to the best of the best lipstick, what are the best foundations, mascara, so that when you come to shop for beauty at Blushington, these are trusted, tested products, and we’ve taken out all of the guesswork because I can tell you, JR, it can be very overwhelming. Women are typically spending one sixth of their lives on their beauty routines. This is serious business.
It is serious business, all the things that women will often do as part of their beauty routine. I can easily understand how it can be overwhelming because it just seems like an awful lot.
You can be very efficient, you can have a very long routine and everywhere in between. What I love about how we approach beauty at Blushington is we do take a less is more approach. We can always dial it up, we can glam it up, but we realize that in today’s world, time is our most precious commodity. We work very closely with our artists on timing. Having outstanding service in a very reasonable amount of time without sacrifice and quality. Time and excellence go hand in hand at Washington.
Finding The Perfect Franchisee: More Than Just Business Skills
Now that you’re in this franchise model, what do you look for in a franchisee?
I get asked, “Do I have to have owned a salon or operated my own business?” Right away, I want people to know that you don’t necessarily have to have had experience running your own business. We have tremendous training program and support across everything you’ll need in franchising, whether that’s your real estate selection, hiring, training, inventory. Those things are all teachable. What I’m looking for in candidates is someone that comes in with those intangibles.
What are those intangibles that are important to me? First and foremost, an open mindset, somebody that shares our values. Blushington is known to be an inclusive destination. This is a destination for customers of all ages, all skin tones, all hair textures. It puts us in a very unique perch in the beauty services industry because of that commitment.
It is essential to me that our partners, owners, future franchise owners share our values. That’s not something you can teach. I have found that can you expand somebody’s mindset? Yes. Coming in with an open mindset naturally is super important to me. Looking for somebody that’s pleasant, gracious, and solutions-oriented, those are all really important things.
Every day, you’re rolling up your sleeve and it’s really different. We’re in the people business. We’re in the service business. You might have a super glamorous day where you’re the face of the brand as a franchise owner and you’re doing a red-carpet event, or you have a store filled with A-list influencers and celebrities, and the next morning, you might be wearing gloves and fixing a toilet and handling a customer issue or whatever may be. It has to be somebody that’s really flexible, really solutions-oriented, and everything about the business is so meticulously documented, tested and really available. It’s those intangible qualities that are most important to me and to my team.
Switching into this mode, I know you’re early in the franchise model, all of the things you’ve proceduralized, is that how you’re going to make sure that you continue to have a consistent experience across all these different franchise-owned locations?
Absolutely. I think that the beauty of coming in as a Blushington franchise owner is how well thought out every cornerstone of the brand is. I’m talking from the minute detail of the font of a headline versus the font of body copy in all of our communications to big things like the build-out. All of our millwork is ordered from the same manufacturer and design firm that we’ve worked with for over a decade. The wallpaper, the tissue paper, every color is prescribed. The training manual follows steps of service.
Be open to everyone you meet; you never know where something will take you. Your next hello can be your future. Share on XIf you were to come in and have your makeup done, whether you were in New York, Boca or Houston, you’re seeing different makeup artists, but they are following the Blushington steps of service. Anything you can possibly imagine or think of has been thought through, has been perfected through trial and error. I like to say you’re not always going to get it right.
We’ve made plenty of mistakes and my philosophy is you try, you succeed and continue with it. You fail, you put it aside, and you try not to do it again. The franchisees coming in have the benefit of over a decade of our really perfecting the business model, but also coming in with the opportunity to grow. This is an emerging franchise brand with leadership that is very open to experimentation as long as it fits within our business model.
You’ve mentioned that social media influencers, , not my space. You’re talking to a guy who barely has to buy shampoo, but this is a space where the influencer community is probably as active as any, and how do you get yourself mental shelf space with them?
I think every brand takes a different approach to social media. Some brands have large budgets and they make investments in influencers and investments in content creation. As a brand and a business, that’s not an approach we take. We don’t have that type of budget. We also are not really looking to pay for content.
