We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Krystle Karee. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Krystle below.

Alright, Krystle thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

At Magic Glam Academy our mission is to empower female professionals by providing the tools and knowledge to show up confidently in their business.

As a female entrepreneur and professional, I believe business and beauty go hand-in-hand, and being able to do your own makeup empowers us as professional women to show up confidently in business each day.

Krystle, 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?

My passion for makeup, design, user experience, and most importantly, empowering other women is what inspired me to create the Magic Glam Academy brand.

I created my first brand “Krystle Karee Makeup” as a college final-year project in 2010. Since then, I’ve been working on my craft and had the privilege of spearheading and collaborating on a multitude of projects in the entertainment, beauty, real estate, and software industry,

After moving from Jamaica to Florida back in 2014, I found myself having to pivot from video production due to my limited network and resources to refocus my efforts on branding, design, and makeup while navigating my way on this new journey.

During that time, I was able to reach for a long overdue dream of mine, which was creating a makeup line of my own. In 2015, I got the opportunity to work with a lab in New York City and launched Facety Gyal Cosmetics.

Due to my limited resources, I had to be extremely creative with my marketing so I started applying my knowledge in videography/video production to brand photography in order to create the content needed to promote my brand.

Shortly after launching, I began getting calls from other female entrepreneurs asking for my assistance in building their brands which led to me accepting branding photography clients who also wanted their makeup done.

During these branding sessions, clients would always ask questions about the makeup products and techniques I would use on them, this had me constantly consulting and helping them along in their beauty journey.

I found that the purpose that truly kept my passion alive was simply being helpful to others and using my talent to do this. My client consultations were the “AHA” moment that inspired the creation of  Magic Glam Academy and our makeup workshop “Makeup & Mimosas”.

Our workshops are focused on teaching female professionals practical makeup techniques that can be applied to their daily routine while covering the core fundamentals of choosing the right products for their skin type and skin tone.

Participants are provided with custom glam boxes and taken through a hands-on and  interactive experience to learn how to do their own makeup.

We serve a yummy brunch with bottomless mimosas and our curated workshop playlist sets the mood and provides the perfect audio sensory stimulation to get the creative juices of our participants flowing.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Having to overcome the challenges of being a young mom in college and starting a new life is what I felt tested my resilience. My hope for sharing this story is that it inspires other young moms with a gift and a dream, to never throw in the towel or give up on themselves.

Life has tested me quite a few times but the period that stands out the most was a life-changing event that presented me with two options, to continue living in my comfort zone or take the biggest risk to build a better future for myself and my son.

I went to college in Jamaica, where I had to defy all odds to make it into a very competitive Visual Communications program. After fighting and having to prove myself in order to secure a spot in the program, I found myself pregnant in my final year. For me, giving up was never an option because I was going to school to develop skills that I was very passionate about.

Working through morning sickness all the way up until Summer break, secured me a spot for graduation but it still was not guaranteed because I needed to complete my final year show. A major event that would provide me with the opportunity to showcase my skills on various national platforms and also receive my final grades.

That Summer I flew to Florida (as I was a resident at that time) to have my baby. During that time, I worked on my final year project up until being rushed to the hospital due to hemorrhaging where I had to have an emergency c-section. It took me a few weeks to recover and come to terms with what had happened and get used to my new reality that involved taking care of a newborn.

Before I knew it 6 weeks had passed and his dad decided to leave, so I knew at that moment I had to make a decision to either stay here in Florida, give up all that I was able to accomplish with school in Jamaica, or find the courage to pack up and head back to Jamaica to complete my degree.

I feel like finding my passion at an early age, helped me to uphold certain values. I’ve used these values over the years to navigate my way through life. I taught myself Photoshop in high school and was hell-bent on becoming a Graphic Designer, so I knew I had to complete what I started.

As soon as I got my baby’s passport I grabbed what I could and headed back to Jamaica to complete my degree. I was able to pull off a successful final year show and officially launched my first brand “Krystle Karee Makeup”.

I believe utilizing all the free time I had during my pregnancy to focus on my “ONE THING” which was my final year show, is what led to the success of the event. When I moved to Florida I had no distractions and I used that to my advantage.

The final year show opened a lot of doors for me and I was able to showcase my skillset in design and makeup. Shortly after my exhibition was showcased on the national TV station I began getting calls from movie and music video producers wanting to hire me to do makeup on various shoots.

Over the period of 4 years, I created two brands while living in Jamaica, “Krystle Karee Makeup” and “Krystle Karee Artistic Media” offering makeup and design services, then later pivoting into video production. I met so many amazing people and worked with a few renowned Jamaican artists like Mr. Vegas, Busy Signal, Ishawna, Keida, Rootz Underground, just to name a few.

All was going well until another life-changing event occurred and I was faced with the option to stay in Jamaica or move to Florida full-time to make a better life for my son. It took me some time but I knew I would not have been able to provide the quality life my son deserved if I continued in my current situation. So I decided to give up everything, packed a suitcase, took the extra bedroom at my friend’s home, and had to figure it out from there.

I lived with functional depression for quite some time and what I’ve learned and hope that you can take away from this, is that you can’t control your feelings but you can control your behavior. What you’re able to achieve, relies greatly on what you DO daily. 

So in 2015 after a year of trying to navigate through my new life, that’s when I decided to put my entrepreneurial hat back on and created Facety Gyal a cosmetics brand and even though the brand wasn’t as successful, I didn’t give up. 

I just took some much-needed time to work on improving my mind and my body. During that time of personal growth, I learned to love and value myself which resulted in me having the courage to relaunch my brands “Krystle Karee Makeup” & “Krystle Karee Artistic Media” now called “Magic Glam Academy” and “Think Magic Solutions”.

Any advice for growing your clientele? What’s been most effective for you?

First, what I’ve noticed over the years is that being my authentic self first, has helped me to attract clients that I actually enjoy working with. You share so much of your space and give so much of your time and energy to your clients so enjoying them is something I strongly believe is important.

Second is the customer experience, people will always remember the way you made them feel so I spend tons of time in this area, creating and fine-tuning the experience of their journey with me. That great experience usually turns into repeated business or referrals.

The third is delivering on the promise made to the client if you promised high-quality work or an increase in customer acquisition, ensure the strategies you’re using provides these results. Also, don’t be afraid to fail, if you find you’re strategies aren’t working just go back to the drawing board and create new ones. 

DON’T GIVE UP • KEEP GOING

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.magicglamacademy.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/themagic_glamacademy/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/magicglamacademy
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/krystlekaree/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCh7UG85DerLplSSI2-BXjOA

Image Credits
Jhaneal Symone