Lifestyle and Beauty Consultant Bola Balogun is one of the pioneers of fashion, lifestyle and beauty consultancy in Nigeria. She is one woman on a mission to include modern African women to the customer base of global beauty brands.
Before the launch of her hugely successful company Glam Brand Agency, she founded Glam Networks – a fashion and lifestyle television production behind top shows which aired on MNet.
In 2012, she officially launched Glam Brand Agency, and since then has executed projects for Herrera Confidential signature fragrances, Hairfinity products, Maybelline New York, Emmaus Beauty, and most recently Lancôme Paris: My Shade My Power Campaign.
In an exclusive interview with Black Enterprise, she talks about her background as well as the successful Lancôme Paris: My Shade My Power Campaign which her team kicked off last month.
Read excerpts of the interview below:
On growing up and the early stages of her career
I grew up in the DMV area and did all my schooling in America. I attended American University in Washington, D.C. where I majored in psychology and the Fashion Institute of Technology, where I took a course on fashion styling. I started my career as a fashion stylist working with Jill Topol. We worked with several celebrities including Destiny’s Child, N’sync, Britney Spears, Pharrell Williams. Lil Wayne and many more. I was also an intern at the popular Honey Magazine. I had a pretty good styling career in New York. After getting married, I moved to Nigeria in 2005 where I became the first fashion editor for the popular Nigerian women’s magazine Genevieve Magazine. I also co-founded Nigeria’s pioneer fashion styling agency with Omoyemi Akerele. I was an image consultant where we focused majorly on the fashion industry and individual styling. We branched into beauty brands with our first clients being Maybelline and Dark and Lovely.
On why Lancôme’s 40 shades Teinte Idole Ultra Wear Foundation was a fit for the African market
We possess local knowledge coupled with global insights, which give us a strong understanding of our target market. L’Oreal has been a client of ours for a couple of years and we have worked on several brands under them such as YSL, Giorgio Armani, Ralph Lauren, and of course Lancôme and achieved visible results. We have a strong retail entry market strategy. Also, our proven track record with other international beauty companies we have worked with.
My team and I sought diversity; in age, complexion, professional backgrounds, size, and that’s exactly what we went for. We selected women who represented the modern day African woman, who are living their best lives, are achieving their dreams on their own terms.
On why representation and diversity in the beauty industry is important to Africans
The beauty narrative has mostly come from the Western world but it is important that African women see an image of themselves and leave behind the Western beauty standard and embrace our own unique beauty.
Read the full interview on www.blackenterprise.com