Poppy King has always swum against the tide, and the beauty industry is all the better for it. She first made a splash as a 19-year-old with a line of 1940s-style matte lipsticks when the rest of the world was still wearing frosted pink. From there, she was tapped by Leonard Lauder himself to work with Estée Lauder in New York, went on to launch Lipstick Queen, and has worked with brands including J. Crew, Kate Spade and Boots. Now, she has come full circle, launching a line of lipsticks in her name, manufactured in Australia, and set to take on the world once more.
Poppy King has always swum against the tide, and the beauty industry is all the better for it. She first made a splash as a 19-year-old with a line of 1940s-style matte lipsticks when the rest of the world was still wearing frosted pink. From there, she was tapped by Leonard Lauder himself to work with Estée Lauder in New York, went on to launch Lipstick Queen, and has worked with brands including J. Crew, Kate Spade and Boots. Now, she has come full circle, launching a line of lipsticks in her name, manufactured in Australia, and set to take on the world once more.
Hi, I'm Glynis Trailnash, and welcome to In Fashion. Mention the name Poppy King to any Australian Gen X woman, and her eyes will suddenly gleam with excitement and nostalgia. In the early 1990s, Poppy was the name literally on everyone's lips. Deep, matte red lips. Her upheaval of the lipstick category quickly went global, and she became a beacon for both women in business and Australia as a progressive nation. Like all interesting journeys, hers has had its ups and downs, and it's always refreshing to speak with someone who embraces their past with all its twists and turns. Now, although she's been based in New York for 20 years, She's back in a sense where she started, formulating a new line in Australia under the Poppy King name. She's launched with just one lipstick, a shade of red with a gold metallic sheen called Original Sin, which I have to say is pretty fabulous. She'll add to this in the coming months, one shade at a time. This podcast was recorded on our first meeting in Sydney. I hope you enjoy this episode of In Fashion.
GTN:Poppy, it is an absolute pleasure and a thrill to actually meet you in person.
Poppy:Well, ditto. And
GTN:we're both, uh, for our listeners, we are both wearing our lipstick. Oh
Poppy:yes, we're definitely going to have to get some kind of selfie, you know, I don't say that often, but yes.
GTN:Now, if you will indulge me for a moment, I will say that, and you will get this all the time, I know, but I was back in the early 1990s, I remember at that time distinctly going into a boutique in Perth. Yeah. And seeing a point of sale display of your first range of lipsticks and being quite taken with these matte lipsticks and bought one immediately, it was just such a moment. I was similarly obsessed with, Retro fashion and old Hollywood glamour and so these were a revelation and when you look at it in the context of that time what made those lipsticks stand
Poppy:out? Well I think there is there are so many factors and thank you you know I have to tell you I just have to do is it just I just remembered something so funny I remember that first display unit and it had on it There was a flower and it said, it's different, it's matte, right? And I remember my boyfriend at the time said, That's strange, why have you got, it's different mate? On the, on the, on the display. Anyway, I just had to tell you, because I just had a flashback to, to that guy asking that. I think there were so many factors about it that were, that were different. Mate, but it was, it was really, first of all, the fact that it was just lipstick, right? So I remember sort of going and getting advice I mean, I was precocious 18 year old asking kind of like adults about sort of business questions. And my mother is an entrepreneur, a fashion design entrepreneur, so she knew a lot of people that I could ask these kind of questions to and, um, and so many people saying, Oh, but you know, how are you going to stand out when it's just lipstick? And for me, it was like, I was almost like dyslexia. That's how I'm going to stand out because it's just lipstick, you know, like I was so confused, now I understand that coming out with just one category was something that is very, very hard to do volume in, you know, it's very hard to make a splash in just one category, and that was a big sort of challenge, but really that to me was very important that first of all it was Just lipstick, so it wasn't in amongst a whole line of cosmetic. Second of all, you had, you know, the retro, the sort of golden age of Hollywood versus the Hollywood of the moment idea of lipstick, you know, and so that texture, the colors, were so different as well. And I think. It was a kind of frequency that, it wasn't really a marketing, it was more of a frequency that I put out, you know, kind of like a dolphin, that really people such as yourself, you know, who really were looking at the time. You know, the lipsticks were all frosted, it was, you know, even though it was the early 90s, it was still the 80s, as far as the lipstick world was concerned. Everything turned pink, everything turned coral, so to come, to have these browns and dark reds and I will say, there