From global beauty executive to award-winning skincare pioneer

Boxers & Briefs Podcast #21: Creating a premium skincare brand, RAAIE, with Katey Mandy

When Katey Ellen Mandy returned to New Zealand after 15 years building beauty brands across London, New York, and Los Angeles, she never imagined that her family’s rewilded dairy farm would become the inspiration for a revolutionary skincare brand. Yet standing amongst the Manuka, Kanuka, and Hakiki plants her father had cultivated to attract native birdlife, she discovered something extraordinary that the global beauty industry had overlooked.

“I really felt like I’d landed in a goldmine of all these amazing ingredients that I thought had real global appeal,” Mandy reflects on that pivotal moment when RAAIE was born.

The science behind New Zealand’s botanical advantage

RAAIE, pronounced ‘ray’ and derived from Ra, the Egyptian sun god, represents more than just another luxury skincare brand. The company’s foundation rests on a compelling scientific premise that plants thriving under New Zealand’s extreme UV conditions, 40% higher than similar latitudes in North America, develop extraordinary protective capabilities.

This unique environmental pressure forces native botanicals to produce exceptionally high levels of antioxidants as a survival mechanism. When these powerful compounds are applied to human skin, they offer remarkable protection against the very damage that causes 80% of visible ageing signs, including wrinkles, sagging, pigmentation, and dullness.

The concept takes New Zealand’s harsh UV environment from a skincare enemy into an unexpected ally. Where most beauty brands focus on damage repair, RAAIE’s approach centres on prevention through nature’s own evolutionary solutions.

Building a luxury brand from the ground up

Creating RAAIE required Mandy to channel her extensive international experience into building something entirely new. Having spent years mapping global beauty trends and acquiring brands for multinational companies, she understood the premium beauty landscape’s unforgiving standards.

“In premium beauty, the standard is so high. You’re competing against Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent, and so if I’m going to show up, I want it to be perfect and flawless and working beautifully,” she explains.

This commitment to excellence shaped every aspect of RAAIE’s development process. Mandy invested two years perfecting formulations, understanding that skincare development resembles baking a complex cake where individual ingredients, however exceptional, must work harmoniously together to create something truly remarkable.

The brand’s visual identity received equal attention. Recognising that luxury consumers expect brands to look worthy of sitting alongside international powerhouses, Mandy invested heavily in sophisticated packaging design and brand assets that could confidently occupy shelf space next to established names.

Strategic market expansion and funding challenges

Rather than rushing to export, RAAIE deliberately focused on perfecting its New Zealand operations first. This measured approach reflected Mandy’s understanding that premium beauty tolerates no mistakes when entering new markets.

The decision to prioritise the UK as the first international expansion market stems from both regulatory considerations and market familiarity. European regulatory standards demand comprehensive documentation for every ingredient, a process that requires significant time and resources. Meanwhile, Mandy’s deep understanding of UK consumers from her international career provides strategic advantages that make this market particularly attractive.

Funding the venture required creative thinking and considerable personal risk. Mandy and her husband redirected their house deposit into the business, recognising the opportunity’s potential during a period when New Zealand property prices made alternative investments increasingly attractive. This initial investment was later supplemented by a friends and family funding round, creating a supportive network of advisors and advocates.

Marketing authenticity in a sceptical market

Modern skincare marketing faces unique challenges that traditional consumer goods avoid. As Mandy observes, skincare represents ‘a promise in a bottle’ where consumers have grown increasingly sceptical due to widespread over-promising and under-delivering across the industry.

RAAIE’s marketing strategy emphasises third-party validation through traditional public relations, beauty editor endorsements, and strategic retail partnerships. Securing placement in prestigious stockists like Smith & Caughey’s and Valentine’s provides credibility that digital marketing alone cannot achieve.

The brand’s approach to influencer partnerships reflects changing consumer attitudes toward sponsored content. Rather than paying for guaranteed posts, RAAIE gifts products to potential collaborators, allowing genuine enthusiasm to drive authentic recommendations. This strategy acknowledges that consumers have developed sophisticated filters for detecting inauthentic endorsements.

“I don’t think we’d ever just send something out to someone who’s never tried it and doesn’t believe in it,” Mandy explains, highlighting the importance of genuine product advocacy in building brand trust.

