# S01E12 · Transcript — Shelley Hayes Full transcript of [The Useful Podcast](https://useful.ventures/podcast) Episode 12, a founder-to-founder conversation between host Gokul Bala and Shelley Hayes, founder of Electric Lemonade. Back to the [episode page](https://useful.ventures/podcast/shelley-hayes-electriclemonade). This transcript has been lightly edited for readability. Filler words and false starts have been removed and the meaning has been preserved. Any errors are mine, not Shelley's. ## Music, before the beauty industry **Gokul** Before your beauty journey, you were a songwriter, a musician, an artist. Who was that person to you? What did making music actually feel like? **Shelley** Honestly, one of my favorite things in the world is being in a studio recording. The process of making any kind of art is my favorite part — what happens at the end is just the bonus, the surprise of what it turned out to be. I was fortunate enough to tour in bands across Canada and the US a bunch of times. It was a whirlwind, and so much fun. It changes a lot once you become a mother. And then I experienced hearing loss in my left ear, probably about a year ago, which became my big pivot this year — a break from it, not forever, but I hear differently now, so that changes everything. **Gokul** You've described songwriting before as like listening to a different frequency. Has that changed, or do you still get that same feeling from a different frequency now? **Shelley** Songwriting is a magical thing — I've always thought of it as interpreting a different language. Once you start listening, a melody will just pop into your head. You sit at a piano, something happened to you that day, you were inspired by a story, there's emotion, and you get this mumble-mouth thing that just pours out. The best songs always just pour out of you, no effort. Some take a few months to finish, and if it takes longer than that, it's dead to me. Sometimes my kids will pull up an old song of mine and ask why I never released it. I'll dig through stuff, especially anything recorded. I'll write on my phone, in my notes, then bring it into my little upstairs studio and get it into Logic — once it's in there, it's concrete, it's a different beast, and you can play with it in a different way. ## AI, art, and the creative director **Gokul** I made AI music myself — I poured my heart into the lyrics and just wanted a way to hear it, because I can't write music to save my life. I'm creative, but I don't think I'm artistic, if that makes sense. **Shelley** I think of being artistic as being able to create something out of nothing, and there's usually some emotion in it you don't fully understand yet. Often when I feel most creative, it's because I'm trying to figure something out, even if I don't know that's what I'm doing. You want to feel something differently, because those emotions just sit in your body otherwise and you don't know how to process them. Even with AI music — a lot of people crap on it, but I think you're either hopping on the wagon or you're going to die in the desert. It's happening whether we like it or not. There are people who've spent their whole lives mastering an instrument, and those people are incredible. But there are also people with an artistic side whose parents couldn't afford piano lessons, who never had the time or dedication for it — now they have an opportunity to make something creative. I think that's cool. **Gokul** It democratizes access to skill, whatever the skill is. **Shelley** For sure. And I think even with AI-generated art or images, you still need a bus driver behind it — a creative director. The director of a movie might not have acted in it, but they're the one controlling the entire project. I think that's what an artist becomes going forward: more the creative director. **Gokul** Does that view come from your record label background? **Shelley** Probably, yeah. And honestly, I geek out on AI too — I'm excited about the evolution happening here. ## Leaving music, three times **Gokul** I wanted to ask about a specific story — you hit a point with a record label around a pregnancy. **Shelley** For the record, I didn't get pregnant from the record label. But I had left my band, was going solo, working with an amazing producer, and we were talking to labels — we had funding, all the exciting stuff, and I was kind of at the peak, maybe twenty-nine or thirty. Then: you're pregnant. I thought, this isn't what labels are looking for. They're not signing you and paying you through maternity leave. That's not usually how it goes. I remember getting to a meeting super early just so I could order a giant non-alcoholic beer and sip on it the whole time, so there'd be no questions. **Gokul** How did you handle that period? **Shelley** I wrapped up the record — me and the two guys I worked with co-produced it, and we were so excited about it, I still think it's a banger. But I couldn't do the marketing the way it needed to be done and also raise a kid. A lot of people manage both, but I couldn't, so I mourned the loss of that record. **Gokul** Would you ever bring it back — a re-release, like Taylor Swift did? **Shelley** I actually pulled that project, called Honor Angelis, off iTunes, because I'd planned to re-release it under