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Shine On Success
Shine on Success is a dynamic, story-driven podcast where extraordinary entrepreneurs, visionary leaders, and resilient change-makers share their journeys to success, revealing both the challenges and the strategies that led to their breakthroughs. Each episode offers a unique blend of inspiring personal stories, practical business insights, and actionable advice, allowing our guests to connect with an engaged, growth-oriented audience ready to be motivated and uplifted. By joining us, you’ll not only have the opportunity to showcase your expertise and inspire listeners but also to be part of a powerful platform that celebrates ambition, innovation, and the courage to turn dreams into reality.
Shine On Success
From Rock Bottom to Radical Purpose: The Rise of a New Kind of Founder
What if your deepest failure became the foundation of your greatest success? In this raw and riveting episode of Shine On Success, we explore the power of starting over, not with ease, but with intention. You’ll hear the story of a founder who lost everything: her first business, her confidence, even her sense of self. But what emerged wasn’t just a new company, it was a whole new way of living.
From sorting donated clothes as a child to leading a seven-figure clean beauty brand, she’s redefining what it means to build with integrity. We delve into how grief, shame, and spiritual transformation became the fuel for a sustainable business that’s not just plastic-free, but fearless. If you've ever felt like a failure or wondered how to begin again, this one’s for you.
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What if your biggest failure was the very thing that made you unstoppable? Welcome to Shine on Success, where we spotlight stories of resilience, reinvention and rising strong. Today's guest is Kate Asaroff, founder and CEO of Dip Sustainable Hair Care, a seven-figure clean beauty brand that's as honest as it is impactful. But Kate's journey wasn't always glossy. She grew up in poverty, publicly lost her first business and walked through a two-year conversion to Judaism that reshaped her soul and identity. What emerged is a founder who's not just building a business, but building a better way of living, working and believing. Get ready for a powerful conversation about shame, sustainability and starting over, with the kind of grit that can only come from someone who's been to the bottom and rebuilt from purpose. Welcome, kate, it's so nice to have you here today. How are you doing?
Speaker 2:I'm doing great, thank you. And thank you for sharing your pod with me. It's very cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's super cool, I love doing it and you know I started doing this because I was grieving my father, who passed away, and I needed somewhere to put that energy, so it's been amazing. We're in the 60s of episodes, so I'm excited to get to know you better. So I'd like to start with this question what is one thing you want people to know about you that most don't?
Speaker 2:Oh, that's actually really. I've never really been asked that before, so I think what most people don't know about me is like I'm incredibly shy. It's very difficult for me to be a public founder because I'm very much an introvert and like to stay at home and just be around my family. Yeah, I was talking.
Speaker 1:But I feel the same sometimes, like I feel like I'm always out in public and hugging on everyone and I like, when I get by myself, I'm like, oh, this is amazing when nobody's talking, which is awesome. So I understand that. So what's something unexpected about your journey that you think shaped you more than success ever could? So I grew up.
Speaker 2:I don't like the word poor, but I would say very unwealthy, it just sounds nicer. My mom was a professor of anthropology and after she and my dad got divorced we were in a very, very tricky spot financially. I was only eight years old but we were living in her car for a little bit and then we ended up moving into church funded housing and part of that journey was like you had to kind of earn your keep to be there because the rent was so low. So you know, when people donate clothes, you know you see them on every corner donate bags and bags of clothes. Well, my mom and I were off often on the receiving end of that stuff sorting through, and we had to sort through clothes and household wares for, you know, into different sizes, and battered women would come with their children and we would give I want to make.
Speaker 2:And you know, if you have never done anything, stepped outside yourself to help others in need, then it's very difficult to run a very empathetic business. I think a lot of people forget that the whole. It's not the whole point of business, but it is what. For me, the whole point of business is to help others. It's like it's actually the starting a business is the cheapest way to donate to other people.
Speaker 1:That is so good, and I do know some people actually in my life right now that they are just not humbled at all because everything just keeps. They just keep getting it handed to them, right, they don't get it. That we've been through. I grew up in a trailer court and I didn't even know we were poor until someone called me trailer trash and I'm like seriously, like I'm not trashy, you know. But yeah, and then lots of things happen and it's just crazy how you go through that. I didn't live in a car, but you know I've had some things happen that were really, really difficult and I totally get it, and I also. My first business failed. So we have something else in common. Let's talk about that. You had your first business. What happened when it failed and how did that moment impact your sense of who you are?
