BEAUTY
From staff to freelance, I wrote copy for Aveda on and off for more than ten years. In many ways it was a dream job for a young writer like me who came to her copy career without studying advertising but had a Master of Fine Art in poetry. For example, cosmetic shade naming for lipsticks and blush had the Aveda writers immersed in books about rare flora & fauna, sea shells, and volcanic rock.
For two years I was their “mission-based” writer, which meant I got to craft stories about communities and cooperatives that Aveda worked with in Africa, Latin America and the Pacific Islands. For a decade, I named products, created romance copy, packaging copy, and radio spots. Many Aveda alums went on to do great things for other brands—or start their own. I’ve been lucky to team up with a few who went on to create the first well-established Cannabis brands and Cannabis branding agencies.
And when I left my staff job at Aveda it was because I was invited to work directly with Aveda founder, Horst Rechelbacher, as his lead writer for 2.5 years while he and our team created and launched his second pioneering beauty brand, Intelligent Nutrients®. Working for Horst was an experience like no other. Brand development from the ground up (voice, naming, packaging), product development, documentary videos of farmers, even planting and tilling on his organic farm in Wisconsin. We may have been “beauty creatives” but he made sure our hands got dirty, and kept things pretty interesting.
Horst Rechelbacher was a true environmental visionary. His philosophy wasn’t so much about looking good as it was about being good to one’s body and the planet—way ahead of anyone else thinking like this. I placed my Intelligent Nutrients® work in Health & Wellness and you can find it here.
Copy Re-branding I Naturapathica
Because of my experience at Aveda and Intelligent Nutrients, the holistic skincare company Naturapathica came to me for a full copy rebranding exercise. I began by redefining their category—rebranding skincare itself as something bigger than the skin.
Next, I worked on their philosophy, and their deep commitment to ingredients that are safe, but also high-performing.
Product naming, product story, taglines, and trademark searches I Aveda
I was at Aveda a long time. Naming was a lot of what I did. Here are some of the Aveda product lines, individual products and product services that bear my name(ing). A special call out to the Aveda attorneys that I worked with tirelessly to get Global trademark searches and approvals on all of these names, and hundreds more that did not make it precisely because of the huge challenge of obtaining a global mark.
Invati was the biggest new product line launch for them ever, and it remains their largest grossing product line, ever.
Here's one of the Aveda services I named. "Eclipting," I also wrote all the supporting copy for it.
"Every aroma tells a story, and our new Pure-Fume™ Hair Mists—tell tales from three different corners of the globe.“ Created by Aveda's Scent guru, Guy Vincent, named and stories created by yours truly. A gorgeous project.
I didn't name this line, but I wrote the product stories.
I didn't name this line, but I wrote the product stories.
I didn't name this line, but I wrote the product stories.