Twelve years ago, Glee aired its first episode, Chris Pratt and Anna Farris got hitched and Lauryn Evarts Bosstick started a blog that would end up disrupting the beauty space for years to come.
Since launching in 2009, Bosstick and her no-holds-barred candor have earned the trust of an impressive one million followers on Instagram, her podcast, The Skinny Confidential: Him & Her Podcast, touts a cool 92 million downloads, and she’s just penned her second skin-care focused book, aptly named Get the F*ck Out of the Sun, out today. Not impressed? The entrepreneur, author and new mom to daughter, Zaza, also recently debuted a skin-care line, currently offering a Hot Mess Ice Roller and Ice Queen Face Oil, both designed to tackle inflammation.
Ahead, Bosstick shares how she got her start, the secrets to her success, postpartum realness and what’s next for the brand-meets-lifestyle-meets-sisterhood that is The Skinny Confidential.
On her why…
“I was at San Diego State and I was bored as shit. I was doing all the things that I was supposed to be doing: I was going to school full time, I was bartending at night and teaching Pilates and pure barre during the day, and I was really, really bored. I joined a sorority and they told me it was going to be $800. I was so broke—I could not believe that I was already paying this huge tuition and getting all these student loans and on top of that I had to pay $800 to have friends. So I quit after one day and told myself I was going to do this myself online for free and I would disrupt the industry when it came to finding community.”
On her big idea…
“I was very purposeful of how I wanted to launch The Skinny Confidential. I planned every single detail from the colors to how I wanted the consumer to feel when they left. It took a year to launch and I paid a web designer that I found on Craigslist $50 a month. I had no money. I went to Home Depot and found paint samples and bought different fabrics and I built how I visualized the blog right in front of me. I presented this poster board from Rite Aid to the web designer, and I said, ‘I want you to build this exactly.’
It launched with 30 posts and they were very focused on diet, health and fitness. We definitely started as more health and fitness focused, but the plan was to niche down and then slowly build out—and that’s exactly what happened. We started with that niche and we slowly introduced the characters in my life. Now we’ve launched product, we have the podcast and the community has grown. It’s been very cool to watch.”
On how she balances it all…
“It’s a lot of trial and error. I am all about maximizing time. I think the first person you should hire is someone who’s a practitioner of your calendar. We just went through my entire calendar for June right before this. We go through every little detail like driving time, when I can shower, when I’m recording, when I’m posting things—every little thing is in my calendar.
What I like to do is batch days. For instance, today is a Wednesday, so I have calls and interviews all day. Tomorrow is more about creating content, and Friday we’re recording podcast episodes all day. So I think batching your time and making sure that you can focus and not be distracted with 600 things is really important. I used to be super reactive when I started. I would do a conference call and then I would go create content, then I would record a podcast episode and do a photoshoot. That was pulling my brain in all different directions. I found that theming the day is much more efficient.”
On being intentional…
“It’s also important to make sure that you have things like creative time or reading time or time with your husband on the calendar. To me, it makes for a very purposeful, meaningful life. I’m more proactive as opposed to reactive. As far as having a baby, that definitely is a whole different layer, and I’m still not a perfectionist at that at all. I still totally experience mom guilt and it’s a lot of pressure. I haven’t quite figured that out yet. But I do think the most helpful thing is really having intentional time on the calendar and being able to do things that are away from my phone.”
On what to expect in her second book…
“We talk about breast milk facials, we talk about baby penis facials, we talk a lot about lasers, Botox, plastic surgery. I got to ask a lot of these big influencers what their real favorite products are. We see so many influencers and celebrities and doctors pitching shit, and you’re like, ‘is this sponsored or is this real?’ This book is completely unsponsored. Everyone’s sharing their actual routines and real tips and tricks.
