How Madison Reed disrupted the hair color industry from scratch

Executive overview

The hair color market is massive, repetitive, and was entirely unowned online. Amy Errett built Madison Reed by solving two hard problems: cleaner ingredients and remote color matching — after getting fired and realising she couldn't work for anyone else.

Ten years later: a $200M profitable business, 1,000+ employees, and a mission to raise colorists out of poverty.

The insight: find the problem no one online owns, solve the hard ingredient and matching questions first, then scale with culture.

From fired to founder

• Getting fired triggered therapy; the key finding: she fundamentally cannot work for someone else.
• Identified her genius: taking near-impossible problems, building a team with a shared mission.
• Six and a half years at Maveron VC gave her pattern recognition on markets and founders.
• Passing on Dollar Shave Club prompted an intern analysis of the "women's analog to shaving."
• Hair color surfaced as the answer: massive TAM, high repeat purchase, nothing online owned the space.
• Her wife Claire's own experience going gray young made the consumer pain point viscerally real.

Building the product

• Went to Italy — where most private label hair color is made — and met 13 suppliers.
• The first 10 laughed at the idea of removing ingredients and selling DTC with color matching.
• Supplier 11 said yes, on two conditions: full payment upfront, in euros (~$80K, self-funded).
• Tested 19 shades on women at a San Francisco stylist's salon — 18 thrilled, one crisis, lessons learned.

Funding and early growth

• Not having a technical co-founder cost 18–24 months of digital product progress.
• Too many co-founders (four total): most lacked the ability to move between 30,000-foot strategy and ground-level execution.
• Key lesson on herself: she waits too long to let people go; learned to act before reaching "dead to me."
• VC background gave access and credibility; DTC boom timing and a tested product drove competing term sheets.
• Forced investors to consult their partners before committing — to avoid half-hearted board alignment.
• Raised $240M total; now a $200M top-line profitable business growing 20%+ annually.

Pandemic and the Bain insight

• During the pandemic, sold a box of color every five seconds for months as stores closed.
• Six months in, had no idea who the customer base was anymore; brought Bain in (taking 50% of fee in equity).
• Bain segmentation identified two customer types: aging "salon lovers" and an emerging "salon realist" — convenience-driven, ingredient-conscious, same-day appointments, mobile-first.
• That insight unlocked the gas pedal for the hair color bar store rollout.

Culture as operating system

• Five values established from day two: love, trust, responsibility, courage, joy.
• Weekly Wednesday company lunch at 12:15 PT — mandatory, same format for 10 years, includes welcoming new hires with "two truths and a lie."
• Publicly apologises at the lunch when she makes mistakes; models that humans err and own it.
• Mission extends to colorists: average US colorist earns under $35K; Madison Reed targets $80K+ with full benefits.
• Tracks individual milestone messages (first house purchases etc.) as proof the model works.
• Three customers in her framework: end consumer, investors, and her team — and she explicitly serves the team first.