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In November, model Madison Headrick introduced her brand, Care.e.on (pronounced ‘carry on’), to the U.K. market. Edward Enninful, British Vogue’s editor-in-chief, is a close friend of Headrick’s and connected her to the magazine’s editors. The resulting story on the brand gave it an unusual jumpstart on international sales. Care.e.on is currently exclusively available on its DTC website.
Twenty-nine-year-old Headrick was first scouted for modeling at age 14, while shopping at a Walmart in her hometown of Charleston, South Carolina. Since then, modeling has taken her around the globe. That international model lifestyle inspired her brand, she said.
Four months after the launch of Care.e.on, which she’s self-funded, Headrick is now spending more time promoting it stateside. To help bring the brand to life locally, Headrick tapped Kimberly Steinberg, founder of KSVP, an L.A.-based branding, marketing and product development agency.
Initially, Headrick said, she wanted to see how much traction the brand could get on its own, before involving a PR agency. Given that she has 538,000 Instagram followers and has spent half of her life working in fashion, the answer was: a good amount. She sent the brand’s debut kit to her own circle of friends. Celebs and influencers including Nicky Hilton, Lily Aldridge, Simon Huck and Ashley Benson have since posted about it. The supplemental PR play has included further gifting, plus pitches to media.
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Though the general idea for the brand came from Headrick’s work travels, the pandemic provided an opportunity to actually get to work, she said. “I always wondered why something like this didn’t exist,” Headrick said, referring to the brand’s beauty–on-the-go focus.
Headrick said, prior to the pandemic, she was typically at her home of NYC just two-and-a-half months out of the year. “I was on a flight every other day,” she said. “I need to get off a plane looking good and feeling good and being on my A game, but I was getting so rundown. My mental health, my physical health, my skin care — everything seemed to be crumbling. I was like, ‘I don’t understand how people do it.’ So I started asking flight attendants, other models, makeup artists — I was like, ‘I need to know all the tips and tricks on how to land and feel like I’m living and breathing!” she said.
The result of Headrick’s research is Care.e.on’s En Route Essentials kit, which contains the brand’s Hydroboost Hydrating Pads, Cleared For Takeoff Hand Sanitizer, In The Clouds Facial Mist and Flying Highdration Mask. The total kit, which costs $38, is meant to be the antidote to the packing conundrums Headrick often faced. She said she’d tried pre-packing her own travel kits at home, but, when rushing to a flight, the last thing she wanted to be doing was transferring “expensive products into smaller bottles.”
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Headrick and Steinberg said the En Route Essentials kit is just the first of several travel-friendly beauty kits the brand plans to create. For now, the products are not available for purchase individually. In addition to the kit, the brand also sells a sweatshirt.
“Our analytics show that people purchase two to three kits at a time. They’re doing the same thing as us, which is the goal — for it to be thrown into a gym bag, a diaper bag, wherever someone needs a little self-care moment,” Steinberg said.
Headrick echoed that pride in the brand’s early success, calling out the brand’s increasing repeat customer base just four months in.
