Overview
You sell Blanka's private label beauty platform to salon and spa owners. You're essentially pitching them on adding a product revenue stream to their service business - helping them put their name on skincare, makeup, or haircare that Blanka manufactures and ships. You handle the full sales cycle from cold outreach to close, working with small business owners who mostly think about filling appointment slots, not launching product lines.
Role Snapshot
| Aspect | Details |
|---|---|
| Role Type | Full-cycle AE (self-sourced) |
| Sales Motion | Outbound-heavy |
| Deal Complexity | Consultative |
| Sales Cycle | 3-8 weeks |
| Deal Size | $3-10K initial order, ongoing |
| Quota (est.) | $30-50K/month |
Company Context
Stage: Early-stage (likely pre-Series A based on 30 employees, recent growth mode)
Size: 30 employees
Growth: Actively hiring, CEO mentions "it's working" after building phase - signals product-market fit with salons/spas
Market Position: Niche player in private label beauty space, targeting specific vertical (salons/spas) vs broader beauty entrepreneur market
GTM Reality
Pipeline Sources:
- 20% Inbound - salon owners who find them through search or content (Blanka Academy webinars), quality varies
- 75% Outbound - you're building lists of salons/spas and cold reaching out via email, LinkedIn, calls
- 5% Referrals - existing customers referring other salon owners
SDR/AE Structure: No dedicated SDRs - you source your own pipeline
SE Support: No sales engineers - you demo the platform yourself
Competitive Landscape
Main Competitors: Other private label beauty platforms (exact competitors unavailable from research, but space includes general private label manufacturers and beauty-specific fulfillment platforms)
How They Differentiate: Zero minimums, zero inventory model - salon owners don't need to buy 1,000 units upfront. Beauty-specific focus vs general private label.
Common Objections: "I'm not a product company, I do services", "My clients won't buy products with my name on them", "I don't have time to market this", "What if it doesn't sell?"
Win Themes: No upfront cost/risk, they handle all logistics, can test products without commitment, potential passive income stream
What You'll Actually Do
Time Breakdown
Prospecting (45%) | Active Deals (35%) | Internal/Admin (20%)
Key Activities
- Building lists and cold outreach: You research salons/spas (Yelp, Google, Instagram), compile contact info, and send cold emails/LinkedIn messages. You're aiming for 30-50 new contacts per day. Most ignore you.
- Discovery calls with salon/spa owners: When someone bites, you're walking them through how the business model works - explaining margins, fulfillment, customization options. These folks are service providers, not product people, so there's education involved.
- Product demos: You show them the Blanka platform - how to browse products, customize labels/packaging, set pricing. This is screen share stuff, not technical. You're dealing with Zoom issues and people who aren't super tech-savvy.
- Following up on stalled deals: Salon owners are busy running their businesses. You'll send a lot of "just checking in" messages to people who went dark after showing initial interest. Deal velocity is inconsistent - some close fast, others drag for months.
The Honest Reality
What's Hard
- You're selling to small business owners who are slammed running their salons - they're hard to reach and slow to respond. Getting someone on the phone is a win.
- The concept requires mindset shift - these aren't entrepreneurs thinking about product lines, they're stylists and estheticians focused on bookings. You're selling them on a new business model, not just a tool.
- You're mostly self-sourcing pipeline - no SDR handing you qualified meetings. If you don't prospect, you don't eat.
- Small deal sizes mean you need volume - this isn't landing one enterprise deal per quarter, you need consistent deal flow.
- Early-stage company means you're figuring things out as you go - playbooks aren't fully baked, positioning might shift, you're giving product feedback constantly.
What Success Looks Like
- Closing 8-12 new salon/spa accounts per month
- Building a repeatable outbound motion (sequences, messaging, channels that work with this audience)
- Generating $40K+ in new monthly recurring product orders
- Getting renewals/reorders from existing accounts (retention matters as much as new logos)
Who You're Selling To
Primary Buyers:
- Salon owners (1-5 location operations)
- Spa owners/managers
- High-end independent stylists with personal brands
What They Care About:
- Additional revenue without additional labor (passive income angle)
- Brand reputation - will the products reflect well on their business?
- Margins and profitability - what's the actual take-home after Blanka's cut?
- Time/effort required - they're already maxed out running their core business
- Risk - what if they launch products and nobody buys?
Requirements
- Comfortable with high-volume outbound prospecting (this isn't inbound-fed)
- Experience selling to small business owners (bonus if beauty/wellness industry)
- Ability to explain business models simply to non-technical buyers
- Self-starter mentality - early-stage company, you'll need to figure things out
- Located in or willing to relocate to Texas (role is based there)
- Track record of hitting quota in transactional or SMB sales