We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Justin Dupont-Price a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Justin, thanks for joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?
EDGE/BEAUTY came to me at a time when I think I needed it the most. I had just lost my mom and I really wanted to feel like I had something of my own that was uniquely mine to fill the void that was left in my life. I had to drop from art school at the time because I couldn’t afford. I got the idea for this brand and I spent months thinking about it so I knew after thinking about it for 3-4 months I had to do it. It just felt right and I wasn’t worried about how much work it was going to be because I knew it was worth all in the end. It definitely was too now looking back. It made me excited and it also gave me an escape to express myself like I never did before.
Justin, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
I went to KCAI for 2 years and studied painting. I’ve been doing makeup for 5 years now and have committed everyday to it since I started. When I first started I would just sit in my dark bedroom in the basement of my parents house and just paint my face. I would watch YouTube and follow people on Instagram because I didn’t know how to start. I would experiment with a ton of different looks to really find what I liked most. After 4 years I really know what I loved which was mostly creative, graphic and out there looks! I launched EDGE/BEAUTY In 2021. I launched my brand because I felt that there wasn’t a brand that was made for me. Everything was suited for heterosexual people or feminine women or vice versa for straight masculine men. I felt that we needed something in the middle that was for anyone who didn’t fit the mold or wasn’t being represented enough. I wanted to create a space for people who could express themselves and be whoever they choose. I am so proud that people have found themselves and found something on EDGE/BEAUTY that they love and feel relates to who they are. I never thought I’d be able to do it and I did. I’m forever grateful to everyone who’s supported me this far already!
Can you talk to us about manufacturing? How’d you figure it all out? We’d love to hear the story.
50% of my products are manufactured partially in China and some are handmade in the US by myself. I did a TON of research to find what was good and what wasn’t. Finding. A manufacturer that does vegan and cruelty free products is very difficult. That’s why only a handful of my products are made by a third party. Especially at the price that I sell. Manufacturing gets very expensive and it all comes down to ingredients and packaging.
Can you tell us about what’s worked well for you in terms of growing your clientele?
INSTAGRAM has been incredibly helpful is building a brand and business. The tools they provide and sleek and streamlined that it makes everything very simple. SHOPIFY is the Platform I use for my website and they are amazing as well. Having a website is a ton of work and they make it so simple that it takes almost no thought and that helped me so much. I’m not much of a tech person so I needed as much assistance as I could get!
Contact Info:
- Website: Edge-beauty.com
- Instagram: @shopedgebeauty
Image Credits
Image 1: ALANA GIVENS IMAGE 2: FAYE JOHNSON photos taken by JUSTIN DUPONT PRICE