I'm on the road by 9am, and stuck in the hustle of central New York. I need to get to Soho in time for my meeting with the international queen of cosmetics herself: Bobbi Brown. Famous for her everyday make-up range - chances are you use one of her key items - I'm eager to meet the woman behind the brand.
Based on Broadway, her chic office wall is decorated with framed letters from royalty and snapshots of celebrity clients such as Michelle and Barack Obama and Oprah. Welcomed like an old friend, Bobbi doesn't mind that I'm late and is warm, charming and totally unreserved, so it's easy to see why she has such a loyal clientele. With over 65,000 Twitter followers, regular book releases and TV appearances, it's safe to say she's a celebrity in her own right as well as a savvy business woman. But Bobbi doesn't put her success down to anything more than her own particular personality.
"I have this gift, which is more like a curse, that I can walk into one of my counters that is perfect and say, ‘that eye shadow is broken'," she says. "I see things - and for me it's not about getting mad at people, it's just an opportunity of how we can do things better."
A self-confessed perfectionist, she prides herself on the people she chooses to have around. "The fact that my team does 12 to 14 fashion week shows without me now, says a lot," she admits. "They're doing incredible."
Bobbi, 55, paints the picture of her team product meetings and tells me comically about how she likes to try on the make-up products they've brought in, often before it's deemed safe to do so.
"Research for me isn't like research for other companies, you know, I don't really care what a product does unless I can see and touch it," she smiles. It's this attitude that helped shape her success.
Launching into the beauty industry in 1991, Bobbi was the first make-up artist to use yellow bases in her make-up, and she initially created ten brown-based lipstick shades to fill a gap she had spotted in the market. The collection debuted at Bergdorf Goodman, and sold 100 pieces in the first day. Bobbi's philosophy was to market simple but flattering and wearable make-up - and that philosophy remains unchanged today.
Knowledge and experience shine through
Bobbi loves to experiment, and many of her iconic products have come from these sessions. Her best-selling mahogany lip colour came from an incident at one fashion week where Bobbi didn't have her usual lip palette and had to create a lipstick for the models on the spot. "I took out a mahogany eyeshadow, Vaseline, lipbalm, and some sort of blush and made a lipstick," she says. "There's no need to yell and throw a fit - I'm a pro."
Mrs B seems to always have the everyday woman in mind, from adapting make-up briefs at fashion week to developing new products. Years of experience and trials have given her a sound knowledge of what her women want. "I don't care when the teams come in and show me all these things they've been marketed by companies, I'm like - OK, great, but does it work? I believe the Bobbi Brown woman is intelligent, so I believe in telling her the truth when it comes to what works and what doesn't."
But she also believes the Bobbi Brown woman to be true to herself. A lot of what she tells me suggests she has built her empire on the ethos of natural beauty inside and out. "I've never said this before but, for me, the Bobbi Brown woman is someone who gets as much enjoyment from helping other people as buying a new pair of shoes."
Sitting around a table with bowls of almonds, carrot chunks and dark chocolate squares, Bobbi goes on to tell me all about the ‘year of health' she has given her team this year. Being a fitness fanatic, she wants her make-up family to share her love of keeping healthy. From buying new gym gear to health and fitness seminars, she has brought a bit more of her life into work.
"I love sharing things that make me feel good with other people," she says. "When my kids were little, I wanted to be the mom who came to school and signed up and helped, and I always did it. I always encourage the moms who work for me to do that too as much as possible."
Her children are grown-up now. Chatting animatedly about her three sons, Duke, Dylan and Dakota, and her husband based in New Jersey, the only thing she can think to add, is wanting the beach to be closer to home.
I wonder if she can tell us the key to happiness. "I have a very successful marriage, which means I still love my husband after all these years. And with your kids, with your husband, with your boss, you pick your battles. Some things are not worth battling."
Her family also appears to be an integral cog in the Bobbi Brown machine; one of her sons came up with the ‘Extra' make-up range branding. But when asked if she thinks they could join the family business, she thinks not. "I don't think it would be right for them, they're three different strengths… they are all just really good hardworking kids who don't ask for a lot. That's one thing my husband and I have done really well."
Being such an icon in the world of beauty, I would imagine her family and friends would be forever asking her to do their make-up but apparently I am wrong. The most requests she receives are from complete strangers, perhaps celebrating a birthday milestone or an anniversary, and their gift to themselves is half an hour with Bobbi.
Reaffirming how unpretentious Bobbi is in all aspects of her life, she tells me she agrees to this request if they donate to her charity, ‘Dress for Success'. This is a foundation that promotes the economic independence of disadvantaged women by providing necessary support and career development tools, and even attire for the workplace. As she says herself, "I believe in rejuvenation and reinvention of everything, body, soul and work, and I think it's about constantly trying to be better."
From pretty to pretty powerful
Her current passion is the Pretty Powerful Campaign, which reiterates her belief that all women are pretty without make-up and powerful with the right make-up. And we can expect her seventh book this year to fall in hand with the message. "I believe all women are actually really pretty without make-up on, and just the right amount of make-up is what makes you feel powerful," she says. "My new book is called Pretty Powerful Beauty Stories and it is basically inspired by the campaign - because the stories are what I hear when I do people's make-up."
So I wonder, after 20 years at the top of the beauty game does she ever think of slowing down? "I think I am slowing down…? What is slowing down? OK, no I'm not! But I can choose now to do more interesting things, I'm choosing my jobs now."
Before I leave I ask if there's anything left to achieve? "I want to do a backbend!" she claims, getting up and demonstrating this, and as we laugh I realise the key to Bobbi's success.
She is the brand; a down-to-earth woman behind a steadfast motto of natural beauty. Inside and out.
