What we refused in our first year

Every no shaped our story.

Most of the time, founder stories are about Yes. The idea behind MILO is that we’re doing everything differently to achieve a different outcome. A lot of the early conversations were about what we didn’t want. What we refused to do. What we agreed we’d never compromise on. 

When Katrina called Lisa with the idea for multifunctional skincare that could replace dozens of commonly used skincare products, it was the conversation that changed everything for both of them. Instead of starting with the goal of selling product, we began with the idea of how to enable consumers to use less.

Using Katrina’s initial thesis that we could consolidate the average skincare routine by ingredient stacking, we got to exploring skin health from a First Principles perspective. Using a combination of internal research and the support of expert R&D consultants, we validated the Six Fundamentals of Skin Health. Instead of paying for endorsements, we decided to put the leg work in and go back to the basics of skin science. In doing this, we established that if we could formulate products around these Six Fundamentals we could cut out the noise of “necessity” that most beauty brands run on. So our first No, was to anything that wasn’t addressing the roots of skin health.

Our next No was to any ingredients that don’t serve more than one purpose. We also said No to fillers. You’ll notice that Aqua (Water) isn’t an ingredient in any of our formulations. Our Hydrating Tonic is Aloe based, offering more nutrients than the water base most brands start with. 

Beyond ingredients and formulation, we had a lot of decisions to make about the kind of brand we wanted to be and the type of business model we wanted to run on. Each of those seemingly straightforward discussions turned into vast explorations of No. One thing about Katrina and Lisa as people and as founders is that they are absolutely uncompromising in their values. It’s been a painstaking process of agreeing on who we’re not, so we can fully embody who we are. 

We agreed that we’d never sell out to a Big Beauty conglomerate which informed our governance and investor return models. We were adamant that our marketing wouldn’t be beholden to Meta or paying Mark Zuckerberg 30% of our revenue forever. We had to design alternative strategies for brand awareness and building relationships with our customer community.

By the time we’d established all these things about MILO, we realized it looked more like an economic philosophy than a skincare brand. That’s when Human Care came into being—it’s the name we use to describe everything we’re doing differently. We’re not building inside the Beauty industry. We are building the Human Care industry next door and inviting you to join us there instead. 

And that’s when the rest of it came together—we got ultra clear on who we are and started saying Yes again. Yes to crowdsourcing and community building. Yes to alternative marketing. Yes to starting a movement instead of starting a brand. Yes to being independent of venture or corporate interests that would put us in a box. Yes to a new vision of the economy that doesn’t run on the overconsumption of products made for no other reason than to undermine your autonomy as a consumer.