Speaker 2:So it was crazy because the business was successful. My partnership was not, and you know when that happens, you can't really talk about the nitty gritty of what made it that way, but I can tell you the aftermath of that. I poured my heart and soul into this business, only to watch it succeed and then have to dissolve. And it was so. I honestly it felt like, you know, I've lost. I've lost a parent, and it felt that way. It was like at the same level of grief when I, when I lost my first business, I was I don't know what happened to you when it when it happened to you, but like even just you could see it. Like physically, I lost a ton of weight. I started to go like blind, like I had got double vision, like I could feel it. I don't know if it was mental or not, I felt like I could. I was so sad all the time, I was so struck with grief that I could like feel my teeth feeling wiggly. You know, it was just so crazy and looking, I actually had chest pains.
Speaker 1:I thought I was having a heart attack. I had to go by er in the hospital. I loved it so much I built 17 years of my life into that business for a partnership to destroy it, so I totally understand that right did you?
Speaker 2:did you like I had this thing where I couldn't sleep at all? I would just my teeth would shatter all night and like I just couldn't, I couldn't breathe. I would google like how to put myself in a coma, like all these like crazy things that I you know I'm generally happy person.
Speaker 2:Like I don't know, looking back it feels so out of body, but that's the level I, a level of grief and like depression I went through and people didn't know because it was during the pandemic, but I was so ill from from closing my business the teeth chattering thing has happened to me sometimes and the stress at the that moment is some of the greatest stresses of my life in that moment.
Speaker 1:In fact, it just happened to me a couple of weeks ago when my husband was passing out because his blood pressure was like 55 over 35, and I didn't understand it. So I'm sitting in bed and my teeth are chattering and I knew it's coming and I'm like, oh my gosh, the stress that I'm underrated at this moment is so great that I can't even control my teeth they're like so I get I don't know like have you been to?
Speaker 2:so now I'm dealing with like the. That was five years ago and now I'm still dealing with like the ptsd of it all and it's weird.
Speaker 1:So it will get better. It. It will because mine's been since 2004 when that happened, but chattering just happened a couple weeks ago for the first time in a while and I was like I thought I was past this not that crazy.
Speaker 2:The body is so strong. It doesn't matter what your brain thinks.
Speaker 1:No, not really good at mindset and positivity, and you know I had a lot of time, but that moment I could not control it. So what was your first business?
Speaker 2:that failed. It was very similar to this one. It was called funny enough, it was called NOAP, n-o-a-p, and you know it. Just, my business partner and I just wanted different things and we, you know, we had to. We couldn't agree on how to get rid of it, so we just dissolved it. But it was shampoo and conditioner bars. But I had spent maybe four years researching and ideating and obsessing over, you know, the plastic free movement and all this stuff that I, you know, I essentially spent so much of my time building it and then, when it didn't work out, I couldn't, I just couldn't wrap my head around it, you know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so for me we were doing a million dollars in sales that year, so the average ticket was about $400. So we I had a graphic design business, so someone had a logo or shirts. It was about $400. We had 2,500 orders in that year.
Speaker 1:Oh, my God 11 employees that I had to say goodbye to and let go, one at a time. Yeah, so it was devastating and I, you know I I'm definitely over it in that. But I also know now, if my whole thing failed right now this, I have a 200 people real estate brokerage. If it failed tomorrow, I know a hundred percent I can pick up the pieces and do something else and be successful, because I went through it.
Speaker 2:That's the best thing you ever learned from failure. Is that? Oh I can. You know it takes a while to get that perspective, but someone told me once they were like that's why the rear view mirror is so small and the windshield is so big and wide open.
Speaker 1:And there's so much opportunity. If I spent 40 hours just studying someone like Gary V on YouTube for 40 hours, by the end of that 40 hours I could have a sustainable business. I know that. So I'm never feared of failure anymore. I actually. The other side of it is something beautiful. So so you began to rebuild. You started a new company. How did you rebuild your confidence to do this again?
Speaker 2:I didn't. I don't know if it's even going to go back. I honestly, you know, confidence is one of those whimsical things that comes and goes, and it was gone for a long time. Confidence left the building and it was really out of, out of necessity. I had two little kids, my husband had lost his job and we had lost all of our savings in in, you know, in the muck of it, and we had.
Speaker 2:It was like a sink or swim thing and I hadn't finished scratching that itch. I was like I know I can do. I know I can do plastic free hair care better than anyone else, because my standards are so high, because I know exactly what I need it to be. And it took me a long time to build the confidence back, but it took me much shorter to build the business again because I was like more agile, smarter. I learned. I took everything I learned in that first one and like ramped it up into being like even better and bolder. If I'm like, if I'm going to do this again, I'm going to do it like wholeheartedly, in the best way that I know possible, and so that's what dip is yeah it's great.
