One thing's for sure. Time just keeps passing by. Lucky for us, we get to celebrate along the way. Here's to marking another year on the calendar of life. Happy Birthday to members born in the month of January!

1/3 - Suzzette Moulin,New Alchemy
1/5 - Rae (Kat) Switzer, RAESIN IMAGES Mineral Cosmetics and Skin Care
1/8 - Alan Keay, Birch Hill Happenings Aromatherapy
1/9 - Karen Mallinger, All Goode Gifts
1/11 - Mark Macy, Alternative Beauty
1/11 - Gina Rafkind, Veda Sun
1/13 - Linda Ruda, Pelle Dolce Soaps
1/13 - Maryclaire Mayes, Alabu Soap
1/14 - Lydia Poblano, Vintage Spa
1/15 - Elise Pearlstine, Sweetgrass Botanicals
1/16 - Margaret Helm-Duell, Natural Indulgences
1/16 - Lela Barker, Bella Lucce
1/22 - Stephanie Grussing, MoSoap
1/22 - Monika Dowker, Aquarius Aromatherapy & Soap
1/23 - Monique Toegan, Essential Wonder Bath Works
1/23 - Arnaud Adrian, Adrian America, Inc.
1/23 - Elizabeth Kryszan, Harmonious Essentials
1/24 - Marla Wilson, Marla's Apothecary
1/24 - Lisa Espenmiller, Venus Bee
1/26 - Lisa Lengstorf, Le'Saric
1/26 - Takuya Sugi, Alternative Consumer Products Co., Ltd.
1/27 - Ann Walls, Afrocentric Imports
1/28 - Jenn Russo, UDesignWePrint.com
1/30 - Blondell Lehocki, Lady Hawk Of Heartland
1/30 - Stephanie Weise, Footbridge
1/31 -  Melissa Holowaty, PhytoAromatics

\Life.Style CEO\n. A person who owns and manages a business, not solely for financial gain, but also to enjoy the personal rewards of entrepreneurship, independence, flexibility and fun.

What's in store at Lifestyle CEO:

• Conference - Lisa Price of IBN member Carol's Daughter (recently featured in Vogue and Celebrity Living magazines) has been confirmed as a speaker at the first Lifestyle CEO Conference on January 28, 2006 in Washington, DC. Register today! Licensed child care is available! Email me if you'd like a personal "Suggestion" sent to someone who loves you to give you the Conference as the ultimate holiday gift to support your business endeavors! Spaces are filling up -- reserve yours today!
• Blog - Come blog with me about everything from business to life and everything in between! New blogs include an inspirational message to encourage you to dream big and move toward your dreams!
• Book - Set for publication next month, and featuring the revolutionary new "Lifestyle CEO Business Action Model (BAM!!) Copies can be reserved for shipping next month!

Building It Big! An encore of one of the most popular shows! Today's Lifestyle CEO Internet Radio Show guest is Graceann Keohohou Lee, co-founder of the Direct Selling Women's Alliance (www.mydswa.org). Graceann is an industry expert with several years of marketing experience, and she has the tips and strategies you need to make your direct sales business a success  She is a co-author of "Build It Big: 101 Insider Secrets from Top Direct Selling Experts", and "Build It Big 2" will be published in 2006. She discussed starting a business as a consultant and as a brand owner and shared her tips for business/life balance and success. You can enjoy the recording of the show and all other Lifestyle CEO Shows at our Internet Radio website link.

Introduction to Monave Mineral Cosmetics

Monave Mineral Cosmetics has been an IBN member since 2003. Started by Debbie Bilezikian in Baltimore, Monave is dedicated to providing fine quality natural mineral cosmetics. The company also supplies raw cosmetic colorants to handcrafters of soaps and toiletries, as well as bulk-blended mineral cosmetics for others who can supply their own packaging and labeling.

Why the Name "Monave"?

“Monave stands for modern, natural and versatile,” says Debbie. “My products are multi-functional and I wanted that to be reflected in the name. I also wanted women to know that “natural” didn’t necessarily mean that you had to wear Birkenstocks, but that rather, “natural” could be incorporated into any lifestyle.

In The Beginning ...

Before children, Debbie was an ESL (English as Second Language) teacher. She stayed home with her son Luis, now 8, for a year and a half. “I tried teaching ESL part time,” she says. Her husband who is in the retail business helped her get a kiosk in a mall to sell a company’s makeup.

“The company gave me a lot of odd colors that didn’t sell for them. I’m an artist and I used those skills to remix the makeup and it sold fast,” she says. “Then I got my own kiosk and I had no money, but I paid out $300 to decorate my kiosk and my husband got me a spot in a good mall down by the inner harbor in Baltimore.”

