We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Sherlline Casucian. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Sherlline below.
Sherlline, appreciate you joining us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
It all started with my eye size insecurity. I always wear a black eyeliner or false lashes to make my eye size look bigger wherever I go. I had an instantaneous feeling of confidence and that feeling I can conquer the world each time I put them on. I have different kinds of falsies and I wear them on different occasions. I believe that no one type of false eyelash kit would fit in all situations. There are times where magnetic lashes come in handy. I find them handy whenever I have a quick photoshoot or video recording or a meeting/lunch engagement. Traditional strip eyelashes on the other hand have always been my go-to for a more physical and longer wear, let’s say attending an event or even at work as I still work as a nurse and it requires a lot of physical activities. I want to look my best at work despite running around and carrying out tasks for 12-hours! DIY cluster eyelashes are something I would wear everyday even at home. I like it because I can still feel at my best if I go to the gym, run an errand or go for a stroll in the mall (you’ll never know who you would bump into!). I want to be able to share the same confident feeling that I would experience to everyone every time I put false lashes on me.
It has been quite frustrating on my part as a “lash fanatic” that some claim or market their “one-type” of eyelashes as the “best” — but of course they will, right? After trying all types of false eyelashes, I realized that NONE is better than the other. For me it is a matter of preference and appropriateness of the situation of what suits best. When I started my brand GEM.IN.EYE Cosmetics, I wanted to offer lash kits that will suit everyone’s preference. I also wanted to make the overall experience uplifting or upscaled as some lashes out there in the market tend to be too commercialized looking.
After conceptualizing the “lash kits” I knew I would eventually expand my cosmetic products. However, I don’t want to just make just any cosmetics and stamp my brand name on it. This has been widely observed in the make-up industry, most especially “celebrity brands” who just make the same thing then market their names along on it. I wanted to make mostly innovative make-up products that are going to be useful, practical yet attractive. I also had to work extensively to bring awareness to the public that we are here and that we have something really beautiful to offer to make-up enthusiasts.
Customer suggestions are important to me and their overall experience. I would ask them personally whenever they shop, or ask my influencers what they “honestly” think about the product. There would be suggestions that would not be really applicable but then there are some that would bring attention to me. Just so you know I personally test my products, wear them and test them myself before producing them. However, through time there would be “tiny details” here and there along the way that would need some improvement and that could impact the overall product experience/satisfaction. That being said, because one of our shared values is maintaining quality, we would phase out or redesign our existing products — even if it is a fall out or a financial loss on my part. I don’t believe in the saying of “Get a best marketer and you can sell an “okay product”. I always look at the long run. That’s why even though I am not getting hundreds of shoppers yet in my ecommerce store, I am proud that we have a high rate of of returning customers.
Sherlline, 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?
I am a nurse by profession. I have as much interest in science as I have in arts. I am the kind of student in the past that excelled academically and had extra curricular activities at the same time and still excell on it. Human body, biology and astronomy were my best fortes when I was in school. I enjoy it because I am always curious how our body works or what the universe is made of. Outside the classroom though, I am passionate about the creative arts. Multiple times I have received “Best in Arts” awards during grades school. You would also see me as part of the drama club or as cheerleader in our cheering squad. Now that I am an adult, as much as I enjoy being a Critical Care Nurse for about 15 years, my passion is craving and calling for me in the creative world. Since putting up this business I was able to continuously tap my endless creative ideas and share it with everyone.
Ever since starting with this brand 2 years ago, it brought me to a new type of experiences and accomplishments. I had an opportunity to share and showcase our brand twice during NEW YORK FASHION WEEK. The latest edition, I was able to launch one of our GEM.IN.EYE Cosmetics Original products – Blush & Bloom™. It is a real looking rose-shaped face blush. It also smells like a freshly cut rose too! It is really gorgeous, and the feedback I am receiving is really positive. They say they have never seen anything like it before, or that it’s so beautiful they don’t even want to use it! LOL. A beauty influencer named Soll Pena who has 5.6 million followers on TikTok reviewed one of our rose blushes. She reviewed our face blush without any ties or connections with us and directly bought herself straight up from Amazon. Her video review about it garnered (as of writing) 2.4 MILLION VIEWS on TikTok.
This year is another year of more exposure for our brand. For the first quarter alone, we will now have an opportunity to showcase our products during LA Fashion Week, Coachella and even at a pre-Oscars event at their “invite-only” gifting suite. I believe that it is imperative for our brand to be actively seen in important events like these to create more brand awareness, to keep building our community and to show the world that we are here and that we are serious about our brand.