Speaker 1:So went through having very little when you were young, and then, all of a sudden, you're back in that position. Things are starting to go down again, right? So how did you, how did the scarcity of when you were a child shape your values of today?
Speaker 2:Well, what it really taught me is that you, you really don't know what anyone's going through, because I, as a kid, I was very, very good at hiding things. I happened to be, you know, thankfully well-liked at school and you know, no one really knew what my living situation was or what. You know how really unwealthy we really were and I was able to be kind of a chameleon in my community and no one knew. But what I did learn is that as I got up, as I grew up and I learned, you know the more people you're exposed to when you go to college, you have jobs, all these things.
Speaker 2:Everyone kind of has this backstory of something you know and it might not be on the same level as yours was, but you learn that, like, people are so dynamic and there's so much going on behind behind, you know the scenes and everyone's lives, especially at a time when people broadcast only the highlight reel of their lives. There's so much going on behind the scenes and I'm guilty of that too, because I didn't know. But I want to run the company in a way that empathizes with the small business owners mostly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and it makes sense and you know I do feel the highlight reels, you know, are a big part, and going through what we're going through right now with the liver transplant and sharing my story has been so amazing on social media.
Speaker 1:Because, yeah, you think you have an impact because you're doing it all the time, but you're always showing all the good stuff, but when you actually show your heart, oh my gosh, it's like a different it's, it's like people are coming to my life that I didn't expect, you know. So you know, I think that's important and not to just always show the good, just show your true self. I mean, that's that's the biggest thing. I grew up in a trailer court. I'm not, I didn't have anything.
Speaker 1:I, when I went to this school that I went to in junior high, when, when they they transfer, like most of the people went to the other school, I was one of four that went to the other side, everyone that's. I was rich, and I'm saying I wasn't, but I didn't know. I didn't know that we weren't rich because, you know, we had so much love and my parents were so amazing, I love them so much and I just didn't think of it. But you know, anyways, that's like it's a lot of stories to tell, for sure it's cool because it gives you you know.
Speaker 2:You become really resourceful when you grow up like that, like I had to. My mom taught me how to sew and so you know. Sometimes when clothes would come in, we'd sort through them and I'd make new clothes out of old clothes and I learned very quickly. It was the age of the scrunchies when I was little, so I could always make an outfit and then make a matching scrunchie and I would look like I can't believe you didn't start like a matching scrunchie company.
Speaker 1:That would have been something fun. Oh yeah, I mean if I had any of that.
Speaker 2:My mom was professor so she didn't have much business acumen.
Speaker 1:Self-employed, so I had that my whole life. So I knew that I was never going to work for anyone because I just couldn't. So I love this, I love being a business owner, and right now I'm going to be 57 in one month and I look at myself and think I'm not done yet. Like I have all something else, like the graphic design business, the real estate company. What's the next phase? Because the next phase has to be something I'm so passionate about, because the last phase of my life.
Speaker 2:You know I'm not. I can't be here for another 60, 70 years. It's impossible. It has to do with something like getting paid to study seagulls on the beach.
Speaker 1:Yes, I love that.
Speaker 2:So let's talk about your two-year conversion to Judaism.
Speaker 1:It's deeply personal, but what called you to it and how did that process?
Speaker 2:change you. So my, so my parents I mentioned before were divorced. My mom was a Christian, she was raised by nuns in a convent school. My dad is from Iran, he's Muslim, and you know. So they found each other and then, when they divorced, my mom married an Ashkenazi Jewish man from Poland and my dad married a Persian Jewish woman, and they both found peace with those partners.
Speaker 2:And, lo and behold, I grew up and I fell in love with a Sephardic Jewish man and I, you know, on both sides of my family, I had this wonderful, robust step family where we would do all of the Jewish traditions. So when it came to, you know, choosing my life partner, I found a lot of peace in, you know, in Judaism, and I really, I really loved a lot of the teachings. And which a lot of peace in, you know, in Judaism, and I really, I really loved a lot of the teachings, which a lot of them overlap with the Bible, and you know, but and I it's weird because I wasn't, you know you go through your 20s, you're not very spiritual and then suddenly, when you are thinking about starting a family or whatever, you start to kind of bring it back in. Do you know what I mean, like suddenly the world. You seem very small in a big world when you're starting to um, you know, choose the person you're gonna.