Operational excellence through strategic priorities

Running a successful beauty startup requires balancing multiple competing demands while maintaining the high standards that luxury consumers expect. Mandy identifies three critical priorities that shape RAAIE’s operational approach.

First, maintaining capacity for strategic thinking proves essential but challenging when managing the daily demands of a growing business. Mandy dedicates one day monthly to stepping away from emails and meetings, creating space for the bird’s-eye view perspective that prevents reactive decision-making.

Second, building the right team becomes increasingly crucial as the business scales. Recognising her own strengths and weaknesses allows Mandy to recruit complementary skills while ensuring team members genuinely believe in RAAIE’s mission and vision.

Third, maintaining uncompromising standards prevents the quality compromises that often derail growing companies. Despite financial pressures and time constraints, Mandy has written off expensive packaging that didn’t meet expectations and restarted branding projects that weren’t quite right.

Recognition and international success

RAAIE’s commitment to excellence has generated remarkable recognition within the competitive global beauty industry. The brand has won ten major international awards within two years of launching, including the prestigious Best Anti-Aging Product award at the Allure Awards in Los Angeles, often described as the beauty industry’s Oscars.

These accolades carry particular significance in skincare, a category experiencing rapid growth but intense competition. Every celebrity and entrepreneur seems to be launching beauty products, making genuine breakthrough achievements increasingly rare and valuable.

The awards provide more than just recognition; they offer crucial validation for retail buyers, beauty editors, and consumers who need reassurance when choosing between countless available options. For a New Zealand brand competing on the global stage, such recognition proves invaluable for establishing credibility and opening doors to new opportunities.

Consumer response and market validation

Beyond industry recognition, RAAIE’s success rests on genuine consumer satisfaction. Early consumer sampling revealed overwhelmingly positive responses that exceeded Mandy’s expectations, providing the confidence to launch both initially planned products rather than selecting a single standout option.

Post-launch feedback has maintained this positive trajectory, with customers proactively reaching out to request additional products and express satisfaction with results. This organic enthusiasm provides the most valuable marketing any brand can achieve, particularly in skincare, where word-of-mouth recommendations carry exceptional weight.

The New Zealand market has embraced RAAIE with particular enthusiasm, supporting a local brand that meets international standards while embodying values around sustainability, natural ingredients, and thoughtful product development. This foundation provides a solid platform for international expansion while maintaining the brand’s core identity and values.

Future vision and global ambitions

RAAIE’s expansion plans reflect careful strategic thinking rather than opportunistic growth. After establishing operations in the UK and Europe throughout 2024, the brand plans to enter the United States market around 2026-2027, allowing sufficient time to build resources and develop appropriate strategies for this demanding market.

The phased approach acknowledges that different markets require different approaches while maintaining the quality standards that define the RAAIE brand. Success in each new territory provides learning opportunities and resources that strengthen subsequent expansions.

As RAAIE grows, the brand continues exploring New Zealand’s unique botanical resources, including Antarctic marine algae from pristine streams around Stewart Island and alpine plants adapted to extreme mountainous conditions. These ingredients offer ongoing innovation opportunities while reinforcing the brand’s connection to New Zealand’s distinctive natural environment.

Building something meaningful

RAAIE’s journey from concept to award-winning international brand demonstrates how deep industry knowledge, scientific innovation, and uncompromising standards can create breakthrough success even in highly competitive markets. By identifying and leveraging New Zealand’s unique botanical advantages, Mandy has created something genuinely different in a crowded marketplace.

The brand’s success offers valuable lessons for entrepreneurs considering how to build premium products that can compete globally while maintaining authentic connections to their origins. RAAIE proves that with sufficient preparation, strategic thinking, and commitment to excellence, New Zealand companies can create brands that resonate internationally while celebrating what makes this country unique.

For RAAIE, the journey continues as the brand prepares to introduce New Zealand’s botanical innovations to beauty consumers worldwide, carrying forward a story that began on a rewilded Northland farm and evolved into something that changes how we think about skincare, ageing, and the power of nature’s own solutions.

If you would like to try RAAIE, visit their website here.

This article and podcast is proudly brought to you by Gilligan Sheppard, the problem solvers in business who believe in thinking differently.n thinking differently.