What Investors Are Looking For in a Beauty Start-Up

In less than 24 hours, I heard about one beauty brand that quietly sold for low single digit millions and another that’s on the brink of closure unless it can find a buyer. Both play in growing categories and have had decent buzz and solid media coverage since they launched.

A handful of enormous M&A deals in beauty – Aesop fetched $2.5 billion in April and Creed $3.8 billion in June – remain the outliers; many founders are struggling to…