Speaker 2:You know kids with and and um, I found a lot my, my husband, jonathan. We've known each other since 2002, 2001. We've known each other for a very long time and um, it's so peaceful and I and you know he was worth the conversion, but it was also something I did for myself. It was, it was something you know, i't know spirituality is a hard thing to bottle and speak about in such a short time, but but I did become more spiritual during that and I I really loved the process.
Speaker 1:So how does your faith influence the way you lead, dip and make decisions in your business?
Speaker 2:So there's, there's a few things. One is my. Everyone has a different version of how they talk in their head to God. Right, whether you believe in God or not, there's always some time where you're like, please God, like, don't let the turbulence take the plane down. Or, you know, whatever my time when I'm even though it doesn't ever take a plane down I'm just using that as an example that's when people talk to God. The most, I think, is on planes, when I feel closest to what I think God is, whatever it is. When I'm running in the woods and when I feel like the light shining through the trees, I suddenly feel like this overwhelming sense of like wow, this is just like the most beautiful thing in the world. And part of that leads into just having a plastic-free business, a plastic-free business that protects that world that I feel so small and feel so hugged by and enveloped by. I feel that way when I go in the ocean too, when I'm in the ocean and I'm like I can't believe I'm in this, this ocean this ocean moves.
Speaker 2:Whether I'm here or not, it's going to. It was here before me, it's going to be here after me. And those are like. I don't know whether everyone has those thoughts, but I have them pretty often and I think about what we're doing as a human, as a species, to the ocean, to the woods, to the landfills, you know, all over the, to the air, to our own bloodstreams with plastic, and a big part of how I run my business is making sure that I support the stores that educate people about the plastic crisis.
Speaker 1:So tell us a little bit about your story with with dip.
Speaker 2:Sure, so with with dip, the, my main goal. It looks like shampoo and conditioner and great hair, which it does all of those things. But what I really want people to do is shop in their neighborhood. I made the bar so good that the plastic freeness isn't part of the marketing. I rarely talk about that. What I really want people to do is know that there are stores around their neighborhood that have you know, all of the vetted plastic free solutions and in great like they vet the ingredients of all their products before they put them on shelves. And those stores are generally called refilleries, and in Pittsburgh I think you have two we do. What are they called? The one that sells dip is called Soul Refill. Soul Refill, s-o-l-r-e-f-i-l-l. And the owner of that store, sydney. She just had twins.
Speaker 1:And I know it's so funny.
Speaker 2:I just know all of our store owners. I know them really well because I engage with them and I make sure that I'm setting their stores up to succeed and that you know I don't, as a brand like I don't undercut them. I want them to be able to sell dip at the same price that we sell it online in order to get people into stores, to avoid shipping costs and get them. Okay, you come in for dip, maybe you also replace paper towels for the rest of your life in that store. That's what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1:So we're saying do you know the other one? It's called, I think it's refillery pgh, pgh. Yeah, yeah, definitely take a look at that. I'm excited about that. Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I mean for me, just the thing when you're talking about the plastic in it. When I learned about, you know, when people are leaving their plastic water bottles in their car and the sun's beating in their car and the plastic is just going into the water. Never, I never knew that. You know, I never thought like that. Now I just won't drink it. You know what I mean? I'm like, I am not drinking that.
Speaker 2:Now it's like a nightmare. You're like I can't believe all of those times I drank that like ignorant Totally.
Speaker 1:And there's a whole list of ignorance. But yeah, it's a dip, isn just a brand, it's a philosophy. How does building a sustainable, honest company help you heal from your past wounds?
Speaker 2:it's a really good one, um I think it gives me the way I run my company, gives me nothing to be scared of. I don't have anything to to feel really scared. I think if you're running a dishonest company or you're not good to your customers, it's easy to bring back those teeth chatters right, the anxiety and the nerves of like, oh, maybe I didn't do the right thing. But now that I'm able to do everything myself and do it in the way that I want and do it in a way that lets me sleep at night and makes money for women mostly they're mostly the store owners, are women entrepreneurs all over the country. Like I sleep with a smile on my face and I sleep well, and that is really important to me now after having such a long time where I couldn't sleep at all.
Speaker 1:So what does it really take to build a value based brand in a world that often rewards shortcuts?
Speaker 2:It takes a lot of patience and a lot of grit and a lot of actual work. I think a lot of people are looking for shortcuts and I don't think you can build really. I don't think you can build a business that's meaningful. You can build a business very quickly, but I think human to human relationships are still very important and I've invested a lot of my time and my energy into getting to know, like the store owners, getting to know my customers, finding out what makes them choose, dip over someone else's brand and what. What is it that? What's the problem you're trying to solve. When you come to us as a company, you know, or like what is it you're running away from Cause if you're coming. Everyone has been using shampoo and conditioner before. So what are you? What got you here?
