We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ana Núñez a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Ana, appreciate you joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

Being an entrepreneur wasn’t in my plans, and if I was told I’d own a curly hair brand I would’ve laughed. I grew up hating my curly hair. It wasn’t until my own daughter asked to straighten her curls that I realized I had to learn to embrace mine. In the process of learning how to care for my hair, I also learned how exploitative and broken the recycle system is. When I went looking for a sustainable haircare alternative and couldn’t find anything that was good for curls, I knew there was potential to make a difference. I launched Vida Bars with the intention of making a positive impact and to this day, it’s what drives the business. Being motivated by money would have been detrimental, because new business aren’t always profitable. But when it’s gotten really hard, I’ve continued to push forward because I know I’m making the difference I sought after from the beginning.

Ana, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I launched Vida Bars, as the only sustainable alternative to curly haircare. I spent a year formulating and testing products before launching from my kitchen. Four years later, we continue to handcraft our products, but have scaled production to a commercial facility. With six different lines of shampoo and conditioner bars, along with a leave-in conditioner, we’re providing premium products tailored to the diverse needs of textured hair. Thousands of women across the US, Canada, Mexico and other international locations are falling in love with their curls because of the results they see with Vida Bars. And with their support, we’ve saved close to half a million plastic bottles from ever being produced and going to landfills. My biggest point of pride with my brand is that we put people over profit in everything we do. We strive to give back to the community and are keeping that commitment by partnering with a coop of indigenous artisans from Mexico for some of our packaging, through donating a portion of our profits to a fund for domestic violence survivors and by in kind gifts to several organizations working with our local unsheltered population. I started this business driven by impact, and it’s so gratifying to see it come to fruition every day!

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

Resilience is at the core of my business. I launched from the kitchen of my home, at the beginning of the pandemic, as a single mom of two, while working a full time job and finishing my master’s degree. I had never owned a business and had everything to learn. We’ve stayed in business for four years and continue to grow, because we started with nothing and had to make the most of every single opportunity. Being self-funded has taught us to be resourceful, which goes hand in hand with resilience – making the best of everything you have.

Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.

For the first six months, I was making products out of my kitchen. However, that was not a sustainable business practice and had to quickly scale production. Those six months, I stayed sold out, every batch I dropped was selling out within days and then within hours. I had to go back to the drawing board and come up with a new way of producing our bars that was scalable and leaner. I bought commercial equipment and moved production to my garage for another six months. A year after launching, I moved into a commercial space where it was easier to manufacture, warehouse and ship our products. It has been and continues to be a big learning opportunity. Every day I look at how we can optimize time and effort. I have considered outsourcing production to a vendor. However, manufacturing our products is what’s best for us because we can maintain flexibility and stay true to our mission of putting people over profit by being a great employer to our team.

Contact Info:

• Website: thevidabars,com
• Instagram: instagram.com/thevidabars
• Facebook: facebook.com/thevidabars
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/anaperla/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thevidabars

Image Credits
Tia Dawn Photography