I also got to ask a lot of people that aren’t really upfront about Botox and fillers those questions. I think there’s a part of the book that’s a little polarizing and taboo, which is I think what people expect from my brand. I went there, I asked the questions, and we really tried to make sure that that any of the fat like ‘drink water and stay hydrated’ was cut. For a lot of these interviews, I went back to them and said, ‘I need you to say more here.’ I wasn’t pushy, but just adamant on making sure that I was putting the audience first.
I made sure that it’s like you’re having happy hour with me throughout the whole book. It’s all the secrets that I’ve picked up from all these influencers and doctors and celebrities, but also my own stuff. So it’s like we’re having happy hour and then you get those gems from these amazing people like Patrick Starr, Dr. Dennis Gross, Kristen Cavallari, Justin Anderson, the Hamlin sisters, Drunk Elephant’s Tiffany Masterson, Stassi Schroeder, some really cool people. I wanted to make sure it was a book that you opened on any page and you could get some kind of value from.”
On baring it all…
“I have been very open from the beginning. I’m an over-sharer, but not all at once. I’ve shared slowly. I’ve talked about everything from camel toes to birth control very, very early. I was talking about Botox 10 years ago—now everyone talks about it, but no one was admitting what they did then. And so I said, ‘Okay, I’m going to, again, disrupt the space and just be really honest about what I’ve done, and I’m going to take them on this ride.’”
On what’s off limits…
“There’s a lot of things that I don’t share because it’s not my story. If it involves my family, I’m a little bit protective of it. I did open up on my blog and podcast about my mom committing suicide, and I think that that ended up helping a lot of girls who were experiencing parents with mental-health issues. That was something that I felt inclined to open up about, but there are a lot of things that are private.
I’m also not flashing my daughter all over social media all day. I’m pretty thoughtful about how much I share her, just because she didn’t sign up for this. I always say Zaza is definitely a supporting character, I’m not just going to flaunt her out on the internet. I think the best way to describe my content is very Gemini—I am an over-sharer by nature, but when it comes to my family, I’m a little bit more reserved and protected.”
On launching a product line…
“We have been working on this line for four years—this was not something I just white labeled my name on. Every little detail, from the packaging, to the postcard, to the website, to the designed thumbprint on the Ice Roller or to how long it stays cold, it’s been totally designed by me and so will all of the products moving forward. I’m involved in every detail, we have multiple calls a week that are or two three hours long on what we’re doing, and we’re really making sure this is a community-driven brand. Every single thing we release will be very niche—I want it to be very specific to my community.
We’re working on more products. Most of the products have to do with inflammation because I feel like there’s been nothing that really focuses on inflammation. It’s about tackling bloat before I even put anything on my face. I don’t want a moisturizer or an eye cream until I tackle the inflammation that I feel. And what I’ve noticed is that so many people feel inflamed in the face, whether that’s because of a rosé hangover, they slept on their face wrong or they had some kind of surgery or a cosmetic procedure. Having great makeup is awesome and having great skin is even better, but if you’re puffy, it’s not fun. So a lot of the product line will be about tackling puff.”
On postpartum pressures…
“I’m still tightening up after Zaza and I think this conversation is so important to have. I’m still 10 pounds away from my pre-pregnancy weight. It has been so hard. Postpartum has been way harder than pregnancy for me. I would rather give birth 25 times than go through postpartum. It’s such a mindf*ck—it’s an identity crisis. You look at yourself in the mirror and you don’t recognize yourself. You’re supposed to be happy, but you are happy, but you can simultaneously be happy about the baby and also look at yourself and not feel like yourself.
I think there’s this culture right now that we’re not allowed to have these conversations. There’s this bounce back with celebrities where they say, ‘Oh, I’m breastfeeding, and I was running around chasing my kid.’ That was not my experience, it’s been so hard. I’ve experienced depression and anxiety with it. I’ve worked with all different kinds of people and experts, but a lot of people don’t have access to that, which makes it so crazy that this isn’t talked about more. It’s a lot of pressure on women, so I think that conversation needs to be had more and I’m happy to be someone who starts tackling it.”