What we have is the ability to invite people in as our guest to experience the brand organically. If they love their service and they love their experience, which 9.9 times out of 10, they love it because who doesn’t love great glam and a glass of champagne, they’re posting about us. They’re coming back to us regularly.
Social media is a very important part of our building brand awareness and how we connect with customers but we do it in as organic a way as possible. Again, partially driven by a very scrappy budget and also driven by a desire to have that authenticity and the review and the content that’s created around Blushington.
Balancing Innovation And Core Values: Blushington’s Growth Strategy
You’ve made so many changes over the years, just the own stores switching to digital franchise model, adding services. How do you balance innovation and, at the same time, make sure that you’re not losing sight of those core values that you’ve talked about?
I love that question, and I think it’s the question we ask ourselves anytime we’re thinking about something new or a brainstorm or great idea comes from an artist, which by the way, I can tell you having run this business for a decade, the best ideas that we’ve implemented have come from our artists on the floor. The ones that are out there day in and day out, working with customers.
We are very rigorous about a new service or new brand checking off, I guess the boxes. I don’t love that expression, but we’re really looking at services or adding products as going through pretty rigorous screening of are we utilizing our existing personnel? Are we utilizing our existing inventory, or would this require a different type of personnel, a different type of inventory? Those are two core questions for us. All of the services that we’ve added at this point, we’re utilizing the same personnel. The majority of our services, we’re using the same inventory.
Those are two of the key expense buckets on that side of things. You’re looking at the expenses and the upside, and also maintaining the simplicity of your business model. When it comes to personnel and inventory and beauty, those are two things that I look at very carefully. If you’d like, I’ll give you a very specific example of an innovation that I’m incredibly proud of, which is we’ve started doing blowouts for wigs.
You think of a blowout, you come in, you have your hair wash, maybe you get a treatment, you get it blown dried and styled. We realized that so many consumers out there are wearing wigs. This is a $5 billion industry and growing just in the United States. They’re wearing wigs, some for fashion reasons, some for health reasons, some for religious reasons, but these are customers that can come in, drop off their wigs or they can stay along for the ride and it’s the same service. It’s just on a wig instead of on the actual person.
Here we’re using the same hair artists, the same shampoo, conditioner, mask. We’ve learned some different techniques. We spent six months training to ensure that we were really taking care of the hair properly. Now we’ve expanded our customer base but still a like customer that’s interested in beauty or has a necessity to focus on beauty. That’s an example.
Am I looking to add nail services, JR? No, I’m not. We did try it once many years ago, and we didn’t do well. It wasn’t our core competency. It required different labor. It required a very complex inventory. While our customers would love the convenience of that service in addition to their blowouts and Blushington makeup applications, it just didn’t make sense. A franchisee, again, is coming in, having learned from our mistakes and how crucial it is to say true to what you’re great at and that it makes sense for the business.
How do you approach your partnerships with the brands that you use?
We are a very unique partner at Blushington for makeup, skincare, hair brands, because we use their products and services. The first thing when we approach brands that we bring on and carry is it’s a real introduction to our business model. Understanding that there is tremendous upside to having your brand at Blushington because you have a professional artist who’s using your product directly on a person in service, talking about the benefits, the ingredients. Letting the customer see in real time what the product can do for them.
Brands love that. They love that their mascara or their blush is not just sitting on a shelf, but it’s in the hands of a makeup artist. The first thing we do is have that conversation. The reason why is because we carry their inventory in two different ways. We have it for using it in service, and we have it to sell to customers.
Beauty Business: What is particularly fascinating about the beauty industry right now is the expansion of the customer base.
It’s a business model that product brands have to get used to. We have what’s called professional pricing for the products we use in service. We have retail pricing for the products we sell. I don’t know if I answered your question or went a little in the weeds on that but that’s a big conversation with the brands.
