The Redmond Family’s Third, Peptide- powered Hair Care Brand Is Here
● Called V&Co., the eightproduct range is rolling out to an estimated 8,000 Target, Walmart, Safeway and other retail doors.
For the Redmond family, arguably each time has been the charm.
The clan behind the Australian-inspired hair care brand Aussie, founded in 1979 and bought by P&G Beauty in 2003, as well as plant-based Renpure, which launched in 2008 and sold to MAV Beauty Brands in 2018, is back for its third launch.
Cofounded by father-son duo Tom and Mike Redmond, V&Co. is a peptide-infused hair care brand debuting with a range of shampoo and conditioner duos for straight, wavy, curly and thick hair types, respectively.
Priced at $7.99 to $8.99 a bottle, the brand aims to offer products that are commensurate in terms of efficacy and formulation to those within the prestige and professional channels.
"Our formula for success is paying attention to other categories," said Mike Redmond, who recalls having begun working at the Renpure manufacturing facility alongside his siblings in seventh grade, and went on to intern at Renpure's corporate office during his college years.
Now 29 years old, Redmond is taking the helm as chief executive officer of V&Co. With distribution spanning around 8,000 Target, Walmart, Safeway, Albertsons and other retail doors, he estimates the brand could do $20 million in first-year retail sales.
"We're hoping to capitalize on the prevalence of peptides in the skin care and professional hair care spaces by creating those kinds of high-performance products within the budget of the everyday consumer," said Redmond, adding that a key consideration informing the brand's development has been the rise of consumer education and awareness surrounding beauty ingredients.
"We want to be that brand that, whatever your hair type is, we've got you covered — you can come to us with all your needs," he said.
While each product features the brand's signature peptide and amino acid complex, supporting actives vary based on hair type. The curly hair duo taps jojoba oil; the straight hair offerings are infused with aloe juice; rice protein bolsters the wavy hair products, and the thick hair products feature biotin and coconut oil.
By next year, the brand aims to ramp up its assortment from eight stock keeping units to between 20 and 24.
"We've built out leave-in conditioners, sprays, hair masks — we're working on a couple of different blonde shampoos and conditioners," said Redmond. "We're in hair care today, but we'd love to be across multiple categories in personal care. We think the packaging, the simplicity and the ingredient call-outs will allow us to do that."
The brand's social media rollout strategy is built around partnerships with "hundreds of influencers, hairstylists and trichologists during our first couple of months to get our product out there and make sure our consumers are hearing about us," Redmond said.
The name V&Co., meant to evoke a similar catchiness to that of "Tiffany &
Co.," was also crafted with the intent of facilitating quick, lasting brand recognition.
"Our goal is to make sure you can't escape us," said Redmond with a smile. "The distribution that we have justifies pushing this launch as hard as we can."