BEAUTY BRANDS TO KNOW: PINK MOON
PINK MOON
Lin Chen is the CEO and Founder of Pink Moon, an NYC based consultancy, digital wellcare space, and boutique that aims to uplift and radically transform the beauty industry. With nearly a decade of beauty industry experience under her belt and the end of a toxic relationship, Lin embarked on a radical self love journey that led to the launch of her business. Pink Moon encourages a more compassionate approach to beauty that is accessible, inclusive, and leads with love.
SHEER: Tell us a little bit about yourself.
LIN CHEN: I'm a second generation Asian American born and raised in sunny Southern California and the CEO + founder of Pink Moon. Sustainable beauty has been a core component of my professional life for nearly a decade. My experience and passion for holistic living ultimately led me to create Pink Moon, a NYC based consultancy that aims to uplift and radically transform the beauty industry. In less than 3 years, I’ve been lucky enough to work with 20 various brands in different stages of growth. I've intentionally built a business that works solely with female-founded brands that value sustainability, philanthropy, and holistic wellness because I believe that these values are key to creating a more conscious and empowering beauty space.
When I initially created Pink Moon in 2017, my goal was to elevate women by helping brands that were striving to create a better beauty industry. This was important to me because I myself have experienced the transformative benefits of taking the time to truly take care of myself and love myself. Just six months before launching Pink Moon (consultancy) in 2017, I had just left a toxic relationship and was feeling lost and uncertain about what lay ahead. After getting out of this relationship, I really took the time to re-discover who I was and to commit to finding and cultivating my own joy. Little did I know that this commitment would lead me to falling in love with myself and self-care and would ultimately result in me launching Pink Moon only six months later.
I’m committed to creating a space that speaks to women respectfully and honors them through a curation of products that are consciously created, is considerate of different needs, and is supportive of their ever-changing journeys with self-care. Essentially, I want to create a safe space for women, inspire women to commit to their own joy, on their own terms.
SHEER: What was your path breaking into the beauty industry?
LC: I've been working in the eco beauty space for almost a decade. My professional foray into the industry was after college, as an intern for 100% Pure. That eventually led me to working in client relations at retailer Ayla Beauty, and then as the Marketing & Sales Director at organic skincare brand Bottega Organica. After working in so many dimensions of eco-beauty, I decided to venture out on my own and start Pink Moon!
SHEER: What was launching Pink Moon like and what inspired the name?
LC: I had always wanted to start my own company. It was on my 'to do before turning 30' list. Shortly after working at Bottega Organic for nearly three years, I had felt it was the right time to launch my own company. In less than three years, I had grown the company from a small local NYC company into a global brand and wanted to bring that experience to smaller companies, and specifically female-led. During my career in the beauty industry and while launching Pink Moon, I had noticed a lack of “by women, for women” spaces that are based in love, compassion, and community. There is a lot of anti-women rhetoric in the beauty industry. Narratives that teach us to be ashamed of our bodies, of our age, even of our own ambition. It isn't possible to live up to these horrific and impossible standards. They are destructive and hurtful.
Pink Moon is about love, not fear. Fear of aging, fear of "toxins" in personal care products, fear of not living up to societal standards. We don't believe in using fear, shame, or guilt based marketing. I don't want the Pink Moon experience to be riddled with anxieties or fear about external beauty. I want it to be filled with encouragement. I want women to come as they are, and to know that they are valued and worthy of treating themselves with the love and compassion they deserve.
There are several stories behind the name Pink Moon. Firstly, in my culture, the moon is a significant symbol. The full moon is a symbol of peace, prosperity, and family reunion. So I knew I wanted the word 'moon' in my company name. At the time I was creating my company, I had made a self-love trip to Bermuda with a close friend. We woke up on the last day of our trip at 5am to watch the sun rise. The sky was this stunning light cotton candy pink mixed with peach and yellows. I was sitting there in peace while envisioning a moon painted with colors of the sky. As I was narrowing down company names, I reflected back to this specific memory and thought to myself "I want my clients to feel a sense of peace and joy while working with me, the same feeling I felt while mesmerized in this beautiful pink sunrise sky."
SHEER: Did you face any challenges when launching?
LC: I had consulted several friends who started their own company and sought advice on how to get started in terms of logistics: how to register a company, what to do about accounting, legal contracts, how to price my services, building a website, etc. These fellow entrepreneurs were so crucial when I was creating Pink Moon! The greatest challenge was essentially getting my parents' trust that I could do this on my own, without any financial support. Launching a company was certainly a big risk for me financially. I had just moved into my own studio apartment in Manhattan nine months before, so I had to plan out my finances and budget to ensure I could still pay my bills and rent on time.
“Just six months before launching Pink Moon (consultancy) in 2017, I had just left a toxic relationship and was feeling lost and uncertain about what lay ahead. After getting out of this relationship, I really took the time to re-discover who I was and to commit to finding and cultivating my own joy.
Little did I know that this commitment would lead me to falling in love with myself and self-care and would ultimately result in me launching Pink Moon only six months later. ”
SHEER: What are some common misconceptions about "clean beauty" that Pink Moon is addressing?
LC: "Clean beauty" has sort of a bad rep right now. We actually prefer the terms: eco beauty, sustainable beauty, conscious beauty, and compassionate beauty. And, clean beauty is quite a vague term. Because it can just mean that the ingredients and packaging are eco-friendly, but the ingredients are not necessarily all natural. That said, living a sustainable lifestyle and using "clean" products certainly has misconceptions. The first being that clean beauty and wellness have misconceptions of being elitist and inaccessible.
