New kind of beauty
Tired of going store to store to find your favourite ethical and clean beauty brands? Well now you can head just to one place for all the essentials.
BALMESSENCE is the only e-boutique and flagship store (located in Mall of the Emirates) in the UAE of its kind to offer authentic, ethically sourced beauty products and unique fragrances.
Founded by Angela Turovskaya, it aims to bring its customers beauty products and fragrance from all over the world, with products created with as much as possible ethically sourced ingredients to follow the main objective in mind by “To swap synthetics for authentics”.
She has worked in beauty and wellbeing industry for more than a decade and has seen first-hand the impact popular non-clean beauty products have on the skin and its health. The lack of ethical beauty presence motivated Angela to set up a distribution company under the name of “Wellness United” that provides spas, hotels and clinics with alternative, luxurious, result driven, but non-toxic beauty products. A year and a half later, BALMESSENCE was born, a luxury beauty e-boutique, that caters directly to customers seeking result-driven products with clean ingredients.
What was your favourite subject at school?
Literature – I absolutely love reading and very passionate about it. I was always the first one to raise my hand in class. When I like a novel, I can continue reading it throughout the whole night and not even realise it.
What was your first job?
Something completely different to what I do now! Once I finished university, I worked as a personal assistant for an oil & gas company.
What inspired you to launch BALMESSENCE?
I have always been fascinated about beauty industry; it became a passion before it turned into my profession. After a decade of working firsthand with a variety of spa holistic beauty treatments, trying out beauty and fragrance brands, I realised there was a lack of ethical beauty presence in GCC region.
My goal when launching BALMESSENCE boutiques for Ethical Beauty & Unique Fragrances was to offer women and men high performance beauty products, which are ethical, not tested on animals, formulated using the best quality natural and organic ingredients while minimising or completely excluding any harsh preservatives and ingredients.
This is what I truly believe luxury beauty products are all about. In BALMESSENCE boutiques as well as on our E-Boutique www.balmessence.com our clients can find authentic luxurious, premium, ethical and niche beauty brands you won’t find easily in beauty marketplaces, and an exceptional luxurious feel reflected in all aspects of the product, from the packaging to the texture, passing by the brand high value system.
In order also to compliment such exclusive offering for clients looking for the best and unique, we have introduced niche luxury fragrances from European exclusive perfume houses, which are made of top quality authentic ingredients such as essential oils, absolutes and extracts, ensuring authenticity, longevity and sensational qualities for real perfume lovers.
What are the key elements of your role?
As a Managing Director I oversee all operational, commercial, marketing as well as financial aspects of the business. I’m also managing all aspects of existing partnerships with brands and developing new ones. Scouting and getting the new and best niche brands in the market are not only one of the most enjoyable part of my role, it is also my top priority.
Talk us through your daily routine.
Every day I start my day with a big cup of coffee, where I add rose water and cardamom to, before getting to the office. I usually spend my day between our two WELLNESS UNITED offices, Dubai Design District and Dubai Science Park.
I believe that there should be a balance between work life and personal life, and I make sure of that every day. I spend quality time with my beautiful daughters, be that helping them with their homework or taking them to music or dance classes. My favourite time of the day is putting my daughters to bed, talking about our day and what were the highlights.
What advice do you have for anyone looking to follow in the same footsteps?
Be persistent no matter how discouraged you could get sometimes. When you start your own business, you jump into it with great enthusiasm, ambition and dream, but then seatbacks do come along the way, alongside its challenges, this is when it becomes really hard to keep going. You are faced with the only option to roll up your sleeves and make it happen or give up – The choice is yours. This is when, strong will, persistence and sticking to your vision matters the most.
It then all starts making sense when you look back and see how far you’ve come. Only then you realise that all the hard work, the pain and anxiety was not in vain. This is how I see it: When you feel you want to give up, this is exactly when you should keep it up and give your 100%! This is when tremendous progress happens.
Which fashion brands can we find in your work wardrobe?
You can find Diane von Furstenberg, Elie Tahari, Theory, Maje, Sandro in my daily wardrobe. I am in love with Carolina Herrera dresses for special occasions. I have a thing for designer shoes! My ultimate go to are Gianvitto Rossi, Stuwart Weitzman, Manolo Blahnik and Salvatore Ferragamo.
What is the best piece of advice you ever received?
To get as many experts’ opinions as you can before taking important decisions. Even if the decision is up to us, we must always try and gather as much information as possible on the topics, in order to be able and make an informational choice. Having a multi-dimensional understanding of any subject given can only help make the right calls.
What has been the biggest challenge you had to overcome?
Myself. Any external obstacles can be challenged by your mindset and attitude. To overcome any challenge, we must learn to manage our emotions and challenge ourselves. Everything originates from the mind.
