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

Serena, appreciate you joining us today. So, what do you think about family businesses? Would you want your children or other family members to one day join your business?

As a homeschooling stay at home mom, I’ve always wanted to have a business. My mom ran one when I was younger and I’ve always envisioned having that myself.

Two of my girls and my husband help with the business quite a bit. My husband helps with the finances. My 15 and 17 year olds help me make and package the products and they help with the packing for shipping.

I love that this is something that we can do together. At this point it would be better to have a facility or an office somewhere, but I like that we can do what we need to at home without having to go somewhere else to do everything. We listen to music and sing. It’s work, but it’s so much fun. My son is a full time graphic designer and helps with some graphics and design work and my oldest daughter has helped a lot with the packaging and product ideas.

I love being with my kids and having them help with this business has been such an added bonus.

Serena, 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’ve always been interested in health and nutrition. About 12 years ago I began using essential oils for cleaning and healthcare. That’s when I found out how important it was to remove toxic products from our lives.

A few years ago I got a booth at our local farmers market selling some products with essential oils in them and I was making and selling lotions made from coconut oil and shea butter. Then I started reading about the benefits of beef tallow on our skin. It’s ancestral and goes back to the dawn of time. It’s one of the most natural products that you can put on your skin and is minimally processed.

Tallow lotion is more compatible to the cells of our skin than any other skincare product. I’m trying to set myself apart for the other companies by staying as natural as possible and by not adding a lot of other products. Many other companies use olive oil, jojoba oil, and coconut oil in their products I’m trying to be mainly animal based since those fats are so similar to ours. On a cellular level, they work better for things like acne, eczema, psoriasis, dry skin, dermatitis, diaper rash, chapped lips, and other skin problems than manmade and plant based products. Our products have other skin improving products in them like emu oil, wild camel hump fat, and goose fat. These fats are specifically chosen for their healing and moisturizing properties.

All of the products come in an unscented variety for those that don’t want scents in them while others are lightly scented with good, quality, natural essential oils. We have many different scents, Lavender is in several of the products because it’s well known for its skin improving and anti aging properties. We also just purchased rose oil from a plantation in Bulgaria so that we could bring our customers the beautiful scent of roses that they can wear.

We also have spray lotion, pump lotions, facial oil cleanser, over night mask lotion, lip balm, natural, tallow based candles, lotion in a squeeze tube, and salt scrub. Everything is natural and made in house….literally, in our house.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

I think having a good social media presence to begin with can be a huge help when building a business. Reaching out to influencers and sending out some free products and asking for a review can help a lot and advertising is huge. People can’t learn about your products without seeing ads. You really do have to be willing to money to make money. You have to be willing to put yourself out there and stand by your products.

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

I’ve always wanted to have a successful business and have had many small businesses over the years.

I had to learn that I can do it! I had to learn that it was possible.

My mom had a small business years ago and took on some partners that ended up taking the company from her. I learned from that lesson and I will always want to be involved and know what’s going on from day to day.

Pretty soon we will need to hire some help and I plan on hiring my children’s friends to give them a safe, fun place to work with their friends. If we need more help, I plan to hire other stay at home moms, even those with small children that don’t have childcare. They can bring their kids when they come to work.

Contact Info:

• Website: Purelytallow.com
• Instagram: @purelytallowskincare
• Facebook: Purely Tallow Skincare