was a precedent, you know, I was lucky enough to have had a world travelling mother, who was very adventurous and sort of bohemian, so I had seen brands like Mary Quant and Bieber, you know, so it wasn't like I didn't have any sense of a sort of indie downtown glamour brand. Like I remember as a little girl, I had been playing dress ups with Bieber, Mary Quant and things like that. And then when I got to be a teenager, there was this sort of memory that when I'm sort of walking around the department stores and there's Lauder and Rubenstein and Longcombe and I'm like, I'm remembering. I'm sure there was something much more sort of downtown glamor than all this stuff. And so I did have those as a precedent. So that really led to the packaging and the marketing. And then I think really what made it, you know, stand out was just completely sent out, was the names, because back then the name, the names of lipsticks were just, So insulting, like things like Tangerine Dream, you know, Blue, you know what I mean, and kind of like, and I remember like really genuinely feeling depressed, sort of like once I, finished high school, thinking, here I am, a newly minted adult female, and I'm just I was supposed to put on something called Pink Chiffon Frostage, you know what I mean? Like, kind of like, what the hell? Like, this is not the femaleness I was wanting, you know? No, it's not at all empowered. No, exactly. And all of my first names actually came, I was, you know, like many teenagers, I had just discovered the Fountainhead in Ayn Rand, you know, so I was like completely in the throes. I mean, of kind of, oh my God, this explains everything, you know. So all the first names, because the Seven Deadly Sins was actually the second range. The first range was ambition, courage, integrity, inspiration, unity, and liberty, right? And all of those words came out of the introduction to The Fountainhead. So, you know, so, and so always, I mean, I've always and even in my work for corporations in, um, in America and the UK and stuff, I've always used literature, music, and art as the basis for all of my concepts.
GTN:Because there's always a sense of, sort of, storytelling or a conversation. Exactly. Now what, the other thing that was interesting at the time, I think, was, just to, kind of, start chronologically, I guess. Sure. Was that, Today, there are female entrepreneurs all over the shop. In the beauty space. 1992, not
Poppy:so much. Not so much, no. In fact, and this is going to really take you back, I think, you know, before me there was Proactin and that was about itch, you know, yeah, right, you know, like kind of like there was Proactin and then there was just a really big gap, so to being a female entrepreneur. Going into the beauty space in 1992 as a 19 year old, you know, really was something that's why it became a news story and I think that's why it was so successful so quickly is because it wasn't just a fashion and beauty story. It was general news, you know, it hit because it was so unique and I remember, I still had so much of my high school Rattling around in my head at that time, because I was, you know, literally one year out of high school. And I, really sort of, I didn't pay attention to anything in high school other about three things. Now the three things I put into action, and I remember in year 12, we did a study of media studies as a, in one of the semesters in English. And there was this fantastic quote the teacher said about, when a dog bites a man, that's not news, but when a man bites a dog, that's news. So I really think that that formed my whole PR strategy. It's like, I'm the man biting the dog, so I think it was, it was the uniqueness. And, but strangely enough, you know, it's still, even though there are a lot of. you know, front person, female entrepreneurs. Still, to this day, you still have to do business with men behind the scenes. Like if you're selling to women, I'm telling you behind the scenes, you're doing business with men. It still hasn't quite changed in terms of where the financing is coming from. Yeah. Right. Interesting.
GTN:Mm hmm. Um, was it hard at that point to be taken seriously then, or was it? Because it did get picked up as that kind of news
Poppy:story. I think it was, you know, I think it was, you may know of that concept. I think maybe you employ it the way I do. Have you ever heard of something called Dazzle Camouflage? No. Okay, so Dazzle Camouflage is what they paint warships. You know, those bright colours and all that kind of stuff. And it's what it actually does, is it disorients. the, viewers from being able to read where it is. So it's, so it's very, very dazzling, but not to draw, but it disorients everyone. And I think that, I think I got taken seriously as a result of some kind of dazzle camouflage. Where, where I, it was just so disorienting that people didn't really have, have anything to compare it to. So they were just, oh okay, I mean, when I think about it, my first business partner, who I'm still friendly with to this day, when he was actually quoted in a magazine article last week, like, what was it that made him become my first business partner? And he said, because I could just articulate so well, you know, what it was I was trying to do, and not just what, but why. Yeah.
