Katherine Power launches “Merit,” a Five-Minute Clean Beauty Brand

Katherine Power is unveiling her “most personal project yet.”

Katherine Power, the co-founder and CEO of Who What Wear, is launching a clean, cruelty-free, vegan beauty brand. The brand, called “Merit Beauty,” is made up of minimalist vanity essentials including a complexion stick, highlighter, cheek color, mascara, brow pomade, lip oil and blending brush. This “clean,” “five-minute” makeup brand is the second beauty company from Power, the who brought Versed, a vegan skin-care brand sold in drugstores, to market last year.

Merit Beauty will debut on January 12 via its own direct-to-consumer web site that will offer seven products Power considers essential for a five-minute makeup routine — a regimen of hers that she shared with her Instagram following in 2014.

Power explains that the idea for Merit came about when Power was pregnant with her first son. “I went to use my normal lip products, and I became nauseous instantly,” Power told WWD in a recent Zoom call. After testing a “clean” lip product, she dove further into the category.

“There was a huge opportunity [for] minimalist beauty for women just like myself who are professional and driven and have not a lot of time and want to look like themselves — but better,” Power said. “As a consumer, I didn’t fit into the bronzed and contoured Kardashian, Instagram kind of look, and I was older and maybe a little more professional than a Glossier customer.”

Merit Beauty, she said, is “the antidote to the 50-[pan] eye shadow [palette].” She defined minimalist beauty as “a holistic approach” that involves paring down both the ingredients list and product offerings. Merit’s products are priced at $38 or less.

She incubated the idea for Merit with Who What Wear’s community, finding that women “don’t want it to be super evident that they’re wearing makeup” and would rather be complimented on their skin. “They want to feel comfortable in daylight or in a conference room lighting and not have iridescence on their cheek,” Power said. “It’s perfect for today, as we’re in a recession. It’s really this idea of less is more, and curating the quality items that have earned a place on your vanity.”

Though Power declined to offer a first-year sales projection for Merit Beauty, skin-care brand Versed has experienced a monthly net sales growth of 210 percent from May to September of this year compared to last, according to the company. Versed’s products are sold throughout the U.S., U.K. and Canada. Earlier this year, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, she cofounded an organic wine brand, Avaline, with Cameron Diaz. Avaline has sold more than 120,000 bottles since its launch.

—
Photo Credit:  Kathy Hutchins / Shutterstock.com