Having an impactful self-care experience should not be cost prohibitive. This is why we strive to stock more affordable self-care options. We curate several under $45 brands because everyone should have access to sustainable self-care essentials, and the majority of our curation is under $100.
Another misconception is that finding sustainable beauty brands isn’t easy and requires a lot of research. Yes, it does require a lot of education especially since there are many brands who participate in "greenwashing", whereby they call themselves clean but when you look a little closer at the ingredients list, you'll find questionable ingredients that are potentially harmful for your health and for aquatic life. That is one of the reasons why I launched Pink Moon: We have a very intentional approach when adding a new brand to the curation and make sure to have a curation that makes it fun for the customers to discover rather than feeling overwhelmed and confused. My team and I thoroughly investigate the ingredients, brand mission, and test the efficacy of every product to ensure the brand aligns with our ethos and meets our quality standards.
Additionally, the brands are formulated with wholesome ingredients, sustainable, cruelty free, and ethically minded through and through. Each brand has their own philanthropic initiatives as well – whether that is giving back to eco advocacy groups, promoting mental health in BIPOC communities, or hiring women from marginalized communities.
SHEER: What are the most popular products on your site currently and what are their most effective qualities?
LC: Our current bestseller is our Over the Moon Duo, which is like a Gua Sha toolkit that contains our cult favorite Rose Quartz Gua Sha Tool, a pink velvet pouch to store and protect the tool, a handy Gua Sha guide, and a face oil we created to complement the tool. This set encourages lymphatic drainage, relaxes facial muscles, releases tension all over the neck and face, and inspires women to make time for themselves every day.
Another popular product right now is our newly launched Pink Moon x Elena Scarlata Makeup Remover Pad / Face Scrub. I'm personally obsessed with it, too! It's a unique multipurpose hemp and organic cotton pad handmade in Italy that acts as a reusable makeup remover round and turns any face wash into a face exfoliant. It's an affordable way to exfoliate your skin without having to purchase a separate face scrub.
Over the Moon Duo, $80
SHEER: How is Pink Moon diversifying the beauty industry in a unique way?
LC: We are a platform of diversified voices. Our curation consists of over 35% WOC owned brands, and unintentionally. I did not consciously think "ok, we need to add a Black owned brand, or we need to add another WOC owned brand". I wanted to launch brands that I personally loved, and they just so happened to be many WOC owned brands! We also partner with BIPOC holistic practitioners to feature and co-lead our monthly workshops.
SHEER: How do you weave together self-love, self-care, and mental health in your brand mission?
LC: These three pillars are essential to the Pink Moon mission, and they all tie in with our brand story – with me learning to truly and deeply love myself, with my mom never taking time for her mental and emotional well-being, and with pushing for better standards and a more compassionate beauty space that embraces all women and does not take advantage of women's insecurities. So many women give of themselves endlessly and sacrifice their own wellbeing as a result. I want women, in every phase of life, to feel worthy and loved. My hope is that everything I create with Pink Moon helps to facilitate this.
“Pink Moon is about love, not fear. Fear of aging, fear of “toxins” in personal care products, fear of not living up to societal standards. We don’t believe in using fear, shame, or guilt based marketing.
I don’t want the Pink Moon experience to be riddled with anxieties or fear about external beauty. I want it to be filled with encouragement. I want women to come as they are, and to know that they are valued and worthy of treating themselves with the love and compassion they deserve.”
SHEER: What advice do you have for women looking to embark on their own entrepreneurial journeys especially during such challenging times?
LC: I always tell others to not let fear stop them. Starting a business is no easy feat, especially if you're a solopreneur, but it is such a rewarding experience to create something of your own. I advise to network as much as you can and learn from others, listen to podcasts, join Facebook groups for female entrepreneurs, and most importantly, believe in yourself!
SHEER: Where would you like to see Pink Moon in the future?
LC: There are so many things I want for Pink Moon and have been manifesting them for quite a few years now. The first is to expand our in-house collection because we've received incredible positive feedback and response to our products and branding. We're also working on launching a digital platform, kind of like a social network, to further my mission of creating a more inclusive and interactive beauty space that’s categorized by phase of life. This would give women a safe space to talk about wellness, sustainability, life's joys and challenges, and meet holistic practitioners and ask them questions. Eventually, I plan to offer monthly paid digital memberships that would allow members access to group masterclasses, 1-on-1 house calls with holistic practitioners, and more!
Pink Moon 2.0 would be to pursue my dreams of opening a physical Pink Moon wellcare space in NYC. This was actually my initial plan before launching the e-commerce, but now has been pushed off to 2021 or 2022.
support & follow Pink Moon below
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support & follow Pink Moon below 〰️
Photography by Nabila Wirakusumah
I first stumbled across Nia Winslow’s work, totally by accident, and there was a piece titled “Secret Keeper” which I couldn’t believe was entirely paper because of the intricacies and detailing of the bobos and barrettes that took me back to my childhood. While digging deeper into her catalog I was shocked to realize her art is entirely collage and paper-based. The level of detail and intention behind her work is so incredibly impressive and even more so once I learned she was self-taught and only started making art in 2019!! Nia’s collages connect the Black and African diaspora by portraying our shared experiences from the seemingly mundane to the more poetic while simultaneously using unique strips of paper to also highlight we are not a monolith and to honor our diverse range of cultures.