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

Miesha , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

The idea came to open my first business “Our Roots Beauty Supply” when I saw these sisters in Moreno Valley opening a beauty supply store. I knew I loved hair, I even went to school for hair but I didn’t want to be a full time stylist. When I saw that article it was like a light bulb went off in my head, I said that’s literally perfect. I can still be in the hair & beauty world! I planned for years, like I have notebooks with plans on how I was going to execute this idea. I always laughed at myself about wanting to open a store after reading their story. I was constantly complaining about not having a store close, having to go so far just for basic hair needs. I had moved from LA to Vegas and it was like a whole foreign world for me. There were no beauty supply stores. I had to drive 15 minutes just to get hair for braids. It was so weird because there are beauty supply stores on every corner in LA. Maybe I just needed to see someone that looked like me to make it seem attainable though. I don’t know.

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?

I am Miesha Riley and I am a serial entrepreneur. My very first business was an online store called MM Blankies. My second business, a brick & mortar Our Roots Beauty Supply and my final brand new baby business is Shè Bébé. I stay on “theme” with my business by staying in the hair care field. I got into this field when I dropped out of cosmo school. I learned so much about hair and hair care that these all came to me so naturally,

My baby Blankies MM Blankies prevents hair loss for babies.
Our Roots Beauty Supply has all your hair care needs and wants.
Shè Bébé is a gentle hair oil crafted for babies and toddlers.

Every business I operate is geared towards healthy hair. I am offering hair care solutions from adults to babies. I use my brick & mortar as a safe space to educate everyone on their hair care needs and try to help them understand or get to know their particular hair care needs. Weather is be their baby getting a blankie to stop their hair from rubbing out. Braiding hair for anyone who is looking for a protective style or my hair oil to help treat craddle cap or dry scalp for babies.

The main thing that set my business apart from others is I genuinely care. I have people coming in all day expressing their gratitude for my knowledge of hair care and helping them solve a problem they didn’t think could be solved,

I am most proud that I get to do what I love and I find new ways to improve. I am proud of the recognition the community has given me. The main thing I want people to know is I don’t take anyone for granted. Every interaction I have with my customers is very special to me. I appreciate them more than they understand and I do my best to express that to them individually. I Thank everyone that walk out of our doors.

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

I found out how resilient I was when I first received the keys to my store Our Roots Beauty Supply. I was prepared to open my store March of 2020. The very next week everything when into lockdown. Instead of backing out and quitting the store before I could even get it open, I stuck it out and found a way to get products and material. I never realized how bold and “matter of fact” I was being at the time but looking back now, I was unstoppable and nothing was going to kill this dream.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

The funding for Our Roots came from a job I was working at the time, profit from MM Blankies and my tax refund. I saved every dime I could to get into that space. As I mentioned earlier, I opened right when the pandemic happened so I was able to recieve from business grants from the City of Henderson and the SBA.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.SheBebeHair.com
• Instagram: @OurRootsBeauty
• Facebook: Our Roots Beauty Supply
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/our-roots-beauty-supply-henderson

Image Credits
Miesha Riley