my alias, Lady Hayes, along with a track called Perfect Getaway. But then I lost my hearing, and it felt like breaking up with music for the third time — and the third time wasn't the charm. I thought, now I'm deaf, maybe it's time to pivot. It's a frequency thing, not a volume thing — I can hear some frequencies and not others. It's different than I expected. Music is actually visual for me, which is strange — I see patterns. When I'm playing piano, I'll see a pattern, repeat it, and it moves into something else. Some people see color. I think it's pattern recognition I got really good at. ## Building Electric Lemonade **Gokul** You've spent your whole life building brands, products, art — even a record is basically a product to market. What's the thread running through it all, into Electric Lemonade? **Shelley** I think there's always been this rebellious tone running through everything — a conversation shift toward independence, a sexy, playful rebellion, a bit of alt culture, but artistic at the same time. That's what I've always gravitated to. **Gokul** You're a mom of two girls now. Does that shape the pace and the stakes of how you're building? **Shelley** Of course. Today, for instance, I was up at six-thirty making a hundred and fifty samples before the kids were out of bed, then swimming lessons, then a pile of emails and mail orders, then a movie with the kids. The pace is completely different — but I wouldn't trade it. That's just summer schedule. It's also changed how I think about the message. There are so many beauty and skincare brands out there that sometimes you ask, why am I even building this — especially once your algorithm decides you only follow other skincare founders and it looks like everyone's doing it. But talk to your actual friends, and no one else is doing this. For me the most important thing became shifting the conversation: a high-impact product that you don't need to overdo. I wanted something for my own life, because I don't have time for nine or ten steps of beauty care — I'm not sitting at a vanity cleansing my face for ten minutes. So I was looking for something science-backed that also felt like being part of something cool — I want to feel something when I use it, and I want it to actually work. And the conversation I want to shift is that this isn't about anti-aging, and it isn't beauty without substance. I want it to be about taking care of yourself as a form of self-respect, first — and I want my kids to see that. You don't need to be fixed. You don't need a facelift, you don't need to look like you have no pores. We're allowed to still look human. That's beautiful. So how do you take care of that as a form of self-care? ## From flower crowns to a black tube **Gokul** As an artist, what pulled you specifically into beauty? **Shelley** It's funny, I've done so many projects. When I was pregnant with the girls, I made flower crowns — didn't intend to, but it turned into a business that did really well. Under Lady Hayes, I had them on people like Ariana Grande and Lights, and other well-known names. I put one on the internet and people started ordering. That was around when everyone was wearing flower crowns, and I was part of that wave — I'd make one while the kids were falling asleep and sell it for four hundred dollars, which felt crazy at the time. I've always loved working, always loved projects and process. More than anything, that's what building Electric Lemonade has been about too — learning how everything gets done. **Gokul** I saw you wearing your own merch when we first connected. Does having merch help put the brand out there? **Shelley** Of course, it's brand recognition. When you align your brand with another cool brand — I'll do things like a "weekend getaway" pairing with a favorite brand — there's a psychology to it: people see the two together and think, that's cool, so this must be cool too. I've done markets where my Instagram following is small in numbers but mighty in engagement, and people will say, I've heard of you, I've seen your brand. That recognition is exciting, even without huge follower counts. ## One product, on purpose **Gokul** You have essentially one product. Even for a guy like me, having just one thing to worry about sounds amazing. Where did the conviction for just one SKU come from, coming out of an industry — modeling, labels — that usually demands a strict regimen? **Shelley** It's more about time, honestly, and about what I kept hearing from people. The beauty industry is so saturated with steps — some people genuinely need that, but I found the more I did to my skin, the worse it got. Cleansing isn't even always great for you; you should wash your face, but over-cleansing strips your skin barrier, which is what keeps moisture in and keeps toxins and bacteria out. You want to keep it clean, not stripped. **Gokul** Do you think a lot of beauty products get promoted just to keep you coming back, even if they're not that effective? **Shelley** I'd say so. If you want your customer to keep coming back, that's not my motive — my motive is to build a trustworthy brand with genuinely good products, and to shift the conversation. But for a lot of companies, making a woman feel like something's wrong with her, that she's never quite fixed, is exactly