CEW Panel Discusses How to Nurture Indie Brands

Along with the newly formed Indie Advisory Group, the CEW hosted its first Indie Learning Lab Wednesday afternoon at the Altman Building to support small and emerging brands. The event was comprised of three panels that gave advice on retail, finance and development of brands. Before the panels, CEW president Carlotta Jacobson addressed how indie brands have an increasing presence in the beauty industry. “Today we’ve got 10 percent of our members coming from emerging, small brands and indie brands,” she said. “We realized that we had the wherewithal to do different things for small incumbents so we formed an emerging brand community that really helped us determine how CEW could support them.” Retail panelists Averyl Andrews, senior merchant at Sephora; Janice Dusina, vice president of specialty brands and services at Ulta Beauty; Kristen Conneen, buyer at QVC, and Jessica Chung, director of merchandising at DermStore, discussed what retailers are looking for when finding new brands. A common thread among all panelists was for indie brands to determine a white space. “Talk about why [the brand] fills a white space within the environment of the retailer you’re presenting to,” Dusina said. “There are so many brands out there right now. Just be prepared to

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