As to how we select the brands, we look to carry every product we need to complete the services that we’re offering but without duplication. You may have many different ranges of a nude lipstick, for example, but it’s critical to us that we don’t have 10 different types of foundation or 10 different types of mascara. What’s crucial in the foundation is that you’re carrying the shade range so that we live up to our brand promise that every customer that walks into Blushington can be seen, that we have the products for you. At some point, JR, on our roadmap is our own products, but we’re still about five years out from that.
It’s a big investment in R&D. There’s a heavy fixed cost that comes with that part of it.
That’s for sure, especially to do it the way we’d like to do it. You can do it off the shelf now very easily. People are doing it. They’re putting a label on. That’s not something we would be comfortable doing.
Where does sustainability factor in, in terms of how you pick the brands that you work with?
It’s a factor. I will say it’s not a defining factor for us. It’s interesting. This is not sustainability per se, but if you look into perhaps a little bit of an adjacent lane, which is the natural cosmetics, the green, there has been a real lag between the consumer desire to have those products and the actual performance of the products. Huge advances have been made but I will tell you that there is still a little bit of a gap. Those are factors we consider, but certainly not the end all, be all of how we choose our brands.
Beauty Industry Trends: TikTok’s Influence And Mature Beauty
Talk about the industry a little bit more generally. What are the trends that are going on in the beauty industry that you’re most excited about?
The beauty industry is such an exceptional industry in terms of innovation, in terms of who the industry touches. You’re talking about, I don’t know, a $650 billion industry and growing. What I find particularly fascinating about the beauty industry right now is how the customer base is expanding. Whereas we typically wore makeup or had our hair done later on in our teens and early adulthood, you are now seeing adoption and some of your savviest consumers are 10, 11, 12 years old.
It’s astonishing. It is because of social media, particularly driven by TikTok. You’re also seeing on the other end of the spectrum, which as someone in their 50s I love, which is a huge focus on mature beauty. It’s not about antiaging. It’s not about trying to hide where you are in life or chase eternal youth. There’s tremendous products and great storytelling, marketing, advertising, really celebrating, becoming older and more mature, which I think is very exciting.
You’re also seeing men become part of the beauty industry beyond haircuts and cologne. There’s a tremendous focus on skincare, on makeup for men, on unisex beauty. I think what I love is the expansion of the customer base and the innovation. It’s really a very exciting industry to be a part of. I would say, at least from my approach to the industry, I try to really collaborate, whether it’s with adjacent business or competitors. I think there’s a lot of room for all of us.
On a $650 billion industry, there’s a lot of room for a lot of people. Where does technology come into play other than the social media, online aspects? In what other ways is technology influencing the industry?
I think that technology is influencing the industry every single day and at so many different touchpoints. We can talk just about the tools and how technologically advanced they are now, whether that’s a curling iron or doing your own dermatological level face treatments at home, the innovation and technology and tools is extraordinary.
Every day, the consumer has access to better and better tools that also may formally have been really out of their price point or just wouldn’t have access to. I think AI is impacting every aspect of beauty. Let’s just start with storytelling, marketing, advertising, copy, images. So much of it is being AI-generated. I will tell you, my team has started using AI. I just took a course on AI because I always want to be up on the latest of what’s happening just in the world.
Certainly specific to our industry, we’ve started incorporating AI in all of our writing endeavors, and it saves a tremendous amount of time on presentations, on social media, writing copy. We have not done it for images. That’s not something we’ve personally decided to cross into. It’s really fascinating. The prompts that you are putting in, it’s your creative ideas. It’s your campaign idea that you’re coming up with.
I would say a good 70%, 80% of what comes back is clever, is on brand and so that’s really fascinating. An area that we’re exploring very deeply right now is how to use technology and AI where our customers will be able to try on the makeup look and try on the blowout style before they even get started in their appointment. It’s been a little bit clumsy, I would say, but the advancements, particularly of lat,e have been incredible. I take my hat off to all of the beauty technology companies that are just advancing at lightning speed, and we’ll look to incorporate that try-on technology as we roll out Blushington locations.