Speaker 1:And all those different reasons are, you know, the thing that keeps me going, I'm sure. So what advice would you give to someone who feels ashamed of a failure and unsure how to start again, Because we've both been there, yeah?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So the thing that I had to keep reminding myself is that no one cares about your shame. Like, literally, your shame is. You're only suffering your shame by yourself. No one really cares. No one cares. Everyone's so concerned about themselves that they don't care about your shame.
Speaker 1:Especially now, these years. Yes, they don't care about anything. Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it took me so long to get there. Like, I still feel a little shame of my first company, even though it's it's in the past. It's like water well under the bridge, but like, still, I still sometimes think like, oh, like you know, are people going to be tired, or am I? Am I, you know, if their last interaction with me was me being hyped about this other company, now I expect them to get excited about this one, like it's it's no, they really don't.
Speaker 1:It's such a short attention span. Yeah, oh cool. Oh, you failed, I will. You know, they enjoy the stories. They love learning that it's not just them yeah, but yeah, we have a lot of people in real time.
Speaker 2:Shame is crippling, get me completely and I can't. I thought people cared so much more than they did and they just don't I was embarrassed about it.
Speaker 1:I thought, oh my gosh, I failed. But I got up, pick up the pieces, did it better the second time and the third time.
Speaker 2:If.
Speaker 1:I had to do it again. It's going to be the best time. So, yeah, I'm not afraid of failure, I'm not afraid to die, like there's so many things that have changed in the last few years. I'm just living my life. And now I'm here with my husband taking care of him. People are like you're an angel. I'm like, no, I'm just doing the right thing, love him and I want him to be okay, and if that means I have to sacrifice some things which I, I definitely am it's okay, cause I love you and that's what you're supposed to do. So what's next for dip and what legacy?
Speaker 2:legacy are you building with it? So normally my answer to this is nothing's next for dip, but actually I've decided I am taking the plunge and I'm shooting a TV commercial. So what I've, what I've discovered, is that people are tired of sustainability, and I think it needs kind of a rewrite. Sustainability in general just needs a rebrand. So we're doing a very weird kind of risque commercial, and so I don't. That's the next thing that I'm working on, and it's either going to sink, you know, or fly Like who knows. But I would hate myself if I didn't try and put this wacky idea out there, and I think people miss real commercials.
Speaker 1:I mean, look at the Super Bowl. I mean they sit there the whole time just to watch commercials. Totally, they're so boring anymore.
Speaker 2:I'm personally tired of watching regular people promote brands. I think it's just kind of like flooded and done to death and I don't mean that like I don't like to see regular people but that's become like a replacement for really fun, silly, edgy, thoughtful commercials and I think the pendulum is going to swing the other way.
Speaker 1:I'm excited I can say I knew you when right, yeah, I don't know. I knew you when your teeth were chattering and we were both sitting there like, oh my God, what's going to happen next? And here we are today. Yeah, totally, it's so wild. It's like talking to myself today. So your story is a testament to what happens when we let purpose, not perfection, lead the way. Thank you for sharing your heart and your wisdom, and can you share with us how the consumers can get ahold of you, or how they can find your product, and a little bit about that? That would be great, sure.
Speaker 2:Absolutely so. My website is dipalreadycom, so D-I-P-A-L-R-E-A-D-Ycom, and that's also our social handles. So at dipalready, on TikTok and on Instagram, if you ever want to ask me any questions, just ask me through Instagram DMs. I'm always there waiting for the questions. Go to our website and you go in the store locator. You can find the store that's closest to you and I prefer that you shop there instead and support the entrepreneur in your town rather than shopping online. But if there's nowhere near there, I've made the shipping reasonable so I can ship it to you as well.
Speaker 1:How many stores are there that carry?
Speaker 2:your product. There's about 500. So we sell in salons, surf shops and zero waste stores mostly.
Speaker 1:Wow, that's amazing 500. So for all of you out there, if you could like, subscribe and share this episode or review it, that would be great, because someone out there needs this story more than you know. And you know it's my goal to help one person every time, but I've changed my goal, as most of you know, to help as many people as I possibly can in this last phase of my life. So, thank you, kate. It was a pleasure to getting to know you and I look forward to seeing your commercial and I thank you for the gift. I can't wait to try my new bars and I'm going to be doing that tomorrow when I get a shower, so I'll let you know.
