She Quit Wall Street to Start an ‘Explosive’ Company Seeing $125M a Year. It Simply Launched a ‘Very Hard’-to-Obtain Product for Home Use.

“ I’ve been obsessed with nails since I was a kid,” Sarah Gibson Tuttle, founder and CEO of Olive & June, tells Entrepreneur. “My dad didn’t let me paint my nails, so I had a box of nail polish under my bed, and I would sneak manicures, especially red. That was his least favorite color.” 

Gibson Tuttle left a decade-long profession on Wall Street to bridge what she noticed as a niche between very high-end nail salons and mom-and-pop outlets, much like the best way Drybar got here in with blowouts at a mid-level worth level.

In 2013, the founder opened her first nail salon, Olive & June, in Beverly Hills. However, because the salon continued to develop, increasing to extra places in Pasadena and Santa Monica, Gibson Tuttle realized the class didn’t simply have a difficulty with affordability — however one with time and entry. 

“ There’s a limitation on the number of manicurists in the country, and the demand far exceeds what that capacity is for those manicurists,” Gibson Tuttle explains. “And so you go to pockets of the country, and there isn’t an offering like there is in LA or New York.”

Launching Olive & June’s first product line in 2019

Nearly each different class on the sweetness market had a significant at-home providing, however nails didn’t, Gibson Tuttle says. So she got down to create one. 

It took nearly six years from Olive & June’s first salon opening to the launch of its personal product line. Gibson Tuttle by no means wished the model to be simply one other product on the shelf, so she led with innovation. 

Olive & June rolled out its patented polish brush deal with The Poppy, that includes counterweighted rubber silicone for simpler software, together with six shades of vegan nail polish freed from seven widespread toxins, in 2019. 

The firm collaborated with one other aggressive nail model for an finish cap at Target, promoting out in simply 10 days, then launched 14 SKUs on the retailer, which remained its unique distributor for 4 years. 

Following pandemic shutdowns, the model’s brick-and-mortar salons remained closed because it shifted focus to its personal merchandise. Ultimately, the corporate scaled to greater than 15,000 retail doorways, together with Ulta and Walmart. 

Additionally, Olive & June’s direct-to-consumer channel allowed the corporate to pair its choices with schooling, a crucial piece in driving product adoption. 

Helen of Troy acquired Olive & June for $240 million

Olive & June continued to see success, however as a lot as Gibson Tuttle and the management group loved working the enterprise, it was additionally their first time scaling a model on the nationwide stage. As the annual income milestones elevated — $50 million, $75 million, closing in on $100 million — so did the attraction of belonging to a bigger home of manufacturers with extra sources and help. 

“ We didn’t have to sell,” Gibson Tuttle says. “We were profitable. It was really our choice to sell at that moment. And it was about if we could find the right partner that will continue to let us run the business, and run it the way we want.”

Global client merchandise firm Helen of Troy, which owns family title manufacturers like Hydroflask and PUR, acquired Olive & June for $240 million in 2024. Gibson Tuttle stayed on as the corporate’s CEO and grew income to roughly $125 million in 2025 — about 35% year-over-year development.

“We run standalone,” Gibson Tuttle says. “Nothing has changed about anything. Other than we have a financial parent company, which helps me sleep better at night.  I’m working harder than I’ve ever worked because we have more retailers than we’ve ever had.” 

Balancing client suggestions with a founder’s instinct

In the early days of Olive & June, Gibson Tuttle relied loads on intestine intuition when it got here to product growth. But as the corporate grew and buyer messages rolled in, Gibson Tuttle’s method began to shift. Now, the founder says Olive & June’s product line is client feedback-based — “with a dash of gut.” 

“ I truly believe that the consumer leads with their dollars,” Gibson Tuttle says. “They show you what they care about, in every category.”

Gibson Tuttle cites a key instance of how taking client suggestions into consideration unlocked main gross sales: Olive & June’s press-on nail assortment.

Initially, regardless of quite a few DMs and emails expressing a want for press-on nail merchandise, Gibson Tuttle was cautious. She thought-about Olive & June a polish-first model and had grown up with “your mother’s press-ons,” sometimes missing in high quality and longevity. But she determined to pay attention.

Once once more, Gibson Tuttle put innovation on the coronary heart of product growth. Olive & June rolled out its 94% PCR (post-consumer recycled) press-on nail assortment Super Stick Mani in 2021, providing twice as many sizes as others obtainable available on the market, the founder notes. 

“ They have been explosive for the business, ” Gibson Tuttle says. “Now I’m a press-on stan. I think what’s important is that without giving up my voice, I really leaned into the consumers guiding us with their dollars and their voice.” 

Olive & June’s Dip Mani System launched October 22

Over the years, Olive & June has efficiently launched salon-level formulations and classes, together with gel and builder gel, and taught shoppers easy methods to use them. Now, the model is delving right into a extremely requested providing, and “one of the last frontiers of salon-focused products”: dip powder. 

Olive & June’s Dip Mani System launched on October 22. “ Other brands have done it in smaller scale and haven’t been as successful,” Gibson Tuttle says. “That’s really where we thrive and shine.”

Traditionally, dip makes use of acrylic powder. Created from a man-made chemical known as PMMA (polymethyl methacrylate), acrylic has been recognized in some instances to trigger contact dermatitis, weaken nails and enhance an infection threat. 

Gibson Tuttle was by no means thinking about utilizing acrylic for Olive & June’s dip powder product. The model would solely do dip (an concept she had toyed with for half a decade) if the product could possibly be plant-based. 

“ That is a very hard thing to achieve,” Gibson Tuttle says. “It is a slightly different texture, and it’s a little fluffier, so you have to work with it a little bit differently. We really had to make sure that we could not only have the same efficacy, but hopefully better efficacy, than what we’re seeing in the market.” 

After 127 iterations, an economical dip powder product

After working with a chemist on 127 completely different iterations, Olive & June locked down its five-step Dip Mani System, with outcomes lasting as much as 21 days. An extra “mini step” within the course of accounts for the fluffier texture. 

And, as typical with new merchandise, getting the colour good —  a Pantone shade on a chunk of paper doesn’t learn the identical throughout completely different formulations — required endurance and persistence. 

Although the plant-based formulation will increase the price of producing the Dip Mani System, which is priced between $75 and $100 relying on the variety of polish colours, for the Olive & June client, that also works out to lower than $3 per manicure, Gibson Tuttle notes.

At U.S. salons, a dip powder manicure tends to vary from $30 to $60.

Post-acquisition, folks usually ask Gibson Tuttle concerning the phrases of her contract: “How long do you have to be there?” But stepping again from the corporate she constructed is the very last thing on the founder’s thoughts. She nonetheless appears to be like ahead to the product innovation and collaboration alternatives that include every new 12 months. 

“ I love the fever and the excitement, and the enthusiasm that our community has,” Gibson Tuttle says. 

“ I’ve been obsessed with nails since I was a kid,” Sarah Gibson Tuttle, founder and CEO of Olive & June, tells Entrepreneur. “My dad didn’t let me paint my nails, so I had a box of nail polish under my bed, and I would sneak manicures, especially red. That was his least favorite color.” 

Gibson Tuttle left a decade-long profession on Wall Street to bridge what she noticed as a niche between very high-end nail salons and mom-and-pop outlets, much like the best way Drybar got here in with blowouts at a mid-level worth level.

In 2013, the founder opened her first nail salon, Olive & June, in Beverly Hills. However, because the salon continued to develop, increasing to extra places in Pasadena and Santa Monica, Gibson Tuttle realized the class didn’t simply have a difficulty with affordability — however one with time and entry.