How Diana Started Consulting For Beauty Brands, Quit Her Job And Built A $10k+ Monthly Business
Diana Choi • Published February 3rd, 2024
SIDE-HUSTLE STATS
40
Hours Worked Per Week
$10,000+
Revenue Per Month
1
Founders
0
Employees
$0
Startup Cost
1
Months Before Profit
Email, Linkedin
Main Growth Strategy
50%
Net Profit Margin
Table Of Contents
Quitting Your Job To Go All-In On Consulting Beauty Brands
Diana was working as a marketing communications manager when she started offering brand consulting as a side hustle. At the start, she didn’t have a clear offer.
And despite having only one client, she decided to quit her job to pursue her brand consulting business full-time.
Long story short? She was barely surviving.
With no money left after taxes, she had to figure out a way to grow her income fast.
This story highlights how she underestimated the cost of full-time entrepreneurship, follow her intuition and scaled her business to a five-figure a month consultancy business for beauty and wellness brands. She also shares useful tips for people looking to start their own service-based business.
Coming Up With The Idea
How did you get started in brand consulting for beauty and wellness brands?
After I left my corporate job, I went back to working for my family’s business. I was doing international sales and business development for medical device distribution. My father represented a lot of startup companies in the medical device space who were looking to expand their presence in Asia, in APAC, for instance.
So what I did was help them acquire clinical data in Asia so they could commercially sell their products there.
I got to travel a lot through that opportunity and get firsthand exposure to what sales is like. And I loved it. I love meeting people. I love talking to people. I love not sitting in an office all day. I hate Excel work, which was what I was doing prior. I fell in love with the lifestyle, but I didn’t like the medical device field.
One year, I found out that there was an Indie Beauty Expo in LA. And it really just spoke to me. The concept of indie beauty was so interesting with this idea of new beauty blowing up. At that time, it was the only year they made the event open to the public. Now it’s only reserved for people in the beauty industry.
I bought a ticket and flew to LA. I told my dad that I was going to go and he totally frowned on the idea. He’s like, “Why are you going to this?” And so many people were like, “What are you doing?” But I felt like something was calling me, and I just needed to check it out because this seemed really exciting.
I kid you not, I stayed there from the beginning until the end. I think it was like a four-hour conference, and I usually hate conferences. With medical device conferences, I’d go there for maybe a half hour, and I would leave because I just didn’t like the vibe.
It’s cheesy, but when they say it feels right, it does feel right. And even though I didn’t know anyone, I was talking to all the vendors and brands wanting to become a distributor for them.
And I was a nobody.
I got all these business cards and was like, “I’m going to email them, and I’m going to help them become distributors and sell their products in Asia.” Basically, what I was doing was for my dad, but for beauty brands.
I remember sending cold emails to really big brands, like Sakara Life, and no one ever replied.
Obviously, I signed on zero brands.
Your First Client
After you attended the Indi Beauty Expo and got zero responses, how did you get your first client?
A year later, there was a concept store in Vancouver I was consulting for. This really big influencer, with over a million followers, came in and she knew the owners. So I was looking at her Instagram and saw her mentioning a lash serum product that she was using. I was curious, so I looked it up and found out that the brand is actually from Vancouver.
Then I emailed the founder and was like, “Hey, do you need help selling your product in Asia? Because I could help you.” And she actually responded. So that was how I got my first client.
It was kind of serendipitous. I was just listening to my intuition. I was also very naive to think I could do it thinking, “Of course they would want to work with me.”
Quitting Your Job
Why did you decide to quit your job to consult for beauty and wellness brands? Would you do anything differently?
I started working on my side hustle in 2019. After about two years into my job, I had one client and was like, “I’m going to give this a go.”
And the first year was f*cking hard.
Oh my God, I made so many mistakes. I was like, “Oh, yeah, one client is fine. I can survive on this.” I was disillusioned of what it really takes. And I think there’s beauty in it, but it’s also like, I couldn’t pay my bills.
I was barely surviving. I was making a basic income but wasn’t growing and expanding. Also, I was working on another side hustle. I co-founded a mental wellness startup, so working on two side hustles when the first side hustle didn’t really take off was very stressful. I would never advise that to anyone.
First Year Mistakes
You mention that the first year was hard. What mistakes did you make looking back?
When I started, I was like, “Oh, I’ll just focus on sales.”
But because my client was a one person team, she also needed help with her Amazon store, logistics and operations. And being the ambitious person I am, I was like, “Yeah, I can help you with all of these”, because I was just trying to grow her brand. Then I was very burnt out, unhappy and underpaid. It was a bad combo, but worth learning.
Growing Your Side-Hustle
When you realized you underestimated the cost of living off your business revenue, what did you do to grow?
When I first jumped into it full time, I did it very incorrectly in the sense that I didn’t work out the numbers. I wasn’t even surviving. Like, what’s below surviving?
After a year of struggling, I realized I needed to at least double my income. Because, after taxes, I literally had no money. And I was still living at home at the time.
So I went into hustle mode.
I went through my whole network and started e-mailing brand founders and other founders in the CPG space. I feel like the universe is always working in your favor when you make a decision.
One day, I was looking on LinkedIn and actually found one brand looking for an international sales rep. I didn’t want to be a sales rep, but my service was exactly what she was looking for, so I was like, “I can help her with that.”
So I reached out to the founder on LinkedIn. She eventually replied, and I got it.
Within two months, I went from one client to three clients. By that point, I had doubled my income. But yeah, I was in hustle mode, emailing everybody I knew. I figured I could at least get one more client, and that would be better than nothing.
Over time, the scope of my work grew. I increased my rates and retainer fees. With any new clients that I got, I started charging them a higher rate. And then there was no more pushback.
Now it’s all been inbound inquiries, so organic worth of mouth through my connections.
How To Get Good Clients
How do you know if you're working with a good client?
I started interviewing my clients. I’ll ask, “What is your runway? How big is your company? How established is your company?” Now I only work with brands that are growing and scaling. They’re not struggling to get into the market and already have a really strong presence in the market.
For me, I don’t want to help build someone else’s startup. So if you’re going to do something similar to what I’m doing, the quality of your clients is really important.
I had one client last year whose retainer consisted of more than 50% of my income. One day, she just told me that she needed to pause our contract. I had to tell her that she needed to give me 30 days notice because in the past she would just terminate people on the spot.
Now, my clients have budgets to work with, and they’re doing over $1 million in revenue.
Revenue + Earnings
On average, how much revenue does your business earn each month?
Startup Costs + Tools
What did it cost to start your business? Any tools you use to run your business today?
Tips To Start Consulting
What tips do you have for people wanting to start a brand consulting business?
General Lessons
What advice would you give someone who wants to quit their job for their side hustle?
Where Can People Find You?
Where can people and brands support you?
If you’re a brand looking to grow your retail distribution, you can contact Diana at dianachoi@far-wide.com.
Diana’s also launching her own k-beauty brand made from innovative formulations and effective ingredients for people with sensitive and problematic skin. You can visit @vibesofgrace on Instagram to learn more.