(0)
Roshanne

Movers and Shakers | Roshanne Dorsett | Founder | The Glowcery

Roshanne is the founder of The Glowcery, a 100% natural, vegan, superfood skincare brand, designed to deeply nourish skin for a healthy, balanced glow. Every product is hand-blended in small batches using fresh, plant-based and cold-pressed fruit, nut and vegetable oils

Roshanne launched her business in March 2020.

What was your career path prior to starting your business?

I graduated from Keele University with a LLB Law with Criminology degree. My goal was to become an International Human Rights Lawyer and so for the next two years, I interned at a human rights charity and a criminal law firm before securing a paid job at an East London criminal defence firm.

I worked on criminal law and public law cases as well as Joint Enterprise Murder cases. The caseload was emotionally heavy and I worked there for just over a year before leaving to go work abroad.

The freedom of being aboard in the Balearic sun, planted and started to grow the idea of wanting to run my own business. By the time the summer was up I had saved enough money to study an accredited skincare course. When I returned to England in October I enrolled on the course and this is why Ibiza will always have a special place in my heart.

How did you come up with your business idea?

The idea for The Glowcery was inspired by my plant-based diet as I was switching from animal protein to plant-based protein and from dairy to plant-based substitutes, I was consistently looking at food labels. These new food discoveries led me to start reading the labels of skincare products and what I soon discovered was that there was a lot of greenwashing.

I also found that whilst there are thousands of vegan and cruelty-free skincare brands out there, none of them spoke to me or made it clear that what you put on your body should be as healthy and nutritious as the food you put in your body. The brand name came when I was at a local fruit and veg market and I feel it perfectly fit the brand

Tell us about the business planning stage, did you raise funding or self-fund?

Prior to launching The Glowcery I worked at Amazon in the book making department. I saved up my pay from there to hire a freelance designer, professional product photographer and to buy in bulk products and packaging. I was also awarded a £1000 grant from WENTA, a local organisation that provides business support.

How far ahead do you plan and what keeps you on track and motivated?

To be honest, I plan my content in advance, but that’s it. With the final quarter soon starting and with Christmas coming, I have booked to work with a marketing expert to plan my email campaigns, etc.

What has been the most amazing day in your entrepreneurial life so far?

There have been so many so could I please do top three?

i. Seeing our customers skin transforms and reading their testimonials
ii. Being awarded Best Facial Oil of 2020 by Women’s Health Magazine
iii. Recently I was selected to do an interview with a big newspaper. They are spotlighting small businesses that started during lockdown. As part of the piece, I travelled to their offices to record a podcast episode and photographers came to my house to take photos of me making my products! Really surreal moments.

What has been your scariest moment?

Two weeks after I launched The Glowcery the UK went into lockdown and it was definitely scary not knowing how it would affect the business especially at such an early stage.

How do you work on making your business grow?

I work with an incredible black women-owned PR Agency Lima Comms ran by Iman, Anesu and Maya in just over a year they have secured features in over 40 media publications including ITV This Morning, Vogue, Cosmopolitan, VICE UK and The Evening Standard to name a few.

Lima Comms also works on influencer gifting and we’ve been able to collab with incredible influencers both macro and micro! I’m now starting to work with marketing experts to learn how to strategise and use paid ads to spread The Glowcery brand far and wide!

What is the best thing about being your own boss?

Good question! There are a few things that come to mind, being able to work towards economic freedom is motivating. I love the fact that working on The Glowcery has given me new skills and higher levels of confidence, because I have to work out costs/margins etc.

I have a better understanding of maths than I did at school, I enjoy public speaking a lot more and I am more self-aware, I know my likes/dislikes my strengths and my weaknesses. I’m also a Gemini and one of our biggest traits is being creative, and so I love that The Glowcery is an outlet for my creativity.

I really enjoy the early research and development phase when working on new products. It’s the sensory experience touching, smelling the natural butters and oils, really allowing everything to flow from formulation, to naming the products and coming up with the initial colour scheme and design. It all feels like I was meant to do this.

What are the challenges of working for yourself and how do you tackle them

I have a lot of ideas and plans for The Glowcery and separate projects and so sometimes I lack discipline and try to take on more than I physically can manage.

I’ve learnt to start small and slowly build it up.I also daydream a lot and this can lead to procrastination. When it comes to lack of discipline, I genuinely talk to myself and remind myself of my future goals, this usually snaps me out of my daydreaming and gets me focused. If this doesn’t work I take some time out to do nothing, recharge and then once I feel like myself again, we move!

Who do you admire or look to for inspiration as a business owner?

Sharmadean Reid, Founder of The Stack World. I have been following Sharmadean’s journey from WAH Shoreditch and the TopShop pop and I have always been in awe of her work ethic, ability to effortlessly pivot into various creative industries, and her dedication to economically empower women.

From her initial Fanzine to WAH Nails, Future Girl Corp to Beauty Stack and now Stack World Sharmadean has levelled up everytime, whilst simultaneously elevating women as a collective. A true icon! I’m a member of The Stack World community, a membership platform for mission-driven women, they host amazing online and IRL events and by attending I have met and connected with so many incredible women.

What piece of advice has had the most impact on your business? And who was it from?

I don’t know where or who originally said this, but the quote “what is for you will always find you” is something I remind myself of whenever business gets challenging.

What are the three books, websites or resources (professional or personal) that you would recommend to other business owners?

  • Double X Economy – shares data on the detriment to economies and societies through failure to effectively close the gender pay gap. it also offers solutions on how we all can help to economically empower women and how doing so would have a far reaching benefits
  • The Alchemist – I tend to read this whenever I start to feel uninspired I didn’t understand it the first time I read it, but having read it several times now the message is extremely powerful.
  • The Stack World – As a solo entrepreneur it gets lonely sometimes and so I joined The Stack World, a community of mission-driven women. The Stack World is a membership community that hosts and curates incredible online and IRL events focussed on Beauty, Business, Culture, Community, Wellness and Society. By attending these events, I’ve learnt a lot about myself, have a better understanding of how business works and I’ve met so many incredible women and made lifelong friends!

What other passions do you have away from your business? How do you relax?

A two hour long Epsom salt bath helps me fully relax. I turn it into a selfcare ritual, I light a candle, put on some frequency music and just lay there, this is my me time.

I’m also learning Spanish because I would like to move to Ibiza. I also enjoy reading. I tend to read a few books at a time, in different genres such as inspiring, educational and non-fiction. At first, I thought I wouldn’t be able to absorb and digest the information, but now I love it!

Connect with the Glowcery on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and Tiktok @theglowceryshop

Roshanne will be speaking at PRECIOUS Nights- the Business of Beauty on Thursday 7 October.

Leave a Reply