Those kinds of technologies are just fascinating, how you can put clothing on you’ve never tried on and see do you like how it looks. It you helps you decide whether you want to order it. It’s just fascinating how all of that has found its way into various forms of retail.
What we're trying to accomplish is a reflection of great leadership. Share on XThere are so many brands doing such fabulous things. I’m excited to learn more. There’s something to read and learn every day. I’m often asked, “What does your day look like?” I start my day reading for a good hour in my industry, outside my industry. Again, you never know where you’ll find inspiration. I also think it’s incredibly important to know what’s happening in the world and how your team might be impacted, your customers, your partners, your industry. The world is endlessly fascinating.
The world is definitely endlessly fascinating and I find it’s harder to really feel like you’re connected to it despite good intentions of trying to stay connected with what kids are going through these days, what young adults are going through these days. It’s difficult when you get older.
I think you’ve it keeps us young to read, watch and listen to different resources. I know people have really put a stake in the ground. I think too much. I think we’ve lost the art of nuance. We’ve lost the art of listening and being thoughtful and measured about how we hear one another or take into consideration opinions and points of view.
When I start my morning, I’m reading 6, 7, 8 different news sites to gain all sorts of perspectives. I don’t know about other working moms out there, but I do follow my son’s friends on social media. I hope it doesn’t embarrass him, but to your point, I like to stay in the mix and see what’s happening with young people. What’s the vocabulary? What are they talking about? It’s really important.
Natasha’s Career Journey: From Newsroom To Beauty CEO
You have a son in college, as we were talking about before we started recording. It’s a little bit easier when your kids move out of the house and you don’t have day-to-day interaction with them and the way that you do when they’re teenagers, it gets a lot harder to really know. Even my kids. My kids were on Snapchat, Instagram, the tail end of Facebook. I’ll say TikTok is completely foreign to them. Even they feel old, which is crazy. You started in the media industry. You started as an associate producer or assistant producer at Fox News, if I’m remembering right.
You are. That’s actually where I finished. Where I started was on the overnight assignment desk. I basically started, I don’t know, I don’t want to say low. I would say it was the entry point to the newsroom. I worked from 11:00 PM to 7:00 AM on the assignment desk. That’s really where I cut my teeth and learned so much about the news, about reporting, about how serious it is to check your sources to get a full story.
For those who aren’t familiar with the assignment desk, I always say it’s the heartbeat of the newsroom. It’s where the stories come in first. It’s our job to fact check. I really started on the overnight assignment desk, graduated to the daytime assignment desk, and worked extremely hard to move into a producing role. It was a tremendous experience.
What made you decide to go in a different direction then?
It was life again that had me go in a different direction. I was newly married, and my husband is a serial entrepreneur, and he had started his own sports agency and was one of the first to represent international basketball players in the NBA, which is now a very common place. Almost every team, or maybe every team has international players.
When he started his business in the ‘90s, he was really at the forefront of this business. I credit him with working hand in hand with the league and with the team owners to really educate them and to grow this aspect of the business. It was an exciting business. It was his, and he was growing really fast. We looked at each other one day and said, “You are traveling around the world. I’m sitting behind a news desk. Let’s go travel the world together.”
Who would care more about growing your business than your spouse? We always joke, and we may lose the younger audience, but we always make a reference to the movie Jerry Maguire. We say he was Jerry and I was Renee. He did all the business, all the contract negotiation, and I did everything that was service oriented with the players, everything off the court.
I got to listen in on every phone call, learn all of the ins and outs of negotiating, whether it was negotiating contracts, whether it was negotiating marketing deals, or just negotiating at relationships between professional athletes, coaches, managements. These were invaluable lessons that I learned. We worked together for over a decade. I’ve had a fabulous and non-traditional career, but each has been a stepping stone to the next thing I’ve done. It’s beauty by day sports bar by night. I love the beauty industry and I love professional sports.