GTN:Do you feel that you became a bit of a role model in this space?
Poppy:I feel more like I showed, I wouldn't necessarily say I'm a role, it's funny I was outside my pop up store in Chapel Street a couple of weeks ago and um, I was getting some photos taken and this woman walked past and she said, oh you're Poppy King aren't you? She said, yes I'm a teacher and you know I teach business and often teach, sorry I said what, in what not to do. So you know I wouldn't necessarily, I mean I, I think the story was a role model of taking a chance and Australia revisiting what it thought, of itself as, I mean once I started selling the lipsticks in Barneys, it changed a perception of where style, you know, we always thought that style came in from the outside to Australia. And we were actually, was one of the first brands that was actually exporting style back out, you know, and so I think that was a role model of what's possible.
GTN:Yeah. I mean, you did hit very stratospheric highs. I mean, in, uh, became a multi million dollar business in 95, you were young Australian of the year, Time magazine named you a global leader for the new millennium.
Poppy:Yeah.
GTN:was that sort of success hard to deal with at a young age, or was
Poppy:it? I think that kind of like I didn't really, I didn't really have, um, anything to compare it to, so I, I think that in retrospect, I think actually that success is actually harder for me to deal with in middle age, because, you know, I'm never going to be able to recreate. That first time, you know, so it's, it's how do I look for a new idea of success instead of, you know, because that first time it was all so new, um, and I think that also I'm somebody that, you know, the goal was never to be be successful. The goal was to move the conversation. So it wasn't necessarily about being successful. I don't think I really focus on the success. I focus more on the impact. You know, that's why I was a founding member of the Australian Republican movement, you know, with. with Eddie McGuire and Malcolm Weiser and you know, so I very quickly, I became involved in the dialogue about what Australia envisaged of itself. So I don't think I was so much focused on the success as I was focused on what can I bring to this country.
GTN:Interesting. and so you have this incredible success that, as you alluded, things started to unravel a little later. Yes. In 98, the company went into receivership. And I read one of the things that you said your biggest mistake was letting investors talk you into doing the full range of colour
Poppy:cosmetics. Was that? I mean, I really think that the biggest mistake, like I have so much 2020 hindsight now, what really the big mistake that I made that really did end it into that scenario, even though we traded out of that scenario. Was, um, when I went to raise money. So, you know, I didn't understand that as a fashion consumer. Beauty goods, you raise money when you don't need it, you know, so that's, that's when you have the power to raise money and keep control, right? Mm-hmm. is when you don't need it. I being the polite, you know, goody goody. I would never want to ask for money until I, you know, unless I needed it. So I had sort of waited until the wrong timing to raise money, which then, which then meant that I didn't really, I sort of lost control of the overall strategy. I got involved with investors that weren't the right fit. So it was in terms of being pushed to do things that didn't feel right, it all stems back from the fact that I didn't raise money at the right time. Yeah. Interesting.
GTN:And these are all great lessons to learn by, right?
Poppy:Yes, they are. You know, I mean, I wouldn't have wished it that way. but, you know, I actually have learned much more from the hard times than the good times.
GTN:Absolutely. And how do you, how do you navigate the aftermath of something like this? You know, within the media and that kind of thing, again, very young when this
Poppy:all happens. Well, luckily I wasn't, you know, somebody who was trying to be famous. I was somebody who was trying to, you know, to be different, actually in my yearbook from high school, believe it or not, you know, we all had to say a quote and actually mine was, um, People with definite characters always draw criticism. A Thomas Hardy quote, right? Can you believe that? I
GTN:love, I mean,
Poppy:I kind prof You know, not, not pathetic, prophetic, um, you know, and so I think I knew also to, I mean, a lot of people ask me, did you read business books and stuff? And I said, no, like, kind of like, What I read was Anna Karenina and things like that, so I really had a sort of classic literature, you know, Dostoevsky, Crime and Punishment, understanding that what goes up comes down, do you know what I mean, and consequences come around and all that kind of stuff, so, I wasn't that So rattled when the tide turned, in terms of, you know, feeling that I'd failed. What was really hard to deal with was being cast as the villain in it. Because the media, because, I'd been cast as the hero. And so the new story was that I was actually a villain. And so the facts massaged to support that narrative. When really actually what I was doing behind the scenes during that time was actually what, pretty heroic.
