Entrepreneur Lani Lazzari continues to stir things up in the skincare world.
She was just 11 when she began experimenting with sugar and other all-natural ingredients in an attempt to cure her eczema and other related skin issues in the basement of her parents’ Fox Chapel home.
Her mother, Gina Nigro, supported her business quest from the beginning, 17 years ago, and still serves as the company’s vice president.
Nigro said working alongside her daughter continues to be rewarding, creative and collaborative.
“We’ve gone from her being a middle-schooler to being a CEO and this was the idea. I’m proud of this company,” Nigro said. “She is a boss. I am ‘unbossable,’ so that’s our friction sometimes, but it serves the business well and we know how to work within it.”
Simple Sugars launched with Lazzari initially selling 24 jars of sensitive-skin products to friends and family.
In 2013, a then 19-year-old Lazzari wowed the “Shark Tank” judges with her Simple Sugars business pitch and Pittsburgh native Mark Cuban invested $100,000 into Simple Sugars in exchange for a 33 percent stake in the company.
The “Shark Tank” appearance resulted in millions of viewers learning about Lani and Simple Sugars. Sales exploded overnight.
“We were working until 3 a.m.,” she said of the show’s effect on initial sales.
Solving her own skin issues turned out to be a lifelong calling for Lazzari, who is now 30.
“They worked so well for all of my skin problems, and I gave them out as gifts. They helped people, and I realized this was something that I could do,” said Lazzari.
Simple Sugars employs 11 and is headquartered in RIDC Park in O’Hara. Cuban still has that 33% stake in the company.
“I’m so proud of her,” he said. “It’s really hard to be an entrepreneur at any age, let alone starting at 19. She has accomplished so much. She reps the 412 well!”
These days, Lazzari is motivated by the outpouring of positive customer testimonials she reads almost daily from folks using her sugar-based products.
“We get the most amazing stories from our customers who have these serious skin problems and they say my products fixed their skin problems,” Lazzari said. “We have a man from the Netherlands who orders regularly.”
Lazzari grew up in Fox Chapel and graduated from Pittsburgh’s all-girls Ellis School in 2012, which was instrumental in supporting Lazzari’s quest to get her business up and running.
She expressed gratitude to former Head of School Robin Newham.
“The time I spent at Ellis was really important for the growth of the business because I was really lucky to be in a school where they were very willing to look at me as an individual,” said Lazzari of the independent study program she participated in during her junior year. “They were super, super supportive, particularly Mrs. Newham.”
The Ellis School invited Lazzari to be the guest speaker at commencement in 2021.
“It prepared me to handle things, prioritize, multi-task and Ellis prepared me and I value the education I received there,” said Lazzari, who opted to forgo attending George Washington University and instead concentrate on building Simple Sugars during a gap year after high school graduation.
Despite some naysayers, Lazzari immersed herself in making Simple Sugars a success and the eczema and psoriasis essentials remain the top-selling products. Today, there are body, face and foot products for men and women — and all are technically edible. Sugar is a gentle way of exfoliating and other ingredients include natural oils and herbs.
A men’s line dubbed Smooth For Men offers one-step products featuring scents like avocado, citrus pine, coffee, green tea and lime.
“Most men don’t want to adopt a multi-step skin care. It’s great because it takes two minutes to use and it’s a good fit for men in general — a lot of men have sensitive skin,” Lazzari said.
The almond and green tea scents are product staples and the Vitamin C Facial is a consistent bestseller.
Emu oil is a key ingredient that delivers on the “stay smooth” motto (emus are raised for their meat and the oil is a by-product; they are not killed for their oil).
“Emu oil has really amazing healing properties and has a very similar chemical composition to the sebum your body naturally produces,” Lazzari said. “It’s completely non-irritating.”
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Simple Sugars only sources ingredients domestically from states such as California and Tennessee. Everything is hand-mixed and packaged on-site inside a warehouse-style and very pink headquarters in RIDC Park in O’Hara.
Simple Sugars is no longer found in retail stores and is sold exclusively online. It ships domestically and internationally.
But please don’t call it a scrub.
“We don’t consider ourselves a scrub. Our products are cleansing, exfoliating and moisturizing. It’s a product that does all three of those things,” Nigro said.
What’s next?
To date, total sales clock in at around 25 million. Sales were robust during the covid years but have dipped post-pandemic.
“The last two years have been challenging,” Nigro said. “We had to raise our employees’ salaries after covid and shipping is a big thing right now.”
Free shipping is often what consumers expect, Nigro and Lazarri said, but shipping costs have consistently increased.
Numerous celebrities launched their own skincare lines during covid too, Nigro added.
“I think people right now don’t have as much money to spend,” Lazzari said. “It’s hard to be a small business right now because we have to absorb inflation and consumers are extra sensitive to it. We’re getting squeezed from both sides and there are consumers who want everything to be on sale, all the time.”
Lazzari plans to keep the business in the region.
“We have a team of people here and it’s important to me to provide these jobs. My mom is here and has no interest in leaving,” said Lazzari, who resides in Downtown Pittsburgh. “We have too many roots here in Pittsburgh to think about moving.”
Rocco Lazzari is a Simple Sugars employee and doesn’t mind having his only sister as a boss.
“It’s great having a job where you actually like your bosses and it feels good to contribute to the family business,” he said.
“We’ve been through much in 17 years and things always change. The biggest challenge at this point is figuring out how to reinvent ourselves in a way that we keep evolving,” Lazzari said.
Finding a healthy work/life balance is now a priority for Lani, something she said she struggled with as a teen.
She likes to decompress with travel and is a huge Pittsburgh Penguins fan and volunteers for the Mario Lemieux Foundation.
“I draw the line at camping, but I love the outdoors,” Lazzarri said. “Sometimes I want to just go live on a horse ranch. I love to ride three days a week at Bargee Farm in Fox Chapel. When you’re showjumping you really can’t think about work.”
Holiday online orders for local delivery (Pittsburgh) are accepted through 2 p.m. Dec. 23 at simplesugarsskincare.com.