Skincare Creator
Skincare supremo Sonia Deasy is the co-founder of Pestle & Mortar, an award-winning Irish skincare company which has grown phenomenally in just seven years. Here she is on her natural healing heritage, her belief in hero skincare products and her busy family life as a mother of five children.
Sonia Deasy is a passionate creator of skincare solutions which focus on one hero product. From the success of her first formulation, Pure Hyaluronic Serum, she has catapulted Pestle & Mortar onto the pages of Vogue, Vanity Fair and the New York Times and the world stage. Her inspiration, she says, came during busy photoshoots with her husband (and co-founder) Padraic. The models struggled with dehydrated and dull skin and she discovered the wonders of hyaluronic. Once she had tried those on the market she realised they weren’t what she wanted and set about creating her own. Her mantra was to create a simple hyaluronic product that was highly effective. Using high performance active ingredients with nourishing natural extracts she created the cult serum that started her on the road to skin stardom. Pestle & Mortar’s philosophies are rooted in Sonia’s Indian heritage in natural healing.
For six generations, her family have practised as Medicine Men in India. Pestle & Mortar is now stocked in 21 countries across three continents. She and Padraic are joint leaders of the business and live in Kildare with their five children. I began by asking her about those family values and whether they helped mould her as an entrepreneur.
“I come from a family of six children, 4 boys and 2 girls. There was lots of chaos and fun, and everything happened around the dinner table. Dinnertime was sacred, and so was education”, Sonia tells me. Her father, especially, valued entrepreneurship and education. “My Dad would deliver lectures on life, school, and business at every meal.
At the time, we rolled our eyes, but actually his values inform who I am today as an entrepreneur and the type of organisation I’m building. At Pestle & Mortar, we value family, we love eating together, and we strive to educate our customers in skincare and wellbeing so they can look and feel their best every day”, she adds.
What did you do before the launch of Pestle & Mortar? I worked alongside my husband in our portrait photography business for over 10 years. Padraic is a highly-acclaimed portrait photographer. That’s why one of the hallmarks of the Pestle & Mortar brand from the start has been to produce the highest quality imagery and design for our media. It was while photographing models for shoots that the idea for Pestle & Mortar came about – their skin was often dry, dull, and flaky, and they didn’t have an easy way to make it better.
We thought, ‘skincare shouldn’t be this complicated’, and set about creating simple solutions for beautiful skin.
You come from generations of natural healers, did that influence your decision to start the business? Absolutely – Pestle & Mortar formulations are inspired by Indian Natural Healing. For six generations, my family have practised as medicine men in India, and my uncle still practices in his village to this day. Our products combine nourishing, skinhealing ingredients from nature with high-performing active ingredients so that skin gets everything it needs to look and feel its best every day.
“Pestle & Mortar formulations are inspired by Indian Natural Healing, for six generations, my family have practised as medicine men in India, my uncle still practices in his village to this day.”
Which trait do you think is the most important for an entrepreneur? One of the most important requirements of a successful entrepreneur is to off er something of unique value to the marketplace and to fill a niche gap in the market. To pull this off effectively usually requires high levels of creativity and innovation. I think these two qualities are crucial for a successful entrepreneur.
Was it a natural partnership for you and your husband Padraic to work together? Yes. Padraic is systems obsessed and driven to get every detail nailed on and perfect in everything he does. On the other hand, I’m an activator - once I get an idea, I decide fast, act fast, and get stuff done. So we compliment each other perfectly!
One of the conversations we find ourselves having regularly with the Woman’s Way community is around ‘the juggle’. If anyone can epitomise the juggle that’s you – a successful businesswoman with 5 kids and a husband who is co-CEO of the business. I know you must have been asked this many times but really, how do you do it? I’m not Superwoman, I can assure you! When we were young, my Dad would always say ‘no need to panic’, no matter what had happened, and it’s a mantra that I live by.
There really isn’t any need for panic once you have systems in place. I come from a family of six children and so my own family feels normal enough to me! Overwhelm mostly happens when you’re not organised - I do one thing at a time, I rarely procrastinate, and I like to be organised.
Also, I learnt a long time ago that done is better than perfect.
You started in 2014 with the hyaluronic serum – was it still relatively new? What was the eureka moment? Actually, the market was flooded with hyaluronic serums at the time. e eureka moment was that I didn’t like any of them! I was looking for a solution for dry, flaky skin - something that would slot into your daily routine and make a visible difference. But all the hyaluronic serums I tried felt sticky and tacky - I didn’t like how they felt on my skin. So I decided to make my own.
You’ve continued to launch ‘hero products’ tell us more about that approach? I believe that skincare shouldn’t be complicated. You just need a simple routine of high performing products that deliver targeted active ingredients to the skin. Each of our products delivers a particular skin benefit by way of a hero ingredient, for example, vitamin c, retinol, hyaluronic acid, lactic acid, and others. This means you can layer our products in accordance with what your skin needs to create your perfect routine.
Your design and packaging are very minimalist and contemporary – did that take a bit of time to devise? The monochrome design and minimalist packaging are reflective of the ethos of our brand where simplicity is at the core. We knew exactly how we wanted to communicate our brand from the start. Coming from a photography background helped to make the design process relatively quick to be honest.
You’ve achieved phenomenal growth did that feel like a whirlwind? At times it did, but more so in retrospect. When you’re actively growing a business, you’re too busy to stop and think about how it feels in the moment. The reality is that behind every overnight success there’s actually years of hard work and dedication.
How has the pandemic been for the business? We lost 50% of sales when the pandemic hit because retailers shutdown. We immediately upped our online game by developing a new, user-friendly e-commerce website which launched last September and almost immediately restored us to a growth position. We streamlined our processes so that work systems were seamless whether our team was working from the office or from home. We had to react quickly and thankfully, it worked.
How was it for you personally? I was very busy and highly effective at work and very busy and highly ineffective trying to homeschool! This pandemic touched everyone in various ways but we had no choice but to adapt and get on with it as best we could.
What about the future – do you think you will continue to grow organically? Pestle & Mortar continues to grow and there are lots of new products in the pipeline for next year. I’m excited for the future.
For more visit pestleandmortar.com