About a 12 months ago, few people had heard of Louisa Schneider’s brand of ear piercings, even people who were inserted into earrings or hoops by licensed nurses. But she made a dramatic move to vary all that, and today, if you have a teenager (even a body part to brighten), you most likely know the name of her company: Mountain ash. It’s not only secure; it’s a excellent spot to go.
Schneider, so to talk, conquered the market by treating piercing as a medical procedure. It was a novel idea in 2017 and perhaps obvious in hindsight, but finding the right business model that might allow her brand to shine like the hypoallergenic jewelry she sells took failure and change. By all accounts, Rowan found his groove today. The 400-employee company has 65 stores this 12 months and annual revenue of $100 million. All this made Schneider one of the 20 finalists of our list of Entrepreneurs of the Year 2024 – innovation leaders.
So in 2017, you founded Rowan as a area of interest, concierge-style piercing service in New York City, where nurses visited people’s homes and performed the honors. How did the nurse case come about?
I worked at a hedge fund and looked at retailers like piercing firms that did well in malls. My daughter was born around this time and I believed: I won’t take her to where I went when I used to be 12. Both my parents were doctors. My sister is an obstetrician-gynecologist. All my aunts are nurses. And they said, “Oh, we pierce patients’ ears all the time.” Then a lightbulb went on and I spotted that this was a medical procedure – and no wonder the issue of ladies’s health care had not yet been adequately addressed. So I began really doing the research and the negative rate was about 30%, if you’ll be able to consider it, which meant an embedded piercing, infection, or poor placement. And now we will get that rate all the way down to lower than 1%.
Fast forward to late 2022, and Rowan had kiosks in about 300 Target stores. What happened next?
Target provided us with tremendous credibility in a situation where a nurse was willing to present up her shift to hitch Rowan and complement her work at the hospital, which might otherwise have been much harder at the time. But our customers didn’t realize they were getting mountain ash piercing, they thought the nurse was getting a Target piercing. And so for me, who was building a brand, it didn’t work. I would not have the opportunity to develop a profitable business this manner. And so we left.
Was it a difficult decision?
Very, very hard. Many sleepless nights. Like I said, it’s really hard to build a branded experience inside another person’s 4 partitions. And this wasn’t Target’s fault. It was just reality. It could have been anywhere. Target was a great partner. They have done a great job hiring well-known, established fashion designers and even Starbucks, but for a recent company just starting out, this is a challenge. So while a goal growth opportunity looks really interesting to investors and in an Excel spreadsheet, it could actually often be very misleading when you refer to the people involved, akin to customers and employees. Once I did this, I spotted that focusing on building Rowan’s own research made more sense.
So, starting in 2023, how did you grow your brand this 12 months to 65 stores and an annual sales rate of $100 million?
We already had several Rowan studios that were doing well. We were easily in a position to open locations in cities where Target representatives were present and already had trained nurses who desired to work with Rowan. At this rate, we are growing almost 100% per 12 months. There was just a lot of turnover.
Rowan also sells earrings and earring products. Were there any recent features last 12 months?
This is something I’m excited about. Many girls play sports, pierce their ears and jump on the soccer field and have a big problem. That’s why last 12 months we introduced our sport studs – soft earrings that you could slip on and have fun wearing. I’ve spent a lot of time in the fields myself and I know it’s a really painful moment and when it happens it’s quite traumatic.
Now that folks know they’re getting piercings at Rowan, how can they attract more customers? What’s your secret sauce?
When you go back to third grade with pierced ears, everyone notices and asks, “Where were you?” So we make sure that every customer who leaves our facility appears like they have had a five-star experience. And it pays off due to word-of-mouth marketing.