Please welcome 10Beauty, the Intelligent Beauty company
Meet 10Beauty, the latest addition to Lerer Hippeau’s portfolio.
HQ: Boston, Massachusetts
Founders: Alex Shashou, Justin Effron, and Chris Casey
The problem: The beauty services industry hasn’t meaningfully changed in decades. Despite significant technological and digital advances in the broader marketplace, customers still have to rely on human scheduling and skill to get hair, makeup, and nails done. While some companies have launched nail-painting robots, customer adoption has been appreciably low given performance limitations, such as the robot’s inability to provide a full manicure or anything resembling a professional’s touch. We increasingly expect total convenience in all other aspects of our lives; making coffee, working out, attending a board meeting, and conducting just about any other task simply must fit into the broader framework of our lives. Beauty services have, to date, remained the exception to that rule. They take too long (receiving a manicure every two weeks consumes, on average, a full day out of the year) and aren’t conducive to multitasking at a time when busy people are looking to accomplish more with limited time. We need a solution that upends the current way of providing beauty services, one that is in step with the digital age.
10Beauty’s solution: 10Beauty is leveraging robotics and automation to reimagine how people interact with machines to receive beauty services. The company has developed the only machine capable of performing a full manicure without human intervention. 10Beauty’s fully automated device allows users to customize their manicure using a mobile app. Users then slip their hand in and the machine removes polish, files and shapes nails, perfects cuticles, and applies new polish. The full process takes roughly the same time as a traditional manicure, but this time on the customer’s own timetable, one hand at a time, freeing them to use their other hand as it works and then go about their day without inconvenience.
Origin story: Following stints at Goldman Sachs and Citibank, college friends Alex Shashou and Justin Effron spent ten years building ALICE, a hotel operations platform that makes staff-to-staff and staff-to-guest communication more efficient, improving guest services. They scaled the business across 64 countries and 3,500 hotels worldwide before selling to Expedia. Shortly thereafter, Alex and Justin began exploring robotics and automation and their potential application to beauty services, which, they observed, hadn’t evolved in nearly fifty years, and suffered from quality control. Looking at other instances where robotics improved accessibility, they saw an opportunity that put them ahead of the curve. They teamed up with Chris Casey, a robotics leader with over 25 years of experience launching new-to-the-world robotics, including the original Roomba for iRobot. We invested in the business back in 2020 and are thrilled to see 10Beauty’s first major product come to market.
Why we’re betting on it: 10Beauty’s business case is, simply put, hugely compelling. The U.S. nail care industry is a $11 billion market. There are more registered nail salons in the U.S. than there are coffee shops, with 20+ million women receiving a regular manicure. 10Beauty is the leading company applying recent advancements in robotics and automation and AI to revolutionize beauty services.
Our take: During their time building ALICE, Alex and Justin gained significant experience in the hospitality industry and developed the skills necessary to build relationships with hotel operators — the currency of hospitality — allowing them to scale their business globally. Now, they are taking those same skills and applying them to the beauty space (another legacy space requiring strong relationship management). Alex and Justin have already solidified deals with four enterprise customers who plan to install their device at 1,000 initial locations, representing an astounding pre-launch run-rate of $13 million in annual revenue. If successful, these first four partnerships alone have the potential to represent $50 million in revenue across 3,000 locations. In addition, dozens of high-end hair salons have signed on to offer manicures using 10Beauty’s device. A pre-launch pipeline like 10Beauty’s is a testament to their vision, and could only have been developed by a team that has real knowledge of how to scale a business of this sort. We couldn’t be more excited to partner with Alex, Justin, Chris and their team of 35 of the world’s foremost engineers, as they emerge from stealth mode to help lead the intelligent beauty revolution.
Further reading: “These guys built a robot to give you a perfect manicure. Can they win over the $11 billion nail care industry?” via Fast Company