Was that there before you met your husband?
I grew up with my dad as season ticket holders to the Cleveland Cavaliers, to the Cleveland Browns. I love NBA basketball and NFL football. My son was high school quarterback. I really enjoy sports.
You also have been involved in some special purpose acquisition companies, too. I saw that in your LinkedIn background.
There's nothing more demoralizing for a team than soliciting advice and ideas, then ignoring them. Share on XI had the privilege of being appointed to serve on two SPAC boards for Cantor Fitzgerald. I really expanded my horizons. The whole world of SPACs is fascinating. They were my two first corporate board seats for public companies. I worked alongside tremendous people and just a fascinating experience. I look forward to serving on more corporate boards as I move through my career.
Servant Leadership At Blushington: Talent Retention And Empowerment
Let’s talk a little bit, just in the last few minutes we’ve got about your leadership style and how it was shaped.
I would describe my leadership style as a servant leadership style. I run a very horizontal organization, and I really look at my role. My role is to be looking 3, 5 years ahead, setting the tone, the vision for the company, but bringing my team along with me and serving them and really serving one another to meet the goals of the company.
I would say I came to that style by trial and error. I had a very painful experience midway through my career where I sat down for an annual review and was told that they saw me as a CEO in the future. That sentence was followed immediately by a but. “You will not achieve that dream and that goal unless,” and the unless was, unless you slow down, unless you listen more, unless you get to know your team better. Understand what makes each person tick, what motivates them, what are they dealing with at home, what are the talents they bring to the table?
How do you have everyone invested working towards that goal? It can’t be top down. It can’t be, “Here’s the agenda now. Here’s what I need you to do. Go.” That was the style I had when I was much younger. I was always in a rush. I always wanted to get to the deadline, to the finish line, to be first, to know the most. That is not a winning recipe for leadership.
Yes, I want to be first. Yes, I am very competitive and want to do things today, not tomorrow, and have an intensity. That, however, has to be coupled with a genuine passion for the people around me and an understanding that having everybody engaged in our purpose and what it is we’re trying to accomplish is a reflection of great leadership. I definitely made a lot of mistakes early on in my career. I really had to be introspective.
I think probably one of the things I’m proudest of in my career and where I sit today as the CEO of Blushington is the tremendous track record we have in talent retention. In the beauty industry, you are looking at a turnover that’s typically 90 days. That is costly. That is detrimental to culture and excellence. We’re looking at an average of five years of talent staying with Blushington. I think that is in large measure due to a real shift I made in my leadership style and understanding these are the goals of Blushington. Now, what are the goals of my artists and how can I create an environment where the business can thrive and they can thrive? I would say my leadership style has evolved tremendously. I feel very comfortable and very happy with where we are now.
How do you foster that sense of empowerment in your team?
Number one, by being a listener that follows through. I think there is nothing more demoralizing for a team than soliciting advice, than soliciting ideas and ignoring them. I think one of the ways I keep my team motivated is by keeping them abreast of what’s happening, by hearing out their ideas and by executing on them when I think it will be accretive to the business. If not, I will sit down and tell the person why.
I’ll not leave a note unanswered or an idea unanswered. I think it’s sometimes the simplest things that keep your team motivated. Keeping them informed. Why are we doing something? Why are we changing something? I like to solicit feedback before I make changes. There are times where those changes are not going to be universally discussed. For most subjects, I like to hear a diverse set of opinions. I created an advisory board, if you want to come back to leadership style. I found there are really key areas in franchising that you need to be outstanding at that are not in my skillset.
I try to surround myself with people that are smarter than me and more experienced than me in subject matter experts where I don’t have the expertise. I want to learn from them. I’m always going to be a sponge to that information. You’re so much stronger. I know I segued a little from the question about keeping your team motivated.
