MCoBeauty founder Shelley Sullivan sets the record straight on $1 billion sale

Beauty mogul Shelley Sullivan opens up on the reality behind selling her billion dollar brand and the true cost of her success.

Beauty mogul Shelley Sullivan opens up on the reality behind selling her billion-dollar brand MCoBeauty and the true cost of her success.

Stellar: You made headlines earlier this year after selling your business MCoBeauty for a valuation of $1 billion dollars. As we sit here a few months later, how are you feeling?

Shelley Sullivan: I’m a little bit more relaxed than when I was running MCoBeauty. I’m still very much a fan of the brand, and watching and cheering along from the sidelines, but running a business that grew so quickly was a lot. It was exhilarating and exciting, but at times exhausting. So I’m definitely enjoying a bit of a break.

Let’s rewind a little. How did you get from launching your own modelling agency in your 20s to founding MCoBeauty in 2016 to that point?

I launched MCoBeauty because I saw there was a niche. I’d spoken to mass retailers [such as] Woolworths, Chemist Warehouse, Big W and there was a huge gap. I said, “What if I created a brand that had high-end products at a luxe-for-less price?” I launched with maybe 12 products. And those drove more revenue than some of the [other] brands... because they offered more of a “luxury” offering than you could get in the premium department stores.

Women wanted quality products at a quarter of the price. I’d already had a relationship with premium retailers. [I thought] if I could do more volume, we could bring down the price and pass the savings on to the customer. That was how MCoBeauty was born. Then it just catapulted overnight. Covid was huge for us because everything was shut except [supermarkets]. We couldn’t keep product on the shelves. The price point was perfect. It was just: right time, right place, and a lot of luck.

Shelley Sullivan is Stellar’s cover star.

Sullivan founded cosmetics brand MCoBeauty in 2016. Picture: Steven Chee

Listen to a new episode of Something To Talk About featuring Shelley Sullivan below:

When figures like that are reported, people might assume you walked away with a billion dollars…

I wish! The business could be valued at $1 billion but that’s not necessarily a reflection on what the people that are exiting get. That was just what followed with [its] success. We had a vision to create Australia’s fastest-growing beauty brand. We drove those sales as hard as we could and the valuation is a multiple of base earnings. So the beauty landscape and industry drives that valuation, not us. But I don’t think myself, the family and the team ever thought beyond our wildest dreams that that’s what we would create.

As an entrepreneur, how do you balance listening to your gut instinct versus following the data?

I tend to go with a gut feel, and take a risk versus [following] the data. There wasn’t a brand that accelerated like what we did. We went from pretty much 12 products to 100 products and doing $6 million of sales to $100 million of sales in three years. So we led the category. We were the risk-takers. We just had to go with intuition.

The entrepreneur tends to go with ‘gut feel’and take risks. Picture: Steven Chee

What sort of hours were you working while you were growing your businesses? Did you ever take a day off? Were weekends a thing?

I had [my daughters] Lucy [now 19] and Emily [now 18] when I started ModelCo [the premium beauty brand she launched in 2002]. I didn’t spend any time at home with the girls. I was working round the clock because I passionately loved what I did, but I wouldn’t have been able to do that without family helping.

Work-life balance is difficult. Anyone who says they have a great work-life balance, I’m not sure I believe [them]. As a woman, I found it very challenging: work-life balance, having great friends, [a] great family, it’s difficult. Plus, you’ve got this behemoth of a business that’s almost running you, you’re not running it. I was fortunate when I started MCoBeauty; the girls were in their teenage years, close to finishing school, so more independent.

I don’t know how I would have coped with the acceleration of MCoBeauty with babies.

The beauty industry looks very glamorous from the outside, but what’s the reality?

It looks glossy but behind the scenes it’s like putting a jigsaw puzzle together. You’re doing wholesaling, retailing, sales, supply chain, logistics and finance. You’re running a business, whether or not you’ve got a beauty product or a soft drink or a bottle of water. No matter what you’re retailing, it requires the same make-up in the background. So it’s a challenge. Because people feel like it’s glossy, but the back end is still the same.

At the same time that you were negotiating the sale of MCoBeauty, your marriage (to accountant Anthony Sullivan, whom she married in 2016) was coming to an end. How did you navigate these two chapters of your life unfolding at the same time?

Anthony and I are very close. [The separation] wasn’t negative. We’ve been close for many, many years. It didn’t even play into [the sale of the business]. It definitely wasn’t a challenge.

Are you somebody who can compartmentalise your emotions?

Compartmentalising things in life helps you succeed, because you can’t dwell in one area, otherwise it brings down another.

Sullivan says she found work-life balance challenging. Picture: Steven Chee

Listen to a new episode of Something To Talk About featuring Shelley Sullivan below:

How are your daughters feeling about this new chapter ahead now that you’ve exited the business?

They’re great girls, they’re both doing business at uni. I always said, “By Year 9, Mum may be out of the business, we can spend more time together.” But they’re 19 and 18 now, so they’ve finally got Mum back. They’ve got their own lives, but they’re very excited to have me around a lot more. I think I’m Mum to them. I would say they’re incredibly proud. They know it hasn’t come without its dramas along the way. I’ve worked long hours and round the clock, so they’ve seen what I’ve given up to achieve what we’ve achieved. [Now] that they’re a little bit older, they actually can understand the full scope of everything.

What does life look like for you after MCoBeauty?

I’ve been between Sydney and LA, working with CAA [US-based Creative Arts Agency] on some projects. I think the opportunities will lie in business: working with talent and artists on some of their own brands, not just in the beauty space, but more fashion.

Speaking of LA, US model Hailey Bieber recently sold her beauty and skincare brand Rhode for a reported $1 billion. What advice would you give her?

I don’t know [her] deal structure, so it’s hard to give advice. We did work with Hailey – [she] was the face of ModelCo for a minute. She’s a great girl who was very much, from what I understand, involved in the product development [of Rhode]. That’s a great brand. I actually purchased some of their products. She’s done a great job.

Looking back over your career, what would you say to yourself at the most difficult points?

Definitely follow your instinct. You’ve got a lot of noise and a lot of people giving you advice along the way, what to do, what not to do – be it financial, strategy. Sit with yourself and continue to follow your intuition. It’s moments where I didn’t follow my intuition that things didn’t work out.

Read the full interview with Shelley Sullivan in today’s Stellar via The Sunday Telegraph (NSW), Sunday Herald Sun (VIC), The Sunday Mail (QLD) and Sunday Mail (SA). And listen to Shelley on the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About, wherever you get your podcasts.

For more from Stellar and the podcast, Something To Talk About, click here.

Originally published as MCoBeauty founder Shelley Sullivan sets the record straight on $1 billion sale