why she comes back. **Gokul** That tracks — a lot of the beauty industry preys on insecurity. **Shelley** Of course. And most people probably don't need nearly as much of it as they buy. Beauty products expire too. Have you ever stood near a checkout counter in Sephora? It's wild — my daughter was buying something there recently, and I stood by the counter and heard everyone's totals. Four hundred and fifty dollars. A seventeen-year-old ringing up three hundred dollars. And you think — where did you even get three hundred dollars, and you're perfect, you don't need any of this. ## Radiance without rules **Gokul** Electric Lemonade feels like a whole world, not just a product — the editorials, the visuals, the website all line up. What feeling are you trying to give people? **Shelley** The essence of the brand is radiance without rules — skincare that fits into your own life, a little rebellious, low effort. It's an amazing product, lab-manufactured with chemists, using great ingredients. On the editorial side, I have to watch myself because I'm a perfectionist — I'll shade-balance my whole Instagram grid as I go. My biggest mistake is probably over-perfecting things; a good friend told me recently I need to shake it up with some real shit, make it a little imperfect. That's probably something I need to work on. **Gokul** I think imperfection reads as more authentic than perfect, honestly. And I love the pink and black color scheme. **Shelley** Thank you, I love it too. The tube was originally going to be pink, but I made it black and white so I could take on any color later — it won't always be pink, maybe eventually blue — because the branding itself is black and white. But pink just seeps out of me. I was painting my kitchen recently and caught myself painting the cabinets pink without even thinking about it. I had to stop myself — enough pink. **Gokul** So what's the actual rebellion in Radiant Rebel? **Shelley** It's a quiet rebellion — I don't like to trash the beauty industry, I just don't believe in a lot of it. I'm anti anti-aging, and the rebellion is adding depth and substance instead of, say, another post about someone's beauty routine. It's more: hey, you were a cool actress in this thing, what's life actually like for you? I want people to leave feeling inspired, even if it's inspired to go learn to skateboard, which is something I picked up later in life myself — not inspired to think "I'm ugly" and start Googling plastic surgeons or Groupon deals for Botox. I don't want people doing that. That's my rebellion. **Gokul** Why does that reframe — not about fixing yourself — matter so much to you? **Shelley** I think men don't really talk about their faces the way women do. When you're hanging out with your girlfriends, it's "look at these lines," "I wish my butt was skinnier" — there's so much talk about what's wrong with people. It's sad, and it's a lot of wasted energy. I'd rather sit down with my girlfriends and ask how they got funding for their startup than talk about that. ## A platform outside Instagram **Gokul** You also run your own interview platform, Radiant Rebel, sitting down with women and talking about beauty and life more honestly. Why build that alongside the brand? **Shelley** It's basically a blog — a chance to talk about current beauty trends, question them, interview interesting women. I think it matters because it gives a voice outside of Instagram. When someone's scrolling, you get maybe a millisecond of their attention. If someone's genuinely interested in diving deeper into what Electric Lemonade stands for, that's the space for it — some questions, some answers, a place people can leave feeling like they actually got to know the brand. **Gokul** Have those conversations changed how you build or talk about the brand publicly? **Shelley** Constantly. When you first build a brand you sit down and define your values, but that keeps evolving — that's one of the surprising things about brand building, watching the evolution. You have to be open to those shifts if you're actually growing. I'd hate to put something out that never changed. ## Trust, one relationship at a time **Gokul** A lot of founders I talk to bring up trust between them and their audience. How are you thinking about that? **Shelley** It's like a new relationship — how do you build trust? You keep showing up, you're reliable, you're consistent, you're transparent about your ingredients, and your values stay the same. I won't compromise on those. If I were offered an opportunity that didn't align with them, I'd turn it down, because when you hold two opposing ideas at once, that's usually when your customer starts to wonder if you actually stand for what you say you do. And on the internet, if you say something that doesn't line up, people notice fast. ## The algorithm, and staying in it **Gokul** You've said content creation can feel performative, even soul-sucking, but you still have to sell online. How do you sit with that tension? **Shelley** I think it's really the algorithm that's frustrating, more than the content itself. With Meta, you have to feed it a lot of money to move anywhere now. When it first launched, organic growth could happen fast — now you can put real time into something and it just won't move the way