We recently connected with Kayla Baskin and have shared our conversation below.

Kayla , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

Many people may not know this but I first started Bodthentic because of my love for hair care. I always knew I wanted to have my own line of products and I’ve always been into health and wellness and the beauty space in general. So initially the idea started with my desire to create a toxin-free hair care line. Eventually, I expanded on my overall love for personal care, and I pivoted and made the focus of Bodthentic head-to-toe body care. I’ve always been a person that would shy away from certain products (especially fragranced products) because I’ve always had sensitive skin so I wanted to cater to people not only like me who have sensitivities and who prefer fragrance-free products, but also those who love to smell good but not at the expense of their overall health. So with that in mind I took the time to research and found a way to implement toxin-free fragrance into my products. All of our fragranced products are formulated with non-toxic fragrances that contain NO: Carcinogens, Mutagens, or Reproductive toxins of any kind. I felt like other brands were not being transparent about the risks associated with fragrance and I felt like there was a need in the beauty space for Bodthentic as well as conversations about toxins in beauty care.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

My name is Kayla Baskin, I am 28 years old and I am the founder and CEO of a personal care brand called Bodthentic. Bodthentic is home of the #1 Body Butter blends, fragrance free options for sensitive skin, and high quality hand-crafted personal care products for your every need! Inspired by my love for skin care, beauty, and holistic health, I decided to launch my own personal care business. With a history of struggling with fragrance and chemical sensitivities and the knowledge about common toxins found in our everyday beauty care products, I set out to create my own non-toxic products and share them with the world. I wanted to create a genuine brand with safe and authentic ingredients and I did. With a background in research and science, a love for photography, and several years experience in retail and customer service, I decided to combine my skills and passions to hone in on this idea I had. I left my career as a Clinical Laboratory Scientist and became a product formulator for Bodthentic and my business was born.

What Im most proud of is the inclusivity of my brand. I wanted to create a space for the sensitive “Bodbabes” like myself. What I want potential Bodbabes to know about my brand is that we have something for everyone, even the most sensitive skin types and we are committed to providing the highest quality of products always.

Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?

Excluding a few products we source such as our natural clays or African black soap, we manufacture almost all of our products. I have a background in molecular biology, chemistry, and I worked in a clinical laboratory so I knew a few things. I took the good clinical practices, antiseptic techniques + more that I learned in my previous roles into account when building my foundation when it comes to formulating. I spent a lot of time educating myself and even now I’m committed to continous development so I will forever be a student and always invest in learning more about formulating.

I had to learn a lot about manufacturing products. So much goes into it but the biggest thing is trial and error and that good things take time. You can not rush when manufacturing products.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

On this entrepreneur journey the biggest thing I had to unlearn was that my journey would look like everyone else’s. I started my brand from the bottom with no experience. In this social media day and age, its easy to find inspiration and even easier to compare. I had to learn to trust my own journey and God’s timing regardless of what was going on around me. When I first started out, that thinking put a lot of stress on me. I ran into some hiccups and questioned myself a lot because I saw other brands scaling and finding sucess in a short time period (what seemed like overnight). I started to wonder had I “bit more off than I can chew”, or was I missing something? But overtime I’ve just learned to trust my journey. I also had to define what “success” looked like for me and continue to strive for that. Since then, everything has started to fall into place.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.bodthentic.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/bodthentic
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/bodthentic
• Twitter: www.twitter.com/Bodthentic
• Other: Tiktok: www.tiktok.com/@Bodthentic

Image Credits
Kayla Baskin