Makeup launches are exciting, more so when there’s a youn’un at the helm of the brand! A part-time makeup influencer and full-time CEO, Kairavi Bharat Ram’s freshly launched conceptual makeup brand Typsy Beauty which is inspired by her personal mental health and creative journey. In a freewheeling chat, Kairavi shares anecdotes about the brand’s interesting journey to its inception.
ELLE: Tell us about your early stint with beauty.
Kairavi: After school, I had a few gap years due to my ailing mental health. I was suffering from depression and found myself cut off from everyone else. As time passed, I started engaging in YouTube videos on makeup and beauty. Following this, I started a blog on Instagram that helped boost my inner confidence despite being bad at makeup. However, after putting up makeup videos on the internet, I ended up interacting with other artists and people which made me feel like makeup was truly my armour. Beauty gave me immense pleasure and distracted me from all my negative thoughts. For the few hours I spent applying makeup, it felt like meditation.
ELLE: What is the inspiration behind Typsy Beauty?
Kairavi: The idea behind this brand was to bring out an element of fun in makeup. I watched international beauty brands make every aspect of their brands – from the packaging to the themes and collections – unique. I decided to bring conceptual beauty to our country. Our brand Typsy Beauty is named after ‘being high’ which is the perfect state of fun between being sober and drunk. Our products are exciting and quirky while maintaining high standards of quality and striking the balance in between. I want to promote the feeling of confidence while applying makeup through this brand. Everyone talks about natural beauty but there’s no harm in applying that little bit of makeup if it makes you feel powerful from within.
ELLE: What is your relationship with makeup and beauty like?
Kairavi: Makeup and beauty are what brought me out of my toughest times. It’s definitely been my guiding light. I do not agree with people who consider makeup as frivolous because it can really give one the strength and confidence they need, and there is nothing wrong with that.
ELLE: Who would you consider as your mentor who helped you through the process of building this brand?
Kairavi: I have had the good fortune of having a lot of mentors over the years. One of them is Mr Sanjay Kapoor who is my investor, uncle, mentor, and has taken various other forms too. He’s been an icon in the fashion industry and now together we plan on taking the beauty industry by storm. His cumulative experience in various industries and the way he’s guided me in my entrepreneurial journey has been a massive support for me.
ELLE: What problems did you face in the initial stage of building your brand?
Kairavi: Being a young woman with no experience made me face some problems in the initial stages. Vendors or even agencies did not take me seriously however, after they realised that I knew what I was talking about, whether it was formulas or my knowledge of beauty, things began to change.
ELLE: Why do you call it a conceptual beauty brand?
Kairavi: A conceptual brand means anything that has a theme to it. It goes beyond the product itself and expands to the packaging and marketing too. The West has a lot of conceptual brands but the Indian continent is yet to see one. A lot of American brands with themes and collections like Too Faced and Huda Beauty are beginning to enter the Indian market and Typsy Beauty will follow the league.
ELLE: What is the brand’s USP?
Kairavi: The USP is of course that the brand is conceptual and that there are themes and concepts behind the products and packaging. The products are of high quality, made in the best labs in the world and are multifunctional in nature. The brand promotes a message of being bold and aims at making one believe that you can be whoever you want to be.
ELLE: Where would your products be available after the launch?
Kairavi: We are launching the eye makeup first because as we know, face masks aren’t going anywhere. We’ll gradually launch the rest of our products every month or two. These products will be available on www.typsybeauty.com but we will soon be expanding to other marketplaces too.
ELLE: Tell us about product formulas?
Kairavi: We try to give highly-pigmented products with high shine in a variety of new formulas to make them stand out.
ELLE: How inclusive is Typsy’s product range?
Our range of products is quite diverse and fresh; the eye shadow palettes, double-sided eyeliner, and highlighters are designed to actually suit the Indian skin tone.