it used to, or the way you wish it would. I plan my content grids in advance, and once I have an idea I get obsessive about it. I love taking pictures, and I do some AI rendering as well — that's honestly my favorite part. If I could hand off the shipping and logistics, I'd just be the creative director of this brand full time. **Gokul** What's actually been the hardest part of building it? **Shelley** Wearing every hat — jumping from answering emails, to shipping, to a retail store call, to something else entirely. Staying organized while your brain is jumping that much is hard, and honestly I think I lose time to it. What I'm hopeful for is scaling — getting some capital this fall, which I'm prepping the numbers for right now, to pursue pre-seed investment, so I can hand some of this off to other people. ## The activation, and what's changed **Gokul** How do you go into new spaces — activations, collaborations? **Shelley** I try to, that's exciting to me — I work alone so much, so any chance to collaborate feels great, it's a human instead of me and my bots all day. Coming up, I'm doing a Lululemon Make-A-Wish yoga event — I built a giant mist tent, an arch covered in flowers with the brand on it, for about a hundred and fifty attendees. After hot yoga in the sun with a yoga instructor, everyone walks through the mist tent and gets a sample. **Gokul** Has anything about Electric Lemonade changed since you started? **Shelley** For sure — I'm such a dreamer, so when I put something online I set myself a number, twenty thousand followers by some date, and then reality hits differently. It's exciting too, though, because it's a good reality check on how hard this actually is, and how rewarding it is. What I end up celebrating now is different from what I thought I'd celebrate — like standing at the door waiting for the UPS truck to drop off my first labels, like it was Christmas. That's not something I ever expected to celebrate. And hearing that someone genuinely likes the product — when a reorder comes in, that's someone who wasn't just trying it once, that's a return customer. That's what I'm most fulfilled by. ## Dream world **Gokul** If Electric Lemonade works out exactly how you envision it, what changes for an average woman, or for your own customers? **Shelley** In a dream world, I'd shift the conversation away from perfection culture and toward celebration — moving women to a place where it feels safe to celebrate their imperfections instead of trying to fix everything. And to build a brand my kids might even want to take over one day. **Gokul** So beyond beauty, almost a movement at that point. **Shelley** Yeah, I think of it as bigger than selling a bottle of cream. I have a pretty big vision for what it could be — not "take over the world," but a safe space for women to have conversations about anything, to celebrate life without worrying about their makeup or going out without any on. I think that matters. **Gokul** Building across two totally different worlds — music and beauty — what would have to be true for you to look back and feel it was worth it? **Shelley** Honestly, some days I already feel it. I was at the public pool with my kids, or in the backyard with my boyfriend — we'd rigged a ladder with a mister on it while building the mist tent, and we were just sitting in lawn chairs with the mist at our feet, and I looked around and thought, I am so content right now. I feel like I've lived a really full life already. That's not to say money doesn't matter — there's no free ride, I still have to make it work. But sure, I'd love to build something legacy-big. I have this running daydream that my kids grow up, join the board, and eventually vote me off — "you're old and useless now" — and that'll be a great day. ## What she wants her kids to see **Gokul** Since the brand is partly for your daughters, what do you want them to actually take from watching you build it? **Shelley** My daughter wrote me a note once and left it under my pillow — "I'm so proud of you" — and hearing that from your kid is wild, I didn't expect it to feel that good. I think you can tell your kids all kinds of things, but to really teach them about life you have to show them, model it. A lot of the drive behind this brand is showing them that you can imagine something in your head, dream it, and build it — but it's not going to be handed to you. You have to work through the hard stuff and work your ass off. But it's possible. **Gokul** When you eventually step back, what do you want to be known for? **Shelley** Honestly, I don't fully know. I hope people feel inspired in some way. I was always looking for a mentor myself, and because I've always done so many different things, it was hard to find someone whose exact path I wanted to follow. Maybe at the end of it, I can be that for someone else — something to look at and think, I could follow some of those footsteps, just to be creative. **Gokul** A role model, in that sense. **Shelley** Yeah, I'd love that. **Gokul** That's a perfect place to wrap it. Thanks so much for coming on and doing this with me. **Shelley** Thanks for the chat — I'll see you on the socials. --- Back to the [episode page](https://useful.ventures/podcast/shelley-hayes-electriclemonade) · [[podcast|All episodes]]