Aside from that, we have another GEM.IN.EYE Cosmetics Original product which we will soft launch this February 2023 and then officially launch it in LAFW. We created a lip kit that has a liquid matte lipstick, a full colored lipgloss and a full sized lipliner ALL IN THE SAME SHADE. There is nothing like this again in the market yet, that’s why we call it our “original product”. The lip kit is called “The Royal Lipkit” as I believe that it is the best set of lip products one can ever own. The kit is sold as set. It is also named after my fascination about anything royal or medieval.
In addition, we already released a “Love Edition” of our Blush & Bloom™ Rose Shaped Blush. It comes in special luxurious matte square packaging. Compared to our classic version, the “love edition” is a blush kit to come together with a flat blush brush for a complete blushing experience.
How did you build your audience on social media?
I have to say it is pretty hard putting up a social media audience. When I say hard, it is really HARD especially if you are going for an organic route. If I am being honest, we are still struggling. Right now we have about 6.6K followers on Instagram. People nowadays are into metrics and numbers. As much as we wanted to make the brand “look” like we have a large following — I want to go the organic route. It’s so easy to pay these social media agencies who would give us thousands of “followers”. I didn’t go that route because I don’t want followers that are not from the region of where the brand is. Let’s say these agencies will have followers that are from outside the United States. Even though I would want to have a global reach, I believe that it is best to concentrate in one region first especially for a start-up brand like us. More so, the followers that these agencies offer are mostly bots or fake followers that make fake engagement or create fake views. As much as possible I want our brand to be Instagram Compliant. I also want a more organic engagement. This way I can personally measure the engagement I am getting and study what kinds of “posts” will my audience will actually interact or engage the most. I always prefer quality over quantity followers.
However, all brands need some sort of support and boost. In my personal experience I get plenty of organic reach and engagement whenever I am present in events e.g NYFW. I also do “Celebrity Follow” campaigns where known celebrities or influencers would encourage their followers to follow brands like me and in exchange can enter the raffle for a chance to win prizes. However, I always check-off the “niche” and the age group of that celebrity/influencer. Let’s say the campaign is coming from a Fitness Influencer/Celebrity – even if he/she has a large following I would turn down this campaign as the probability of the audience that will participate are interested in “fitness” type of content rather than Beauty, Fashion & Lifestyle content which my brand offers. I know after the raffle campaign is over, I would eventually be unfollowed. So I shy away from those kinds of follow campaigns.
Have you ever had to pivot?
I had a real tough time during the first two years in the business. Just so you know, I am doing this business mostly by myself. I would get help every now and then. I am fortunate already to have support coming from my husband and very close friends and I have my brand model ambassador who supports me all the way! But the bulk of work is ofcourse coming from the mastermind – ME. I am also still a working professional. Balancing between building a brand, running a business, continuing my nursing career and taking care of my personal life is such a big adjustment that I had to put together. There was a time when it was affecting my personal life that I went into a terrible crisis. At one point I went into a deep depression. This depression is not just something I subjectively claim, I was actually diagnosed by my primary care physician that I have it. I didn’t even realize I was undergoing this kind of crisis not until I was told towards the end of my annual check-up. I have known myself to always be mentally tough, so getting into a state of depression is something that is out of ordinary for me. I am also usually cheerful and positive. However, there will always be a question of, “Is it worth continuing this?”. It’s hard to maintain motivation all the time. When you are putting in a lot of work and it’s not being paid off of course you start to question your efforts especially if it is at the expense of your personal life. But a “Never Give Up” attitude is ingrained in me. I also believe I have a group of skills and talent that I can share and make use of. So during the times that I feel down and unmotivated, I give myself a break and let those emotions pass and find a reason, no matter how small the reason is, to continue and press on. I had a lot of adjustments to make for myself to try to balance it out but also I think everyone around me adjusted with my new role. Just so you know the capital that I use from the business is mostly coming from my hard earnings as a nurse. Aside from personal changes, I also made a change in my career like switching from Full-Time to Per Diem to have more flexibility in my schedule and juggle around all the responsibilities on my plate. Right now, I learned to stop when it’s time to stop, or make a switch from one stuff to another. If it’s family time, it’s family time. I stop whatever I am doing and not entertain any business stuff because I believe the happiness that my family brings me can never be replaced by a business no matter how successful it may be. Then If I am working as a nurse mode, I switch and focus on being a nurse — taking care of patients also makes me feel grounded and that it teaches me from time to time that life is fragile no matter our status — rich or poor. And then the rest of the days I will do the business, do meetings, research, talk to manufacturers or design — these bring out my strong passion for creativity.I also binge watch selected shows on Netflix or play mobile games on my phone and I love going to the gym!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.gemineyecosmetics.com
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/gemineyecosmetics
- Facebook: https://facebook.com/gemineyecosmetics
Image Credits
These images are all from Gemineye Cosmetics team