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McKINNEY — It all started with the YouTube channel Cute Girls Hairstyle in 2008, before Pinterest, Instagram, Snapchat, and TikTok. Mindy McKnight enjoyed playing with her four girls’ hair and sharing ideas with her fellow moms.
It was the beginning of a journey that would create a 21st century social media-based family business, with six children working after school and the father eventually leaving his corporate job to join the mother full-time. was. Therein lies the similarity to running a family restaurant or shop.
The McKnights have mastered digital platforms and content to build a following for their branded products, including Mindy’s hair care line called Hair Heritage.hair heritage was exclusively sold as Walmart’s top independent brand for four years and is now also sold at CVS, Kroger, and HEB. Walmart sells a full line of Hairitage tools and bath and body products.
These Cute Girls Hairstyles videos have been viewed more than 2 billion times in almost every country.
Mindy McKnight, 45, is CEO of the M-Star Media business, and her husband, Sean McKnight, 49, is president and chief operating officer, and joined the business in 2012. M-Star’s five YouTube channels have a combined 17 million followers. She is one of YouTube’s Top Moms and her #1 hair care destination with over 5.6 million followers.
The family, which also includes twin daughters Brooklyn and Bailey, 24, and younger sister Camry Noelle, 21, has a combined following of more than 35 million people. Camry Noelle is studying neuroscience at Brigham Young University and she wants to become a doctor, but she still brings her followers and creates content.
Brooklyn and Bailey have grown with their audience.While attending Lovejoy High School, the twins became one of the first high school influencers in the United States. They graduated in his 2018 class. He then attended Baylor University in Waco while running a business. They started their own mascara brand, Lash Next Door, as teenagers, and it’s still going strong today, with the addition of an apparel collection. The twins then developed the itk skin care line. The company operates his Amazon store and sells products on social media, including his TikTok, where he has 6.7 million followers. Brooklyn and Bailey are currently married, and her husband occasionally appears on digital shows.
social business
The twins have the biggest audience of any member of the family, but Mindy McKnight’s hair heritage brand may be their biggest cash cow. Hairitage claims to be the first comprehensive hair care brand for all hair types and textures. The McKnights have six children. The last two were African American and adopted. She founded Hairitage in partnership with her Maesa, a beauty brand owned by Boston-based Bain Capital. Bain Capital’s founders include U.S. Sen. Mitt Romney. Measa also collaborated with Brooklyn and Bailey on her ITK skin care line, Drew’s Barrymore’s Flower Beauty She Makeup, Ashley Tisdale’s Being French She Beauty and Personal Her Care products.
real creator Quan Hsi, assistant professor at Southern Methodist University’s Temerlin Advertising Institute, said social media content has attracted brands in recent years, and that trend will continue to grow.
“Nowadays, it is becoming more profitable to create your own brand and monetize your followers,” says Xie. “It makes sense given the close relationships they’ve built. We come to trust influencers and feel like we really know them.”
That translates into particularly fashion, beauty and wellness purchases, Xie said.
McKnight declined to disclose total sales for her Hair Heritage brand, which launched at Walmart in 2020, but beauty industry publications say the brand generated $30 million in sales in its first year. The company has generated an estimated $75 million in sales in 2021, soaring during the pandemic.
Hairtage ranks No. 12 among Walmart’s hair care brands, competing with products from consumer goods giants Procter & Gamble, Dove & Alberto Culver, Paul Mitchell and Suave. Hair Heritage has expanded its presence at Walmart to include a full collection of hair care, body care, tools and accessories, and McKnight confirmed that sales have more than tripled since its launch.
“Mindi is extremely reliable when it comes to hair, bringing products to the market that people need and that work,” said Jessica Vaccaro, Maesa’s senior brand marketing director. “She doesn’t just do the heavy lifting in marketing the product; she’s involved in the actual development: color, bottle feel, bottle shape, formulation.”
“Measa has helped me realize my vision for the brand,” McKnight said. She was interviewed at her home in McKinney. Her comments have been edited for clarity and brevity.
