When the pandemic hit, model Anastasia MacKay saw an opportunity to give her hair the TLC it never got on set. That led to a shopping trip where she noticed a “big gap” for brands that made textured hair care feel luxurious, she said. Soon after, she launched her brand Lobie, which means “love” in Surinamese, one of MacKay’s native languages.
“I saw the products I’d used since I was a little girl — they work great, but they’re gaudy, so I’d always hid them in my cupboard,” she said, regarding her trip to the hair-care aisle. “And the beautiful brands I do like never worked for me because they were never specifically tailored to textured hair.”
Her first step was to link with a research lab, which she found in her home of Los Angeles. She then developed the brand’s inaugural product, the $40 Peptide Leave-In Mask, which launched direct-to-consumer on Tuesday. The company is self-funded by Anastasia MacKay and her entrepreneur husband, Ross MacKay — he also founded the beverage brand Cadence and plant-based chicken brand Daring Foods. Ross MacKay is a silent partner in the business.
Anastasia MacKay said the fragrance of the brand’s products is a big focus area. “I worked with a fragrance house that has worked with a lot of big textured hair-care brands, and they kept [pointing to] data showing that people in the textured space love coconut, vanilla, very sweet [scents],” she said. “I wanted a more premium scent, so I had to [stress] my mission to differentiate and elevate the space.”
MacKay was not alone in her desire for better-smelling textured hair products. In a TikTok with over 27,000 likes, comedian Jazmyn W. (1.9 million followers) posted about wanting products for textured hair that don’t smell like “honey butter, cookies, and cream and sugar.”
“Many body care, face care and fragrance brands like Byredo have premiumized scent and aesthetic, but never has that translated into textured hair,” Ross MacKay said.
The scent complements the brand’s sleek packaging.
Anastasia MacKay has been teasing the brand’s launch to the 34,000 Instagram followers she built thanks to her modeling career, she said.
To launch the brand, the couple focused on seeding products to influencers. Anastasia MacKay said she hopes to build a community around the single launch product, as brands like Vintner’s Daughter have done. “I want to focus on brand awareness and community and get feedback from people,” she said.
As they expand Lobie’s assortment, the founders hope to partner with salons, host pop-ups and eventually sell at Sephora. Anastasia MacKay has already developed an entire product range focused on moisture, she said. And according to Ross MacKay, the brand has already been approached by retailers. The plan is to establish the brand before linking with a retailer so that it’s not “sitting on a shelf [when] no one knows who you are yet,” he said.
In the past few years, several aesthetically minded brands for textured hair have launched, expanding the category. Tracee Ellis Ross launched Pattern Beauty with Beach House Group in 2019, and Taraji P. Henson launched TPH Hair with Maesa in 2020. Other newer entrants include Bread Beauty Supply, another 2020 launch, and OurX, with a personalization component, in 2023.
According to a Syensqo report, over 65% of the world’s consumer population, or about 1 billion consumers, have textured hair — and women with textured hair spend 78% more on hair products than women with straight hair, on average. As reported by Glamour U.K., research conducted by U.K. retailer Superdrug showed that 70% of Black and Asian women feel the high street does not cater to their beauty needs. Given such stats, Ross MacKay said he feels Lobie will be embraced by consumers eager to find more options.