Debbie says she was selling loose mineral makeup products and she did “great” with the tourists in the summer and the school groups, mostly during February through May. She decided she wanted to change the formula for the matte and foundation because they weren’t natural enough. “I started doing research. No one wanted to help me, but I kept at it and got tidbits,” she says. “I made a lot of mistakes along the way.”

Balancing Family and Self

Debbie is a multi-talented, creative artist. She paints and draws and she’s a musician and a songwriter. She’s an environmentalist and a community activist who involves herself in issues relating to the health of forests, air and water, as well as local issues in Baltimore.  She’s a classically trained musician also who performs weekly as well as working on her own CD of her original music.

Her day has to include her music, because that’s her soul. She is able to send her kids to private school, so her early mornings are devoted to her songwriting and music. Then around 11 she starts in at her local warehouse where she has six employees and she spends hours on the phone and in e-mails (she is a “voracious e-mailer”), but at 4 p.m. she’s out the door because that’s her time with her kids, Luis, 8 and Nino, 4. Plus summers and holidays she and her husband share care of his children from a previous marriage, Canela, 16 and Jona, 10. “My children come to work with me on their days off from school,” she says. “ They toddle around on the computer and get into everything, but I can usually rope them into some sort of interesting activity for at least half an hour while I get some work done.”

Debbie says those afternoons with her children are precious to her, especially since she hasn’t always been that strict about her time. “I used to work until 6 pm.,” she says. “Now I take off to spend time with my kids. I tell customers I’ve got to go. My best customers are moms and they understand my values as I understand theirs.”

“We promote and support each other,” she says. “I turn down high pressure people. I won’t let their emergencies become my emergencies. Instead I spend my energy on my regular customers like the 200 or so people who call me weekly.”

She spent a long time researching manufacturing and formulation to start her own line of cosmetics with the support of her husband, who she says “is the reason that I am in business for myself at all." Debbie continues, "He was my mentor for opening and running a retail business, for negotiating with management, for dealing with taxes and other issues, “ she says. “I wouldn’t be where I am right now without him.”

Her husband also stays home in the evenings with their children which allows Debbie to focus on her music several evenings a week, either working on her original songs in a recording studio or performing in local coffee shops and bars in Baltimore. Evenings are also her time to e-mail customers and talk on the phone with customers on the west coast. “I tell people I’ll call them after 9 at night,” she says. “I also have a lap top and I’m always e-mailing at night when I’m not out doing music”

Debbie says “it’s all about trade-offs. I work pieces of my business everywhere in my schedule.”

Monave Today and Future

Debbie manufactures (with the assistance of four production assistants) loose mineral foundation, loose mineral blush, eye shadow, bronzers, setting powders and other items. She has a 2,200 square foot warehouse in a row house that she says is beautiful. But with several hundred loyal wholesale customers and many retail customers, and both growing at the same time, she looks to the future to having her own place that would include a spa.

While Debbie buys some homemade base products from a close friend who is a vendor, she manufactures lip glosses, lipsticks, cream to powder mineral color and cream foundation herself. She says “pretty much every growth in my business is because my clients ask me for items or programs and I respond.” Now that Debbie's business operates at a healthy and handsome profit margin, she can see that it grew quite organically. "I just made sure I sold the products people asked me to sell," she says. That’s how she got into the bulk/wholesale business because “people asked me to!” Debbie says she wasn’t at all prepared for that “huge” step in the beginning and she made a lot of mistakes, but eventually she says she pulled together a smooth-running operation.

She works to empower other women to build their own businesses. “Women get the short end of the stick often, especially single parents. I would like to help more women work from home and spend time with their children.”

At the moment her internet store keeps her busy, but she plans to reopen a retail store soon. “I prefer retail, but it’s hard with the short season to build up the customer base, so my wholesale business pays the bills,” Debbie says.

“I would like to expand, but keep the same goals of offering amazing natural products that perform better than commercial products,” she says. One long term goal she has is the desire to see mineral makeup more accessible, like for women who shop in CVS. “I’d like to see them buy good quality mineral makeup for $12 there, but realistically that probably won’t be me, but I support it happening.”

Struggles and Benefits of Owning Your Own

Debbie says the toughest part for her is never being able to take a vacation from her business. “Right now I feel like I need to be there to supervise,” she says, adding that she would love a week off. She says she takes mini-vacations where she will take several hours and not work, but that never works. She doesn’t really relax and she and her employees always know she’s right there if needed.

