Chemical engineer-turned-beauty entrepreneur Aisha Ceballos-Crump couldn’t find the right products to care for her multicultural family’s wide range of hair textures…so she made them herself. And her first business, Honey Baby Naturals, was born.
But she wanted to go deeper and “create a brand that celebrates the overlooked and underrepresented Latina woman in the haircare and beauty industry”…and she launched Botánkia Beauty in 2019.
“When I quit my corporate job in 2015, it was because I wanted to change the face of beauty. I wanted to have better representation, uplift our community, and uplift our voices. I want Latina and Black women to feel pride when they see the brand on the shelf because it was created by a woman that understands us and our hair concerns,” she told InStyle.
Cellabos-Crump was the first Latina to have a natural haircare and skincare brand in mass retail. Both of her brands’ products are available in Target stores and Botánkia Beauty is also carried at Walmart.
Cellabos-Crump continues to strive to make massive change in the beauty industry and represent the Latinx community as a whole.
Ceballos-Crump’s Instagram | Botánkia Beauty | Honey Baby Naturals
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Lulu Cordero
Founder, Bomba Curls
For a long time, Lulu Cordero struggled to embrace her natural texture, but when she realized she suffered from severe traction alopecia, she turned to hair treatments from her native Dominican Republic and fell in love with her hair…and dreamed of helping women fall in love with their own natural beauty.
“I have big, natural, curly hair-which the mainstream would consider unprofessional or undesirable, basically, something that needed to be ‘fixed’—when in reality, the only thing that needed to be fixed was society’s idea of what is considered beautiful. I created Bomba Curls with the idea that it would be a celebration of what makes you unique,” she told Yitzi Weiner of Authority Magazine.
After saving for 10 years, Cordero launched Bomba Curls, a nontoxic curl product line designed to nourish and care for type 3 and 4 curls. It went on to become the first, female-owned Afro-Dominican haircare brand at Target.
Cordero continues to use her voice and influence to celebrate the beauty in everyone.
Cordero’s Instagram | Cordero’s TikTok | Bomba Curls
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Lulu Cordero’s Bomba Curls is the First Female-Owned Afro-Dominican Haircare Brand at Target
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Julissa Prado
Founder, Rizos Curls
Julissa Prado spent years straightening her curls to fit in. But in high school, she had a lightbulb moment, realizing that she “couldn’t fully love myself until I loved my hair”…and that changed everything.
After spending years carrying around a Ziploc bag (what she calls her “special little formula bag”), Prado launched Rizos Curls, a clean curl care brand, in 2017 with Rizos Curls Trio.
“I created Rizos Curls because I always felt that Latinas were left out of the curly hair conversation because the broader beauty industry did not understand the needs of curly-haired women and men across diverse communities. I wanted to change that by creating clean curl care and styling products, but also by creating culturally relevant curl content in both English and Spanish,” Prado told Latina.com.
Rizos Curls was the first Latina-owned curly hair brand sold at Ulta Beauty and the first Mexican-owned curly hair brand to be sold at Sally Beauty stores in Mexico.
Prado creates free curl education on her company’s YouTube page, continues change the norm in the industry by creating ingredient transparency, and supports other local small businesses with #RizosCurlsSmallBizGrant.
Prado’s Instagram | Prado’s TikTok | Rizos Curls
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Babba Rivera
Founder, Ceremonia
With a hairdresser father and beauty queen mother, Babba Rivera grew up in a household that prioritized beauty rituals. After relocating to the U.S. for work, she reconnected to her Latina heritage and soon became inspired to fill the gap in the Latinx haircare market.
“[A]s a Latina woman myself, I find it interesting how the Latinx communities are still very often overlooked…We are also the biggest spenders in haircare and we actually spend 46% more on hair care products. Yet, where are the brands that not only represent us but are found by us?
“I realized that I have to stop everything I’m doing and dive headfirst into this company because if I don’t do it, then who’s going to do it? I am a Latina woman who has acquired a lot of success and privilege throughout my career and I wanted to use that to drive the change that I wish to see,” she told The Quality Edit.
Ceremonia launched in October 2020 and was the first Latina-owned haircare brand at Sephora. To ensure their products are clean, Ceremonia has their “own research and development lab,…in-house chemist, and every single formula for Ceremonia has been created from scratch, replacing common filler ingredients with natural ingredients from Latin America,” Rivera told In The Know.
Rivera’s Instagram | Ceremonia | Ceremonia’s Instagram
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Stay tuned for more posts celebrating Hispanic and Latinx makeup, skin and body care, and other beauty industry founders!
