After successful iterations in New York City and Los Angeles earlier this year, FounderMade CEO Meghan Asha explained, “We wanted to weave the entrepreneurial spirit of FounderMade with the vibrant cultural backdrop of Art Basel. This fusion offered attendees an exclusive chance to network, gain insights and experience a creative and innovative atmosphere unlike any other FounderMade event. It wasn’t just about scaling businesses — it was about connecting visionaries in a space where art and commerce collide.”

The day’s agenda featured impactful keynotes, fireside chats, and panels led by industry pioneers, offering attendees strategies and exclusive access to thought leadership. FounderMade tailored the lineup of speakers and content to resonate with high-growth consumer brands. Asha added, “By assembling a curated group of executives and thought leaders, the event was designed to foster connections, share actionable insights and equip attendees with the tools to drive growth for consumer brands generating $10 million or more in annual revenue.”

Experiential Marketing: Turning Moments into Movements

Among the career learnings Wilson shared were the importance of founder passion and hands-on involvement. For founder attendees, she also explained how the investment landscape has changed in recent years. Today, she said investors are not as focused on growth as they were in the past. “The prospective investor, whatever stage you are from angel to institutional, they’re thinking about liquidity, they’re thinking about the exit. When I was starting these other ventures, it was more about grow as fast as you can, beat out the competition, gain as much market share as you can, and we’ll figure out the rest later.”

Offering advice for navigating the fundraising process, Wilson said, “Interpret ‘no’ as ‘just not yet’ or really ‘maybe.’ Have that attitude when you face any kind of rejection from an investor, never take it personally and send them updates. There are companies we’ve seen where we weren’t sure and then they send us updates, they’ll send us their numbers. They’re not worried about confidentiality. We’re like, wow, they’re killing it.”

Wilson also knows the driving force behind her success: “At the end of the day, the arc of my career has been the consumer. It’s the same person in different life stages and it’s fun.”

The Marketing Revolution: Bold Moves to Captivate Tomorrow’s Consumer

With digital dominating the marketing playbook, this panel didn’t waste any time before jumping into where to invest. “If you’re focused on performance, the big three are Meta, Google and TikTok,” said Dr. Snow. Yet Dowling emphasized, “Focus on impact and don’t try and be everywhere all at once.”

AI was another focal point of this discussion, which touched on the technology’s impact on brainstorming, user-generated content, brand copywriting and more. Smolyansky shared, “We’ve used AI brilliantly for concept testing to launch new items and flavors, and learn about a market,” which in Lifeway Foods’ case was Dubai.

The panel also unanimously agreed that maintaining authenticity must be a priority for brands as AI grows. “No BS with the consumer, that’s how you build trust. That’s how you build authenticity and ultimately, we’re building a relationship with them beyond the first purchase. It’s critical that we have that transparency there,” Dowling added.

Maximizing ROI: Strategies for Driving Growth and Profitability

The most beauty-heavy panel of the day brought insights into strategies for sustainable growth and maximizing ROI. Revenue Roll audience-analysis platform CEO Diesu opened the conversation with, “The most important profitable growth is one that we don’t have to pay for. That’s having a great product, having your existing customers, somebody having an excellent experience with your product and telling friends about it. Sustainable growth is all about having happy customers.”

Price of Blooming Brands shared, “It’s very tempting in today’s day and age to make a million different things for a million different people because the consumer is so broad, and the consumer is asking for so many different things. But I think you really have to just stand on your foundation as a brand and your foundation as a product, whatever that product is, and believe in it and lean into it in whatever second you’re doing business.”

Touching on unexpected and unplanned growth, Chillhouse’s Ramirez-Fulton and Price shared the pivot stories that changed their brands’ trajectories. Launching press-on nails during COVID not only allowed Chillhouse to continue operations while its small Lower East Side spa was closed during lockdown—but eventually led to Target becoming the brand’s largest retailer. Price saw the shift to at-home manicures as an opportunity to dust off the Blue Cross brand, transforming it from an unknown professional-only product to a top-selling SKU on Amazon.

With her LIVELY days behind her, Grant shared GORGIE’s recipe for success thus far. “We created the best product possible. We did everything that would make the consumer happy. Now a year later let’s figure out how to maintain this product and its quality while also being able to scale it and allow us to pay for the things that we really care about. The combination of how you analyze the margin and while providing what society wants is a personal approach.”

Looking to the short- and long-term future, the panel had a variety of predictions ranging from hyper-personalized AI-driven funnels and, according to Grant, a return to a more aspirational content aesthetic as a backlash to the “TikTok culture of trends and putting out fast content.” Based on conversations hair professionals, Price also foresees a resurgence in the hair category and “a lot more glam” due to more aspirational brand positioning.

Crafting Iconic Brands: Masterpieces of Innovation and Growth

In this intimate conversation, a marketing thought leader and beauty brand builder took a deep dive into the factors specific to the innovation and growth of iconic brands. Among the key factors explored included authenticity, emotional connection, and the importance of the founder being the face of the brand.

To start, Glamnetic’s McFerran shared her journey from influencer to launching a bootstrapped “cold call” brand in 2019. Her mission to create a product that solved a real-world problem (especially during the pandemic when wearing masks was the norm) was actualized in the form of Glamnetic, a line of false lashes that rely on magnetic eyeliner instead of glue to secure the strips.

McFerran recalled, “Once I saw people who’ve never been able to apply lashes doing it within a minute, I saw the gap for on-trend press-on nail designs of better quality than those already existing on the market. Press-on nails have been around for 30 years, but there has been no innovation in this category.”

Using collaborations to reach new subsets of potential customers has become ubiquitous for start-ups and legacy brands alike. Hawke Media’s Huberman explained, “Customer acquisition gets more difficult every year because of market saturation and more brands spending. For new brands starting out, it’s a little bit more difficult. They have to figure out organic ways to grow, and I think a really good organic way to grow is through collaboration.”

These two Forbes “30 Under 30” alum also agree that brand founders must stay true to their company mission. Huberman shared, “You have to be very clear on your mission, your vision and what you want to build. You have to build the company you want to run and build a company that works for your goal, not for what ends up happening.”

The afternoon’s programming wrapped up with a one-on-one between FounderMade’s Asha and Daniel Rosensweig, former CEO and current Executive Chairman of Chegg, former COO of Yahoo!, former CEO of Guitar Hero, and board member of Adobe. A passionate investor as well, Rosensweig shared stories of his entrepreneurial journey and leadership philosophy, noting the importance of surrounding yourself with people you can trust and rely on, especially during difficult times. He stresses the need to find a boss that appreciates your work and a company you can be proud to be associated with. His inspiring words also implored rising founders to find their own path in today’s ever-changing world.