The Year 2020 was a heart-breaking year for most businesses and manufacturers in our economic system.  Since the beginning of the Covid Pandemic, like many other industries, our Beauty Supply Market was hit hard with some difficult challenges that we haven’t seen in decades. With confusion, lack of workers, and national shutdowns, our industry ran into a major halt.  Many of our big hair care brands were not able to keep up with the demands, not because the demand grew, just simply because it wasn’t able to produce.  The manufacturers and supply chains in the beauty industries’ abilities to keep shelves stocked lead to our consumers to look for other means to keep up with their beauty supply needs. This is when social media and e-commerce combined and made ways for the “Indie” Brands.

Indie Brands, or independent brands, were starting to become popular even before the Pandemic because of its “niche” to be able to cater to its consumers’ specific needs that the big brands were overlooking because of their corporate policies and politics.   Now with these factors such as big brands suffering from their own issues and with opportunities with ecommerce readily available, combined with consumers with free time since the shutdown, it was a gold mine for these emerging entrepreneurs to take advantage of the bad situation for the better.

There were hundreds, if not thousands, with the help of social media, of these indie brands taking notice during the pandemic.  Most of them were being profitable, but not sustainable. Because most of these so called “entrepreneurs”, with no background in business, lack the fundamentals of the running a successful business. But not all Indie Brands were going to fail.  There were a handful of them that lasted and has scaled up to become one of the contenders in our Beauty industry.  One of them, with the help of experienced professionals of the industry, that have been trending is Nouvelle Nouveau.

Nouvelle Nouveau was created about 3 years ago, before the pandemic. Unlike other Indie Brands, Novelle Nouveau was created with the help of beauty expertise in our industry to meet the “niche” of end consumers and to meet the requirements of everyone in the beauty supply chains from manufacturing to distributors.  So, what does Nouvelle Nouveau, mean? It means “NEW NEW”, Nouvelle for Feminine and Nouveau for Masculine. meaning its for men and women. With the end consumers in mind, they currently have 5 SKU’s. and more coming down the line.

Nouvelle Nouveau Foam Set is available with 4 different “Flavors” with each of them being unique to satisfy the specific needs of the everyday users. With the hair trend evolving from just Natural styles to a more Protective Styles, such as Braids, Twists, and Locs, these 4 fabulous products were created for easy maintenance and daily use for the Natural Protective styles.

The Nouvelle Nouveau Texturizing Foam (Green Apple). This foam Styler is for the natural look and shine. It is bouncy and light for everyday use to maintain the styles with a firm natural hold. It can be used on both natural and relaxed hair, and safe for colored hair. With natural ingredients and alcohol free, it eliminates any build up, residue and flake free.

The Nouvelle Nouveau Curl Defining Foam w/ Extra hold (Cherry). This Foam Styler is one of the top sellers in the foam line. This foam is so versatile.  With Extra hold, the foam can be used to lay those stubborn edges while also bringing out the natural curls with more light bounce and shine. Did we mention, it has the hold of an Extra hold edge control without the stickiness?

The Nouvelle Nouveau Leave in Conditioner Foam (Blueberry). This Foam is for EVERYONE! Short hair, long hair, natural, relaxed hair, colored hair, grey hair. You name it. This Foam is a maintenance free moisturizer. You pump some in your hands and work it in your hair and leave it in. Stay hydrated all day. No build up so you can use every day to condition your hair.

The Nouvelle Nouveau Waterless no rinse Foam (Grape). This foam is for convenience. For hair styles that require cleansing without the mess of water to ruin that expensive hair style. Pump it and leave it to do its thing cleaning the scalp. You can use everyday to remove the dirt and natural build up to provide a healthy scalp for your hair follicles to grow hair. This is the perfect products to have in between your regular shampoo days.

Now since we described each product in our Foam line, let’s get into the Braiding Gel.  Like mentioned before, Nouvelle Nouveau listened to both consumer and business partners to see what is desperately needed on the shelf. That answer was Braiding gel.

Nouvelle Nouveau “Stay Laid” Braiding gel. This is not just any styling gel. It is a Braiding Gel to keep those braids, locs and twisit styles in shape while strong enough to lay those 4c curl edges down. With extensive market research, and tested among hundreds of Briaders and Locticians, the Nouvelle Nouveau became a go to essential for these stylists.

Like many indie Brands, Nouvelle Nouveau has gained a lot of tractions from social media followers within a couple of months after launching, but unlike most, Nouvelle Nouveau was carefully created with experience.  With many Brands coming into the market, store owners will have to be extra careful when it comes to choosing which items to carry and push. The store credibility depends on what products that the store carries.  At Nouvelle Nouveau, the products are not made by
“kitchen chemists”.  Each of its products are created with highly recommended ingredients with each individual benefits.

With or without the pandemic still going on, it is hard to run a successful business with business partners that does not have a solid foundation. That said, a lot of indie companies are good, and some are doing well, but keep in mind that just because they have the demands doesn’t mean they are capable to be profitable and sustainable.  Carrying a product that does not have the business basics means bad for YOUR business.