POV Beauty’s Mikayla Nogueira unpacks her creator-brand playbook with CEO and co-founder Ani Hadjinian

The trio dug into the tentpole strategy behind POV Beauty, which launched in 2025 and entered every Sephora store in the U.S. and Canada earlier this year. The brand sells skin prep and complexion products with big ambitions to expand into new categories. 

Built off Nogueira’s experience, which includes a start in special effects makeup, years in retail sales at Ulta Beauty and a prolific career on TikTok as a beauty creator, the brand leverages its online community in several ways. 

“I always love to just ask my community, ‘What are you looking for? What are you craving in the beauty world? What can we create?,'” Nogueira said during the live fireside chat. “Something I’m trying to balance as a brand founder is creating a brand [that] product-wise is authentic to the way I do makeup and products that I would actually use. … But also creating products that the community is seeking.” 

Nogueira launched and built the brand alongside co-founder and CEO Ani Hadjinian, whose CV includes Bobbi Brown, Estée Lauder, Tom Ford Beauty and Augustinus Bader. Together, Nogueira and Hadjinian walked the audience through its brand playbook. Press play now for the candid conversation. 

On getting her start in makeup 

Nogueira: “So a lot of people don’t know this, but my beginning in makeup was actually in special effects. I worked for 10 years at a haunted house doing special effects makeup on cast members. … That’s when I kind of got excited about makeup. My dad ran the haunted house, so I would go with him every day to watch the cast and see how it worked. And I saw the makeup artist doing the cast, and I was so fascinated by it. So I just asked him one day, ‘Can I just watch and maybe participate a little?’ even though I had no makeup knowledge at all, and he said, ‘Sure, you can.’ So, for a couple of years, I just kind of shadowed, and then I got my own chair, and I started doing it myself for a few years. So that’s kind of how I got my start. And then obviously a few years later, I decided to work at Ulta Beauty. That was where I gained a lot of information and a lot of education. I obviously love makeup, and I do a full beat every day, but I also love product. A lot of people ask, ‘Why did you want to work at a beauty retail store versus being a freelance makeup artist?’ And for me, it was product. I love product, and I love how when I was working at Ulta, I was constantly surrounded by new innovation and the brands — and just learning how all those brands worked made such a difference. And then as I began on TikTok.”

On the inspiration for POV Beauty

Nogueira: “A lot of people think I had this idea to create a brand when I was a creator, but the idea actually came when I was working in beauty retail. Now, obviously, at the time, I didn’t think that would ever come to fruition, so it was crazy to be sitting here talking about this. But when I was working in beauty retail, I noticed we were missing a lot. There’s so much product to consume. What’s missing is the way we go about creating the innovation and bringing it to market. So what I noticed working at the beauty retail store was that people would come in, and there was so much intimidation and confusion around beauty. I find that you walk into Ulta, you walk into Sephora, it’s overwhelming the amount of product, and a lot of times people have the same concerns about the way their makeup looks, how their makeup’s sitting, their makeup’s not reaching its full potential, and there’s a lot of confusion around: How do I make my makeup look its best? — even though all of the solutions are right in the store. … So with POV, I wanted to create something that, one, made you feel like you could be your own makeup artist at home. I wanted to give you the tools that are most important to an MUA.”

On growing POV Beauty

Hadjinian: “It’s an interesting balance because, especially in the world of when things can go viral, keeping it very habit-based and systemic is sort of the approach we try to take. Engagement does not necessarily equal demand or your forecast, and so I think for us, it’s really taking it with a grain of salt. I think it’s information, and I think it’s insight, but I think you really have to build it to where you think the potential is based on where the markets are trending. And so, for us, having moments where we have millions of views, which we’ve had, we’ve had so many engaged audiences. But again, that doesn’t necessarily go one-to-one with what is actually going to convert. And so, you sort of have to effectively build habits, because what we’re building for is the customer who’s going to come back the third and fourth time. We’re not necessarily building for the customer who’s going to come back the first time, because the first time is the sort of the quote-unquote easy part, right? I think it’s the habits you build that bring people back. That’s the real challenge.”