Q: How did this start?
McKnight: I started blogging and posting photos, but once YouTube became popular, videos were a better way to explain hair styling. YouTube contacted me and asked me if I wanted to partner with them. AdSense program. At first we thought it was a phishing scam. But when we realized, that wasn’t the case. So we started it and it started right away. I think it touched the hearts of mothers as well. We used to get our hair done in the morning from the bathroom before the kids went to school. We have six children, five of whom are girls. Over the years, we adopted the last two and started incorporating more tutorials and talking more about the needs of hair and the needs of ingredients that work on Paisley’s hair. I learned how to do her textured hair and shared what I learned.
Q: How is your business currently structured?
McKnight: We operate like independent companies. They are all collectively not one. Although they are all independent companies, they all leverage each other’s socials to help with announcements and push followers to each other. Social media accounts interact with businesses more than they actually do.
Q: Does your business, M-Star Media, work with other influencers on a consulting basis?
McKnight: I strongly believe in karma. So I feel like if I put out something good, I’ll get something good back. But no, it’s not. Also, I fundamentally believe in female entrepreneurs and indie brands, and we are not competitors to each other. My competitors are household goods brands. right? Great people, it’s not the girl who’s trying to start another shampoo company that lives down the street from me.
Q: You all make content creation seem easy. But anyone who tries it can tell that’s not the case. You recently had a job where you were supposed to take a vacation.
McKnight: That video is just over a minute long. It probably took him 50 hours to shoot, edit, and ideate everything. This is not the time it will take for every video, but especially for the select videos we were going to publish on his Kroger, give Kroger a call. Well, it took quite a while to do all this. It was never a day off.
Q: What do you think about TikTok as a sales platform?
McKnight: I launched a TikTok shop in November. It was really, really exciting. Imagine QVC or HSN on his TikTok. That’s the best way to describe it. It’s literally live shopping with product demos. Casual and big in Asia. Now it’s here. Is it something new? For me it’s QVC, but on my phone. TikTok is also taking over as the search engine, replacing Google. For example, some people are searching for things like how to do braids. They enter it into TikTok and wait for the video to appear.
Q: What are the challenges of sharing your life digitally? Brooklyn and Bailey are now young adults. You all maintain a certain standard. How do you do that across a family business?
mac night: In the early days, we were very strategic. Because you wanted to work with a brand, but brands don’t work with creators, and some brands don’t work with certain types of creators. We always kept in mind that they had a young audience, especially when they were young and new. As they’ve grown, I feel like the channel has grown with them. I mean, as they get older, so does what and what they’re saying, which seems like a healthy and appropriate way to do it. They were relevant. We talk about what we’re going through and what we’re doing. We received thousands of messages from people saying, “I’m so glad you talked about periods because your mom didn’t talk about them.” It is very important for young women to have access to highly relevant information. I think the girls are doing a good job of bridging that. At this time, the content is carefully selected for her 18 year old to her 25 year old. Are 10 and 13 year olds watching? Probably, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with their parents observing the twins.
Q: Does being authentic mean you have to tackle difficult topics?
McKnight: I’m 45 years old and we’re talking perimenopause at this point. Welcome, just like you are learning about perimenopause at the age of 18. We’ve always had the attitude that it’s a healthy debate. I understand why some people are so embarrassed to talk about urinary tract infections, women’s health, reproductive health, menstrual support, and intimate relationships with a spouse or partner or someone who is healthy and loves and cares about you. not. In a meaningful way. I think these are very healthy conversations, and I think you can see them being carried through.
Q: What topics do you want to avoid?
McKnight: Negative topics, politics, religion. The key is to make it accessible to everyone. And I feel like there are a lot of platforms where you can get political feeds and find people who want to talk about religion full time. That’s fine. But that’s not our job. We want everyone to feel safe, regardless of religion, gender, sexuality, etc. We will not discuss these hot buttons in detail. Race may be the only reason, but that’s because we are a biracial family. So talking about the nuances of what we experienced was part of our story.
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