GTN:It's kind of, you know, Australian, if I may, it's the
Poppy:tall poppy syndrome. I know, I know. I mean, you've heard that line before. Yeah, but I'm only 5'4 It shouldn't apply to me. It should be 5'8 and above. Now,
GTN:the company was sold later in 2002, I think it was. You received an email also from Leonard Lauder. Yes, I
Poppy:did. In that year. Yes. Which kind of
GTN:set you off in a slightly different
Poppy:direction. Totally. It changed my life. It was like the Wizard of Oz. And it was totally, completely out of the blue. So, um, Poppy was still going, but it was a sort of pale version of itself. It did have a full line of product that I wasn't necessarily. That was more a business decision than a passion decision, you know. and I got this intriguing invitation to meet with Lauder from the highest, um, office in the land, and, um, went over to New York and having no idea what they may or may not want, but I thought, I think this is worth a plane ride to find out, um, and it turns out that unbeknownst to me, He had been a really genuine long term fan of the Poppy brand for the narrative ability that I had in terms of being able to tell a very big story with a very edited amount of product versus the opposite way which most marketers have a lot of product and a tiny bit of story. I was kind of the bizarro opposite of that. Big story like the seven deadly sins and just seven lipsticks, you know, so there was a brand that They had called prescriptives at the time That he felt would really benefit from that kind of narrative ability And so when I went over there, I found out that that's what they wanted. They wanted me to Move to New York and to bring that kind of my style of narrative to this brand as a creative marketer. Um, which I explained I would be very happy to do, but I was under contract at that point. here in Australia and so um, they bought the brand to get me out of the contract. And move me to New York. I love
GTN:it when Estee Lauder just says, yeah, we'll sort this out.
Poppy:Yeah, we'll sort this out. Yeah, I mean I will never forget, you know, kind of like just seeing my whole life change, in one meeting, you know, just kind of like, then no problem, we'll, you know. We'll sort this out. We'll get you clear and free for that. And you can come here and be the vice president of creative marketing. Would you be interested to do that? And I was like, I think yes.
GTN:Wow. You were there for three years. What did you learn from that
Poppy:time there? That it's not my natural habitat, for sure, but basically what I learned is that the fundamental difference, and I think it's across sectors, not in just, not just in beauty, between corporate world and non corporate world, is a corporate world you get lulled into A situation where you're focused more on pleasing the person above you than the customer. You know, like the focus is, the focus in the corporate world is, always becomes the people at the top. Whereas I'm much more interested in the people on the ground floor. And that's, I think across any sector, whether it be beauty, fashion, you know, as soon as you're in the corporate world, the emphasis is who's above you. Not. Who's with you, you know, so it's just a totally different mindset and in the time I was there I had two different people I reported to and I remember one woman telling me with some sense of endearment but also a little bit of impatience that she'd never met anybody more maladjusted to the corporate world in her life. Because I just, because it was all the politics, you know, as an owner, operator, business person, you know, I'm used to kind of, if there's a problem you go straight to where to fix it. So I kept on stepping on people's toes and, you know, I kept on getting sent to the principal's office. And the other thing that I really learned, which was a hugely pleasant surprise, um, was how fascinating Middle America is. It's such a bad rap, you know, in terms of, I'm not going to talk politics here, but I'm talking about the female consumer in middle America. I was spending so much time in shopping malls and stuff that I learned how much imagination that woman has that she's not given credit for. And I just really, really found that the real women, like the Backbone women of America. Again, let's not talk their politics, because who knows with that, but in terms of their imagination around beauty, they were just being so underserved. Interesting. Yeah, really like, and I'd be going back into the corporate office, think I'd much rather hang with the women in the shopping mall than these women. Oh,
GTN:I love it. so after you left Lauder, you then launched another lipstick brand. Lipstick
Poppy:Queen. Um,
GTN:Why?
