Recently I had the pleasure of sitting down with Gail Sagel, founder of Faces Beautiful, and Meryl Moss, founder of Meryl Moss Media Relations—two successful, women entrepreneurs who own Westport businesses. Gail and Meryl are connected by more than our town; Meryl handles public relations for Gail.
For those of you not familiar with Faces Beautiful, it’s a makeup and skincare studio, as well as the name for Gail’s line of cosmetic products. The premier product offering is Face in a Case, a stylish magnetic makeup organizer that doubles as a wallet and phone holder and makes it easy for women to take all the makeup they need with them in a small case when going out or traveling. Gail came up with this unique approach to cosmetics for women when her clients buying makeup asked for an answer to the problem of heavy, overstuffed handbags. Women needed to be able to keep their travel makeup neat and tidy (ziplocs didn’t do it) and avoid having too many items (wallet, phone, makeup) to fit in an evening bag. Face in a Case provides an elegant and practical solution.
When I asked Gail how she got her start in the makeup business, she said she always loved cosmetics and skin care, since she was a kid. She studied oil paintings from the age of five and was always intrigued by the idea of painting faces and people. During her career on Wall Street as a derivatives trade, she had some client in Paris, and while there, she fell in love with skin care. Then, while working at a hedge fund in Westport, she was hit by a car while biking home from work. The near-miss caused her to ask, “What am I doing with my life?” and motivated her to make a change and pursue her passion. At first, Gail became a freelance makeup artist, but she couldn’t travel as she was raising her children. So she made another change and opened up a studio in Westport to avoid travel and commuting.
It took a lot of prototypes and experimenting to create Face in a Case, but now Gail can offer a product that enables women to pull together the right colors and use ingredients they can trust, along with instructions on how to use the palette to create their best looks. Gail sees the geometry of faces—triangles, circles—and is able to show users of her products how to use those shapes to their advantage. Gail has both a design and a utility patent on Face in a Case.
Gail’s favorite thing about her job is making her clients happy. She loves when they call or email or shout out on Instagram or Facebook about how much they love her products and her service.
“It’s feels wonderful when a woman says to me, “You make my day beautiful, you make me feel great. Because when you look good, you feel good. And the number one reason women wear makeup is that it makes us feel more confident about whatever we’re going to pursue that day. We feel pulled together, and we can conquer whatever we’re setting out to do. If I can help empower women that way, that’s amazing.”
I asked Gail what she would list as her principles for success. They are:
- Follow your passion, no matter how many times people tell you you’re wrong
- Remember that destinies do not take a straight path
- Remember that objections and obstacles don’t mean not to do it, they just mean find a smarter way.
Meryl chimed in that Gail is also an incredibly positive person.
“When you carry that kind of energy, it overflows to your clients, people you’re working with. She’s incredibly inviting, and her energy is fantastic.” Meryl added, “Gail is the face of Faces Beautiful. People want to connect with a brand, but ultimately they want to connect with a human being. And Gail is amazing at connecting.”
What advice would Gail give other women looking to build their own businesses?
“First—have a business plan. That doesn't sound passionate, but if you’re passionate, you have to be smart. You need to have goals and objectives, risk and liability, all outlined, because you can never determine if you’re actually successful unless you’re fulfilling a goal. Also, know yourself. Not everyone is meant to be an entrepreneur.”
Gail also recalled advising a friend in her late forties who was thinking of starting a business but felt she was too late and had missed the party on work after raising her children. She told her friend, “we’re going to be first generation that lives to 100, so you’re really only half way. Unless you’re financially set for life, what are you waiting for?”
As for living and working in Westport, Gail said she loves the people here. “It’s a wonderful cosmopolitan mix. The women are energetic, well-educated, well-traveled, beautiful, from all sorts of backgrounds I have clients of every nationality, and everyone brings something to the pot. Westport is a beautiful town, but it’s the people who make the town beautiful.”
What’s next for Faces Beautiful?
Gail explained that going forward, all her makeup products will fit into Face in a Case, including a new line of lip glosses. Also, all of Gail’s products are available on line at facesbeautiful.com She continues to seek investors to help her business grow and look for new distribution outlets.
Gail found Meryl Moss through another businesswoman whose PR firm specialized in IT and who worked next door to Meryl. While Meryl works primarily with authors of books, she has branched out into addressing the business needs of clients who have books as part of their larger businesses.
“Books are the cornerstone to bigger things. Everybody wants to have a book as part of their business, so our business has expanded with this trend.”
As it turns out, both Meryl and Gail made shifts in their businesses to adjust to their customers’ needs, and Meryl now works with many companies and foundations as well as best-selling authors.
Gail noted that she and Meryl are both agile and understand that you can’t be stagnant.
“When we first started working together, Meryl said we need to look at Instagram and influencers and bloggers, an area it wasn’t my first instinct to go into. She gets it. She has a good nose, and a terrific creative side.”
Meryl recently launched booktrib.com, a site that serves up video interviews with authors and connects them to readers.
“When media started to shift, we wanted to be part of the media, a place where readers meet writers. We also began helping clients develop websites to expand their online presence and build their communities and platforms.”
Meryl added that a recent story she ran about Gail’s book, Making FACES Beautiful, has gone “off the charts in terms of traffic, with thousands of readers.”
Gail observed that “the hook of a book is important when I meet with potential clients, partners, and investors. I have something I can give people when meeting with them. Also, sending a book along with an article pitch makes a beauty editor at a magazine more likely to take my call.” Meryl noted that the book “sells out” at every one of Gail’s promotional events.
Meryl got her start working for a graphic design firm, where one day a writer came in and warned her about getting stuck there. She started thinking about what else she could do, found her first pr job, moved on from a difficult boss, then found a company focused on book publicity in 1990 and fell in love. Nine months later, she started her own firm, handling publicity for mega-best-selling author Robert Fulghum’s tour to benefit literacy. Now she employs a staff of 15 in a building she recently purchased at 99 Saugatuck Ave. “It will be 24 years this May.”
Meryl advises women starting out to “be positive, stick with your vision, make integrity a really big part of what you do, and caring, you can’t substitute caring, really caring about people. Be caring, creative, and compassionate.”
For more information on Faces Beautiful, visit facesbeautiful.com.
For more information on Meryl Moss Media Relations, visit merylmossmedia.com
