Ann McFerran Left Thailand With Nothing. Then Built a $40M Beauty Empire.

Superwomen with Rebecca Minkoff

Rebecca Minkoff

Society & Culture

4.8 • 543 Ratings

🗓️ 16 April 2026

⏱️ 47 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Ann McFerran was a broke artist in a Koreatown backhouse, driving a PT Cruiser, with a few thousand dollars and an idea for magnetic lashes nobody had made yet. No investors. No business degree. No safety net. By year two, Glamnetic hit $40 million in revenue. This week on Superwomen, Ann breaks down exactly how she got there through cold DMs with 30% conversion rates, hand-labeling products with friends at midnight, maxing out credit cards, and becoming her own influencer before TikTok even existed. We also get into why she's never taken outside funding, what she's building next with DIGI Beauty, and the mindset shift that separates founders who quit from founders who scale. If you're in the early, unglamorous stage of building something… this one's for you. Episode Guide: (00:00) Meet Glamnetic’s Ann McFerran (01:57) The journey from pre-med at UCLA to fine art (03:47) How Ann created magnetic lashes through trial and error (06:02) Using direct messages to generate initial sales (08:02) Glamnetic’s explosive growth in 2020 (10:18) How to find the right people to join the business (13:07) DIGI Beauty and how the pivot to nails came about (14:52) The importance of staying scrappy (21:13) Constant innovation vs. patents (23:54) Addressing the decline of the lash craze (29:09) Balancing business and personal health as a founder (35:42) The decision to remain self-funded (39:39) Leaving Thailand with nothing, to where she is today Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	For small businesses, every hire matters, but the time and resources required to hire right are limited.
0:06.0	Luckily, LinkedIn Hiring Pro is built for that reality. It's your hiring partner designed to help you hire with confidence by servicing only the right candidates without turning hiring into another full-time job.
0:16.8	When you start getting applications, it's exciting for about 10 seconds and then it gets stressful.
0:21.5	It can be so overwhelming to sort through all the resumes while you're trying to find the right
0:25.3	candidate, and it is so high stakes, which just adds to the pressure.
0:29.3	Posting a job isn't always the hard part.
0:31.5	It's finding, connecting with, and screening the right candidates.
0:34.9	Hiring pro streamlines the entire process from drafting your job
0:38.4	to shortlisting candidates and conducting AI-powered interviews for initial screenings, all through a
0:43.9	conversational interface that lets you describe what you need in plain language. Nearly 60% of hires
0:49.0	find a candidate to interview within a week. With hiring pro, you spend less time searching
0:53.7	and more time connecting
0:54.8	with the right talent. Hire right the first time. Post your first job and get $100 off towards your
0:59.8	post at LinkedIn.com slash superw. That's LinkedIn.com slash superw. Terms and conditions apply.
1:08.0	Isn't life grande and making it better just got easier with Starbucks new protein cold foam.
1:15.0	A little something, something to take your favorite drinks up a notch with 15 grams of extra protein.
1:21.5	Turn your usual iced caramel latte into a smooth iced caramel protein latte.
1:26.8	Add a delicious swirl on top of your drink, just like that.
1:31.7	Protein never tasted so good with Starbucks new protein cold foam.
1:36.0	Subject to availability while stocks last.
1:38.3	I was actually like kind of a broke artist, like living out of a one-bed room apartment in Korea town,
1:44.6	literally a back house to another house, paying less than a grand for rent.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Rebecca Minkoff, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Rebecca Minkoff and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.