Poppy:Well at the time, I don't know what was happening in Australia, it was 2006 and I was in New York. Lipstick looked like it was about to be, become a dinosaur. There really was a time in America, again, I've got no idea whether it was Australia, but in America, Where no one was wearing, it was just all lip gloss and nudes, you know, that Jennifer Aniston friends, you know, like no one was wearing red lipstick in 2006 in America, no one, like if you saw another person, so you'd almost wave like, Hey, you know, like, like people who own Volkswagens, how they beep to each other. It's kind of like, hi, there's another one of my, yeah, there's another one of my species, you know? and so whereas like the impetus was to launch my first brand was having that. Matt 1940s style lipstick. Lipstick Queen, the impetus was just to actually protect lipstick from sort of being something that ended up in the Smithsonian, you know, kind of in a vitrine with people. Because literally, it really was something that was starting to be considered very old fashioned in its pure form. And so Lipstick Queen was about... Really bringing it back, um, into the conversation and in its iconic, um, role in the female psyche. So it was much more about the actual category versus any one texture. And, and I launched with saints and sinners. And so it was ten shades, but in two different strengths. The saints were sheer and the sinners were more opaque. So it was really about the category. And so then you can have
GTN:that
Poppy:broad appeal still. Yes, it was like Diet Coke and Coke, you know, you could kind of like, if you wanted the sheer version, that was the Diet Coke version, or you could have the full blown version.
GTN:And you were playing as well with some kind of innovations at that time with around the coloured lipsticks that
Poppy:would change colour. Well, and that's, you know, the real hero skews, which are all coming back, by the way, from Lipstick Queen. It's like I'm releasing my greatest hits and some new hits. Um, so Medieval, which was a very sheer red. Hello Sailor, which was a sheer navy, which looks amazing. And then Frog Prince, which was a green that turned pink. and I really became, sort of, Embedded in sort of the two extremes and being able to do highly pigmented, but also understanding how to do these incredibly unique sheer lipsticks that you wouldn't expect would look good, but because they're sheer, they do.
GTN:Interesting. there is obviously a huge nostalgia for those of our generation who remember your lipsticks from the first time around. With your new Poppy King record. Yes. You've got a captured market there, that's a given. How do you then attract this new generation of lipstick customers in such a saturated market?
Poppy:Well, I think, yes, there definitely is, an unbelievable emotional connection. with a certain generation to Poppy Lipsticks and Poppy King as a name. How you do it with the new customer, or with Gen Z, I think that it's with really Really innovative product, you know, so it's not going to be the emotional connection because they don't know, you know, to begin with, but the innovation in my narrative and this sort of authenticity and the layers that are in it, everything I do, there's the sense of discovery that I think, um, will appeal, even if the emotional connection to my name is not there. The innovation in my storytelling, I think, is what gives me a chance with a new generation. Yeah.
GTN:And then the marketing. I mean. I've noticed you've got the pop up shop in Melbourne with the Instagram account, which is a lot of, people trying the product. It's quite grassroots.
Poppy:It's very grassroots. And also in, you know, in, in its own way, it's radical because I'm only using real customers showing themselves so in the past I think I'm the it'll be the only beauty campaign that's ever done that in the past if a beauty campaign Has used real people they bring them into a studio and style them and put them through The lens of the brand. It's still a casting kind of process. So it might be real people but it's still through the sort of shaping of the brand. Whereas what I'm doing is just absolutely organic. So you've got you know, a 65 year old woman next to a 25 year old woman. You've got women. With all different lip sizes, you know, and shapes, you know, versus that sort of, over saturated, pumped up lip that we kind of see everywhere. Women are sending me who've never taken a selfie before, they're not native to that. Are sending in their pictures because they really understand that this is something different. A real user. Generated content, like campaign for lipstick has not been done before because it means that I'm relinquishing all control of the image.
