The Glow-Up with Nude Coco

By: Jazmyne Courtnii Byrd

We’ve gotten really intentional about what goes on our faces. Serums, routines, the whole thing. Body care, meanwhile, has mostly stayed an afterthought. That gap is what the founder of Nude Coco couldn’t stop thinking about, and it’s what she built her brand around.

The idea didn’t start in a boardroom. It started with her sister, who was dealing with dry skin. The founder kept wondering why there weren’t more body products that treated skin concerns with the same care as facial skincare. “I knew I wanted to create something that was effective, beautiful, and actually made you excited to use,” she says. That became the foundation of Nude Coco.

Getting it off the ground has been the hard part, mostly because she’s doing it with limited resources while holding herself to the standard she pictured from day one. She’s also still working a 9-to-5. On any given day, she’s the founder, the product developer, the marketer, the fulfillment team, and “so many other departments within a typical org chart,” as she puts it.

There have been moments when she’s had to remind herself that not having every resource doesn’t mean she can’t build the company she sees in her head. She leans on her resourcefulness, keeps pressing forward, and puts her energy into what she can control. Sometimes that means doing it herself. Other times it means knowing when the next step is to bring in someone who can do it better.

One of the biggest turning points came when she brought her best friend in as a partner. For a while she’d been building Nude Coco mostly on her own. She had a clear vision for the brand, but she realized that building something meaningful didn’t mean she had to do it alone.

Having her friend on board changed the whole energy of the business. They challenge each other, they bring different strengths, and she gets to make decisions next to someone who cares about the vision as much as she does. It also made her think bigger about what Nude Coco could become. What had been a solo project turned into something the two of them are building together. “Having your best friend beside you while you build your dream is pretty special,” she says.

Ask her what she wants someone to feel the first time they try the brand, and she’s got a very specific reaction in mind. “Like, wait, why has body care not always felt like this? Looked like this? Helped me like this?” She wants Nude Coco to feel elevated without being intimidating, effective without being clinical, and fun without being juvenile. There’s a confidence to the brand, and she hopes people pick up on it right away. Ideally, they try the product, love how their skin feels, glance at the packaging on their vanity, and think, okay, she’s cute.

Looking five years down the road, she sees Nude Coco as a recognizable beauty brand that has changed the way people think about body care. She pictures a bigger collection of products that handle different skin concerns, a direct relationship with customers, and a presence beyond the brand’s own website, including retail.

But the part that excites her most is the idea of the brand outgrowing what she and her partner can build today. She’s looking forward to the team, the community, the creative ideas, the collaborations, and all the experiences they’ll be able to create around Nude Coco for their customers. “I started Nude Coco with a very clear vision of the impact I wanted the brand to have on consumers,” she says, “and seeing that vision exist in the real world at scale would be incredibly rewarding.”

To purchase a Nude Coco click here www.nudecoco.com