Dive Brief:
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Supergoop has expanded its C-suite with the promotion of Britany LeBlanc to chief marketing officer and the hire of Ryan Crowley as chief financial officer and chief operating officer.
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LeBlanc has been with the DTC sunscreen startup for five years, most recently as senior vice president of marketing, according to a company email.
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Crowley previously served as CFO at Intermix and Marc Jacobs, and has held senior finance positions at luxury conglomerate LVMH.
Dive Insight:
LeBlanc and Crowley join founder Holly Thaggard and CEO Amanda Baldwin in forging next steps for the cult sun protection brand, which has had a busy year following its sale of a majority stake to Blackstone at the end of last year.
Supergoop isn’t just depending on the exclamation point in its trademark to generate enthusiasm for its products. The brand is taking advantage of wholesale’s ability to bolster sales and marketing and has partnered with retailers including Sephora, Nordstrom, Bluemercury, Anthropologie, Amazon and Ulta.
The brand, which specializes in creating a wide variety of products that include sun protection, was founded by Thaggard in 2005, after a close friend was diagnosed with skin cancer at age 29. Baldwin told Retail Dive last year that her vision for growth at Supergoop includes finding new ways to work SPF into products consumers will want to wear every day.
“If I can give you a beauty product or a skincare product that you love to wear anyway, and then slip in the SPF, that’s my best shot at encouraging you to wear it every single day,” Baldwin said. “The first insight that drove the product development of this brand was not that there wasn’t enough sunscreen, but that nobody actually enjoyed wearing it.”
Baldwin became CEO of the brand in January last year, bringing private equity experience as well as time spent at beauty giants Estée Lauder and LVMH. Her financial background has meant an emphasis on profitability at Supergoop, while her beauty experience means she knows what she’s looking for in scaling the company.
“It’s easier to build a house if you’ve lived in a house,” Baldwin said last year of building the Supergoop brand. “When you start at a few million dollars, and you’re trying to build something that I fundamentally believe will be a multi-billion dollar global company one day, it helps to know what one looks like.”