GTN:Do you feel there is a sort of sense of responsibility working in this industry now to show more
Poppy:realistic? I mean, I've always, I've always felt that, diversity has been in all, in my, I mean, like, Back in, uh, 1994, I sponsored the Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras with a float of lipstick lesbians, you know, you know, and that was, you know, that one, and that was well before other, you know, kind of like, at, at, at that time, the only people that would go near that Mardi Gras sponsorship wise were, um, condoms and alcohol, you know, and then I also sponsored, um, Melbourne and Sydney film festivals and the restoration of film and, you know, so for me, this kind of responsibility to, Open the dialogue in whatever way has just been there the whole time and now I've got the tools because women can photograph themselves, to be able to do it and allow somebody to show themselves in their version of themselves rather than being posed by a marketing brand deck, you know, as to what they have to look like. So it really, I mean, it's amazing. It has such A tailwind, this thing in terms of like, I don't even have to explain. People are just sending me in photos, and I'm not even having to explain the authenticity of it. People just are getting it straight away. Amazing.
GTN:Um, fairly audacious move to launch one lipstick. One colour.
Poppy:Yeah. I you know, you've got to really feel that you know what you're doing. And can I tell you, the response has been, I mean, we're almost up to six figures. I mean, on just Instagram, just in Australia, just one colour. The response has been enormous because the lipstick is so universal. and it is, like you said, it is a bold move, you know. especially launching a reg, because a lot of women are intimidated by reg. But, go big or go home. Or, or I've, or I've come home to go big. Well, on
GTN:that. you've lived in New York for 20 years now. Yep. Why come back to Australia and work with the same lab, I believe, that you first worked with? It sure
Poppy:is. Yeah, why? That's the reason, because I've pretty much ticked everything off my bucket list. you know, corporate wise, and I've worked with J. Crew, Kate Spade, Disney, Lord of the Gap, you know, all these kind of, you know, bastions in America in varying degrees. And so the idea of going back to Australia as an exporter just felt so meaningful to sort of close the circle, sort of, you know, you know, close in terms of instead of me bringing into Australia product I'm making outside of Australia, the idea, you know, appealed to me in a sort of very Willy Wonka esque way, you know, of returning to what really was so amazing about what I did in the nineties, which was to actually export lipsticks from Australia. back out into the world. And so that, to me, felt so meaningful. I wouldn't be back here if I was just launching a brand that was made in America or made, you know, it's about the fact that this is now going to be a global brand. Because I launch on Moda Operandi in a couple of weeks. Dun, dun, dun. Dun, dun, dun. Which is. such a high profile, um, prestigious partner to get, and that'll be an Australian made product sitting up there in moto operandi, so the reason why is the return. Home from a manufacturing perspective and being an exporter again instead of an importer.
GTN:There will be a lot of politicians who are very happy to hear that because there is, as you would be aware, a bit of a move to get Australia to be a manufacturing nation
Poppy:again. Yes. So this is excellent news.
GTN:Also, I will say that Australia does, for all its tall poppy stuff, it does love a comeback story. Not that you ever really went away, because you've always
Poppy:been doing stuff. Yes, no, but I think, Australia certainly, back when I was growing up, you know, it was like fair go, mate, you know what I mean? And I think that there is something, So intrepid about Australians, you know, there's a reason why so many of the top actors and actresses are Australian. There's a reason why so many, relative to per capita, there's a reason why so many US CEOs, are Australian. I mean, there's an intrepidness, there's kind of, because you have to, we're, in such a A strange corner of the world, and so travel for us is such an adventure and also I really want to show, my own generation and a new generation, what courage is and be the change I wish to, to see, which is that you can have a difficult time here, um, but you can overcome it and you can rise again. So good. Um,
GTN:I'd quickly want to touch on something you mentioned a moment ago about other projects that you've done. Yes. Because when you haven't been working for other companies, Yeah. You've been consulting and doing all sorts of things. All sorts of stuff. Including... I was fascinated to see that there was a range with Kate Spade of nail polishes inspired by Florence Broadhurst.
Poppy:Yes, my goodness, you do do your research. Even a line
GTN:of lipsticks for Boots No.