I think public recognition in an authentic, meaningful way and consistent way is important. Don’t say you’re going to recognize your team and then do it one month and not the other month. We’re very rigorous about a monthly meeting. We acknowledge, we celebrate, we recognize different types of achievements. We have a board in the back where we print out beautiful reviews. We don’t let that get stale. We stick with it because it’s important. Sometimes, it’s really not that complicated, but I think people can sometimes take it for granted.
It’s those details. They matter. They add up in people’s minds.
It’s all in the details. In 2025, when I look at constituencies, my customers and my teams, they’re constituencies that are on the same playing field. I know when I was starting work in the early ‘90s, first in, last out, got screamed and yelled at, ate lunch at my desk. I was not a constituency as an employee. That’s not 2025.
Blushington’s Explosive Growth: Franchising And Future Plans
No, it’s not. What’s ahead for you and what’s ahead for Blushington?
Beauty Business: AI is impacting every aspect of the beauty industry—from storytelling and marketing to advertising, copy, and images. So much is now AI-generated.
What’s ahead for Blushington is explosive growth. Our goal is to sell over 100 franchises in the next three years. The hardest thing, JR, is selling the first one, having that leap of faith be taken. One of the most gratifying things happening in the world at Blushington is that we’ve sold our first three franchises to existing customers. Our first customer, Dr. Karen Diaz Meaike is opening in Boca Raton, Florida. Courtney Freels is opening two locations in Houston.
Both are rock stars. One comes from a background of selling real estate and has a doctorate in social work. Courtney is a former oil and gas trader. What they have in common is they both love beauty. They both have those intangibles that we spoke about earlier. They’re go-getters. They have open mindsets. They are fastidious about excellence and share our core values. I think we are off to an amazing start and really looking particularly to expand in the southeast is our focus right now. Texas, Florida, the Carolinas, Atlanta as we chatted about earlier before, those are the markets that we’re really excited about.
What about for you?
For me, I think to continue to love what I’m doing, I am incredibly energized by my job. I am entering the 24th year of an amazing marriage and the mother of one son who is the love of our lives. Being on that journey is fascinating. I also have a family foundation that my husband and I started. It’s called the Courts of Dreams Foundation. We restore outdoor basketball courts in New York City.
When we’re not both super occupied with our day jobs and our family and social lives, were hard at work on raising money and building courts. I will say our son ran Courts of Dreams for the last several years. His school, Horace Mann, and in particular the head of his school, this extraordinary educator and leader, Dr. Tom Kelly, was instrumental in our family building several courts in the Bronx. We’ll continue that work, travel, enjoy life. Having suffered a personal loss, JR, I will tell you that I’ve always been an optimistic person that looks forward to every day, but taking it very seriously that no day is promised. That’s my plan to continue appreciating and loving life.
That sounds great. Thank you. Thanks for the time and the education on the beauty industry, about which I know nothing.
I think you asked pretty astute questions. Something tells me something about everything.
Enough to be dangerous. Again, thank you. I wish you well with what you’re off to.
I really appreciate the opportunity to get our story out.
Yeah, absolutely. I love hearing stories like this, so I was happy to do it.
It’s a real privilege. Thank you so much.
All right, take care.
All right. You take care, also.
I want to thank Natasha for joining me to discuss the firm she runs Blushington, the broader beauty industry, her career journey prior to joining Blushington and her thoughts on leadership. As a reminder, this episode is brought to you by PathWise.io. If you’re ready to take control of your career, join our community now. Basic membership is free. You can also sign up on the website for the PathWise newsletter and follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and TikTok. Thanks.
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About Natasha Cornstein
Prior to Blushington, Natasha served as Director of Brand Management at CIRCA and Vice President of Client Services and Media Relations at Pinnacle Management Corp. She also worked as an Associate Producer at Fox News Channel. Natasha holds a Bachelor of Arts from Washington University in St. Louis and is a graduate of the CORO Fellows program. She resides in New York City with her husband and son.