That said, she wouldn’t trade the flexibility of being her own boss for anything. “I don’t have to ask off,” she says. “If I need to take a child to the doctor, I just let my staff know and don’t have to worry about making up time.”

Sage Advice For Handmade Beauty Start Ups

“Light a candle, say a prayer, keep looking and always dream,” says Debbie. “You have to keep looking for the right match for you, the right building, the right supplier, the right insurance, whatever you need, it’s out there.”

“Don’t get discouraged. Just keep looking,” she says. “You’ll find the right match. You’ll find people waiting for your product who will say ‘I’m glad I found you’ and you can respond back, ‘I’m glad I found you.” Encourage other women. That’s what women need to do for each other.”

You can enjoy more of Debbie's positive outlook and advice at the January 28, 2006, Lifestyle CEO Conference in suburban Washington, DC. "I'm so excited to be attend, much less be invited as a speaker. It's amazing what can happen when you follow your dreams and work hard. I never thought I'd be a speaker at a conference, yet here I am. It's an honor to be in a position to help other women succeed," says Debbie.

Benefits of IBN Membership

“I wouldn’t be here without Donna Maria and IBN,” says Debbie. “dM launched my wholesale business. She works tirelessly to get exposure for small businesses. She understands the importance of advertising and she pushes us in a good way by helping us get national opportunities.”

“I owe everything to dM and my husband,” Debbie says. “She knows what we need as a community and she pushes us where we need it. She’s wonderful!!”` Learn more about Debbie and Monave at her website.

Last Week's Answer: Ellie Trinowski of Moonshine Soap and Melody Upham of Rainbow Meadow

This Week's Question: Plant me in your garden and I'll grow all over the place. Pick me, wash me, dry me and soak me in oil to make a soothing treatment for your dry skin. I am one of the primary ingredients in Donna Maria's Emerald Oil. I grow so easily that if you trample all over me around your garden and yard, I'll spring up everywhere. For this reason, I have been called "The White Man's Footprints". What am I?

Be the first to answer and win some soap!

Please read the contest rules here before submitting your entry. Put "TRIVIA CONTEST ANSWER" in the subject line or your answer will not be considered.

While time does not permit me to respond personally to all entrants, the winner's name will be announced in the next newsletter!

Help IBN Celebrate 6 Years of Serving the Handmade Beauty Industry!! 

Nominations are now being accepted for the Handmade Beauty Business of the Year Awards!!

The nominations are rolling in! To celebrate, with your help, we will honor a member who exemplifies the spirit and tenacity of the handmade beauty industry. Our goal is to recognize and share the winner's amazing accomplishments in the hopes that others will be encouraged to pursue their dreams. The winner will also be posted to IBN's website, included in the Handmade Beauty Business Magazine and included in any other locations as deemed appropriate by IBN.

Judges are Alison Deyette of Style Bakery, Anissa Mook of Indie Shopping and Tanya Sharma of CiCySuds.

To find out more and nominate your choice for the 2006 winners, click here.

To read about the 2005 winners, click here!

With tremendous growth comes tremendous change. What better time to take stock of that than the first week of a New Year? Of course the handmade beauty industry has undergone huge growth over the past five years. IBN started in 2000 with no members. By the middle of the year, there were 46. Two years later, there were 200 and today, there are over 450 members in 7 countries.

While many IBN members operate their businesses outside of their homes, many others work and manufacture products at home. Indeed the number of home-based businesses in all sectors of the economy is increasing and micro-formulators of cosmetics is no different. With the growth of the home-based micro-formulator comes the increase in the number of consumers who are able to benefit from the unique benefits of handmade beauty products. And you know what that means of course -- increased liability exposure, at least in the minds of the bean counters at the nation's insurance companies.

As a result of our industry's success, RLI Corp., one of the only companies that provides comprehensive products liability insurance nationwide, announced a decision to discontinue providing products liability coverage for businesses that gross over $5,000 in sales per year. That means that people will have to choose between stagnation at the $5,000 level or growth and success without products liability coverage. For some it may even mean closing their doors since a growing number of retail outlets across all sectors of the economy will not buy products unless the manufacturer can produce a certificate of insurance.

What does this mean for IBN? Well, judging from the number of responses I got from an announcement sent to the membership on December 21, 2005, it means that a priority for IBN this year is to seek out alternatives and ensure that our members voices are heard on this issue.

To that end, I have assembled the Home-Based Personal Care Business Task Force (see Announcement), consisting of the following organizations which accepted the invitation to join the Task Force as leaders:

Best & Success!!
Donna Maria
Editor, The Handmade Beauty Connection
The Indie Beauty Network | www.handmadebeauty.com