Poppy:7 Yes. So there was Poppy King for J. Crew, there was Poppy King for number seven, there was, Kate Spade, I, first of all they came to me to develop lipsticks, for their brand, My name wasn't on the product, but I did all the press for it. So I was sort of, I was the public image of it. But it was Kate Spade, Bran and I. I got along so well with the creative director that they, and the lipsticks did so well that they decided that when they were doing this Florence Broadhurst, collaboration for clothing, they said, well, let's get Poppy to do a cosmetic. So it sort of came about because of how well the lipsticks had done. And so, I mean at this point, I can work on any category. You know, I know how to develop. I'm actually Kate Spade, it's not well known, but Kate Spade actually also then employed me to really Um, a fragrance with them called Live Colorfully, and help them with the narrative of that. So I'm sort of a beauty storyteller, and so there's been so many opportunities that have come my way. that I've also walked away from, frankly, because, I'm not just kind of like a, you know, a jukebox machine where you just put a coin in the slot and out comes it. You know, it has to be something I feel connected to. Yeah, I did
GTN:also read there was collaborational project that has not come to fruition for Disney.
Poppy:I know exactly what you're talking about. Can
GTN:you tell us about this gold? Isn't this absolute gold? And I really, I am... Hoping against hope that this can still happen.
Poppy:Some way I'm going to make it happen. Please. Some way I'm going to make it happen. So Disney approached me, they'd just bought, um, the Muppets from Jim Henson and they were thinking about doing a line from, from the one, the only Miss Piggy, right? So little did they know what a story... I am like, kind of like, like when I moved to New York, Laura shipped all my furniture and everything like that. And I, and books and everything. And in those books that I shipped to New York was Miss Piggy's guide to life. Literally like, I'm like from the 80s, like, which I have to digress and tell you has the best beauty tip ever. Let me tell you, Miss Piggy says, if you're worried about wrinkles, stick a bit of spinach in your teeth and no one will look at your wrinkles. This
GTN:is my greatest paranoia, can I just tell you? I have a deal with friends that if we are ever eating a meal, if I have something in my teeth, you have to tell me or we cannot be friends.
Poppy:Alright, good to know. There you go. That's your deal breaker. So, um, so anyway, so they came to me and I was just... Absolutely. They had no idea that Miss Piggy, to me, is up there with Mae West, is up there, you know, is in a long line of feminists, and such a complicated figure, you know, like her relationship with Kermit was so complicated, you know, you know, but I I so understand her, like her contradictions of how she was really strong and also really vain and needy and she really was for me the first sort of role model of the contradictions of trying to be a strong female, anyway, so they came to me and they said, we'd love you to come back to us with a concept for Miss Piggy, right, and me being. Um, me, I didn't think of it in any way, shape or form as junior. Because she's so sophisticated, in terms of her intelligence and in terms of her philosophies and everything. So I came back with a very kind of, cerebral brand, right, now in retrospect I realise why Disney were just kind of like completely not expecting it, like they were expecting me to sort of come back with glittery, kind of like junior sort of things, and I, I came back with a line of, Of course, very high pigment lipsticks, um, which in her tagline was, When I say pigment, I mean it. LAUGHS But you should have seen around the, around the board table. They said, oh, we think that this may not be, uh, right for a junior customer. I'm like, no, absolutely not right for a junior. What the hell are you thinking, you know? So, yeah, I mean, but it was just, because I was on QVC at the time, and I had such a vision of me and Miss Piggy on QVC. Like life goals. Right, exactly. When I say pigment, I mean it. I can never, I will never forget the moment that whole line just dawned on me. I was just like, ah, religious moment. That, that really is.
GTN:We absolutely have to make that happen. so this time around also.
Poppy:I do, but it's a very personal story. So I don't, it's not corporate backing. So it's my original accountant from when I was 19. When I was. I'm talking about doing this. I was just going to get him on, you know, like it's like the Blues Brothers, getting the band back together, do you know what I mean? So I was like, would you come back on, as the accountant again, you know, it's sort of like, here we are 30 years later, his name is Paul Money, would you believe? And he said, not only would I come back on as the accountant, but I'd like to be your business partner. So my backers, uh, is, is the same person that knew me when I was 18, who was, who worked as my accountant and is now actually my business partner. God, how brilliant. Isn't it? Everything about it is, has a real reason for being, you know, it's a narrative with a product. It's not a product with a narrative. Brilliant.
