We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Isabella Mahealani Ramsey. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Isabella below.
Alright, Isabella thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the best or worst investment you’ve made?
The Best Investment I’ve ever made as a young artist/entrepreneur was saying YES! The initial decision of saying yes to the life that was meant for me. I have opened up my life to recognizing my God given talents of creative thinking combined with passion for how art can change minds and lives into a business, and ultimately profitable assets that will support me in the long term. This decision has allowed me to tunnel vision what’s for me and what’s not for in this life path. It has really allowed me to direct my energy and attention towards the people and experiences that see my vision and believe in my dreams. It has taught me to focus on acquiring knowledge that will best propel me forward in my craft. It has taught me the importance of valuing the process of learning. I am a leader first but forever a student. It’s caused me to sacrifice a lot of what might seem fun to other 21 year olds, I figured out pretty early on that if this was the life I wanted, it would be necessary to say No to experiences that did not fuel my best interest. Overall, the dedication to saying YES to my mission of making my dreams real life is by far the best investment I’ve ever made for myself.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
My name is Isabella Mahealani, CEO of Mahealani Beauty Group LLC. I am a Multifaceted Creative, Designer and Beauty Artist.
Originally, the first translation of my business was named Mahea Beauty, I was a Professional Eyelash Extension Specialist for 2 years from 2018-2020. I had a cozy in home studio, the most amazing clientele who I was able to bond with, relate to and I was really able to get to know a great community in my city, Louisville, KY, of women and similarly beauty enthusiasts just like myself. This was my first taste of entrepreneurship and it definitely gave me a vision of what I am capable of achieving as a business owner.
After my first business venture, I decided the best decision for me would be to take the amazing opportunity I was given of attending school at the Savannah College of Art and Design studying the Business of Beauty and Fragrances. I credit so much of who I am now and where I am today to the experiences, professors and people I was able to connect with at this school. Due to Film/TV being our biggest major and my natural interest in beauty, I began practicing Hair and Makeup for Student Films and Fashion Editorial Shoots. These opportunities have been transformational, opening so many doors to network with other amazing artists killing their craft! It was really a dream come true to explore these worlds and get a taste of what it’s like to be part of an Art Department on a Production. SCAD definitely supplied us with the tools necessary to create amazing, industry adjacent productions.
I greatly appreciate every Director who has believed in me, every actress/actor that has trusted me with their beauty needs on set!
After 2 years of college education, I made the bold decision to trust and put my full attention on my Entrepreneurial Career. Some have named it risky, I have named it trusting my vision. I believe finishing my degree is absolutely prospective in my lifetime, but for the moment, I know I have made the best decision for my future, and I have continued to be shown that this is true!
Today I am Brand Designer helping entrepreneurs and business owners build professional online identities with my services in Full Brand Development, taking them from Idea to Execution starting as simple as Logo Design, Website Creation/Design & Development, to Creative Advertisement, implementing Marketing Material and much more. It all started with myself becoming Adobe Certified, and practically a ProCreate Professional. I played around with creating full mock brand renovations, sampling graphic designs, a lot of opinions from other professionals in this field, learning about content creation, tons of trial and error.
After months of retrying and adjusting my approaches to better reach client audiences that fit my current business model and the services I have to offer, I have built a beautiful client portfolio, and Designed some amazing projects that I am so excited to be able to announce!
It took me dedicating my daily life to my craft to make it a reality for myself today. I learned an immense amount of knowledge about understanding successful Business design in my major, I was emulating a lot of it. In Summer 2022, I made the decision to actively learn everyday how to better build a Brand from scratch, it has been an incredibly rewarding experience and my client experience has completely transformed, in the best way possible. Like I said, I am forever a student. I am proud to say that Mahealani Beauty LLC is blooming as I am.
My absolute favorite thing about what I do as a Brand Designer is being able to watch my clients face light up as I can bring their visions into fruition. My mission is to use my talents for good intentions, I love supporting businesses that are passionate about creative thinking, cultivating community, empowering lifestyles and have strong missions and visions for the future of their Brand.
My brand and my business is so special to me because it really is handcrafted to my best skills. I am proud of the fact that I have been faithful to what I know I can do best, instead of trying to fit the mold of any other businesses I look up to, I believe that I really paved my own path for myself and my business.
I am incredibly grateful to be able to wake up and do something that I love everyday, I am so excited to watch Mahealani Beauty Group LLC grow and continue to engage with other passionate individuals and companies.
How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?
Probably every odd job you can think of, haha! As I was still in school when I was saving up to make this big move, I was working as a waitress on the weekends from Thursday to Sunday as my main income, cleaning airbnbs once a week, still doing eyelash extensions in Savannah for close friends, the occasional modeling gig and providing social media management for a local business. Saving, Saving, Saving.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I had to unlearn taking advice from people who were living lives that I did not want for myself. Maybe it sounds naive but I feel like as a default, I used to believe that the people around me would want to see my dreams come true just as much as I do. The reality is that no one can see into the vision you have for yourself better than you, I learned it’s better to show up everyday than wait around explaining your dreams and never acting on them. Trust and Believe in the life you want for yourself, and go out there, put in the work and make it happen! God doesn’t plant seeds in our mind without the intention of you planting that seed and nurturing it to grow and thrive.
Contact Info:
- Website: maheabeauty.com
- Instagram: @immahealanii
Image Credits
Deante Small Mitch Ritter Aldair Maruz Andrew Gabay Clifton Carter