GTN:Um, you could argue that beauty has taken, well, there are some camps. A
Poppy:very bad turn. Well, there's, there's,
GTN:there's two, I sort of see it as two camps. You've got, um, a very natural turn. Yeah. And then you've got a very... Plastic. Synthetic looking, plastic looking turn. And it's all very cookie cutter. What place do you see glamour having today? Do you think glamour is a different thing now? Is it a, is it a
Poppy:mindset? I think it's about an exuberance, and that's what glamour is. And that's why it's not there in the natural. And that's why it's not there in the plastic for me, because those are not exuberant. Spirited areas, you know, they're kind of, they're areas where, you know, where there's a sort of a whole playbook that you're going with. Glamour is free, you cannot contain glamour, like it bursts out of you, in all the wrong moments. And so. For me, glamour has always been about, the mind, you know, like your lips are the gateway to your mind, like if your eyes are the gateway to your soul, your lips are the gateway to your mind. And glamour is really kind of like, I'm such a believer in the power of words. and bringing those words into, into colours, like turning words into colours, like lust and envy and, you know. And so to me it's that, it's connecting your lips to your brain, is, makes it glamorous. I love that. And what is
GTN:it for you about lipstick? It's...
Poppy:You always come back to lipstick. Always, because lipstick is not cosmetic, you know, it's not a corrective product, I mean, it can be, but it's absolutely transformative, because when I was seven and I first tried it on, you know, snuck away with my mother's Bieber lipstick down the hall, quietly, and tried it on, and I knew as a little girl, because I'd seen my mother wear it, that I was going to look different once I put this product, once I put it on, what totally took me by surprise and has kept my fascination now for 50, well 47 years because it was about, when I put lipstick on. I didn't anticipate I'd feel different on the inside. And so it's the effect on your inside that is so different to any, I mean I think the only other thing is fragrance that sort of compares to it. But lipstick, the, the change that happens internally is what has kept me completely fascinated with this single kind of invention for, for, you know, for over a quarter of a century.
GTN:It's so true that I, it is the one thing I don't wear a lot of makeup but I never leave
Poppy:the house without lipstick. Yeah, oh, only when I want to be, only when I want to be invisible. It's so funny when I'm in New York and I don't have lipstick and someone say hi Poppy, I'll be like how did you see me? You can't but you can't see me. I love
GTN:it. Now I did have someone tell me recently, which this was fascinating to me, that as some people can read tea leaves.
Poppy:I can read. You have been known to read lips. Alright, so it's not the prints, it's your actual lips. So I can do, it's um, and it sounds like a whole load of hogwash, but it's not. For years I have looked at women's lips, right? Like when you're doing in store appearances in shopping mall after shopping, like, you have to find ways to entertain yourself. And I started to sort of like look at lips and think, God, I can really see someone that her personality it's not about the size or the shape, it's really about how you hold your lips kind of says a lot, like, and I've actually been able to really accurately read kind of like, so in yours. Okay, so I'm looking mainly at the corners of the lips, right? So, because that's really where it tells me, you are somebody that definitely leads with impulse. You know, like, you're not somebody who is, who is going, you know, who's going to hold back. Like, kind of, your lips go straight up at the corner, so there's not that pulling back that sort of shows. But they're also very straight, which means that you, like, there's a straightness to the interior of your lips. That also means that you are very determined. You may, that you've got these two sort of forces where you are willing to completely just go into the fire. But you, but you're also determined to make it work. Like it's not flighty. Ooh, interesting.
GTN:Yes. There we go. You had it here first. I love this. Well, we don't have a lot more time, but I would just. I'm just curious, what do you hope to achieve with the new brand?
Poppy:Um, interesting, I haven't really thought about that, you know, I know it sounds wrong for an entrepreneur to say I'm not goal oriented, you're supposed to be so goal oriented. Um, uh, joy. You know, I really feel that, um, joy has, all sorts of things have come into beauty, including a lot of diversity, which is great. But joy, and joy is something, if I can bring joy, you know, that's what I hope to achieve. And joy is not something about anything to do with how you look. It's about your imagination instead of your aspiration.
GTN:What a perfect note to finish on. Poppy King, it has been an absolute treasure to meet you. Oh,
Poppy:and treasure and pleasure and vice versa. Um, and I feel like we could, I feel like we could talk forever. I know. And thank you so much for having me on. Thank you. And for wearing your lipstick shirt in deference. We have to get a selfie. We do.
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