E.l.f. Beauty turned in probably the greatest performances of a publicly traded company in 2022, but for those who think chairman and chief executive officer Tarang Amin has all the answers on the subject of navigating an enterprise through a rapidly transforming and really volatile business landscape, you’d be mistaken.

He’s got all the questions.

For Amin, who has been leading the corporate for the past nine years and notched his sixteenth consecutive quarter of growth earlier this 12 months, who oversaw a 78 percent increase in share price in 2022 (versus a 19 percent decline for the S+P 500) and an expected 38-39 percent sales increase to $545 million for FY 2023, curiosity is the important thing to E.l.f.’s oversized success.

Ask him one query and also you’re more likely to get two, three, 4 in return.

“What are the opportunities to eliminate waste?”

“Why can’t we go faster?”

“Are we meeting our community’s value standards?”

“The Weather Channel and E.l.f.? How do this stuff go together?”

Those that have frolicked with Amin know the questions pour out, from the standard CEO query to the more unexpected.

 “I naturally have loads of curiosity,” Amin said, during a wide-ranging interview in the corporate’s Flatiron-area Latest York City office.

“The longer I’ve been in business, the more questions I ask. I learn rather a lot and it creates a culture where that’s the norm. We would like you to be curious, we wish you to have interaction on topics well beyond what recent product we’re making. One in every of the large differences in our culture is we’re looking for the reality, looking for learning, after which putting that into motion.”

When Amin says motion, he means it. E.l.f., which has a market capitalization of about $3 billion, brings products to market in as little as 13 to twenty weeks, because of a product development and marketing machine that works concurrently slightly than sequentially. That model enables the brand to “work on the speed of culture,” as E.l.f. executives say.

“It’s less concerning the time as much as we’re in a position to take the energy of the team and make good ideas occur faster,” said Amin. “It’s the unique ability of balancing speed, quality and costs. Most firms often pick one or two of the three. It’s our insistence that we’d like all three.”

The strategy is working. Of the highest five mass market color cosmetics firms — Maybelline Latest York, L’Oréal Paris, Cover Girl and Revlon — E.l.f. increased its share by 150 points in FY third quarter, in line with Nielsen, almost twice that of closest competitor Maybelline, which saw a rise of 65 points. In response to Piper Sandler’s 2022 Taking Stock of Teens survey, E.l.f. is Gen Z’s favorite makeup brand and a top 10 favored shopping destination.

To this point this 12 months, the stock has increased, from $55.34 on Jan. 3 to $73.77 at press time, with most analysts bullish on the corporate.

“One in every of the hallmarks of Tarang and E.l.f. is speed,” said Oliver Chen, managing director and senior equity research analyst covering retail and luxury goods at Cowen. “They aren’t afraid to check read and react. They’ve been early pioneers in rethinking social and the evolution of the brand new customer. They execute quickly — each in product innovation and marketing engagement — and the speed helps them increase their relevance with consumers.”

That willingness to experiment is what has enabled Amin to tug away from the pack. Nevertheless it wasn’t all the time so. While the corporate thrived through the pandemic, not so long before, in 2018, E.l.f. hit a wall.

“We had two quarters in 2018 where we were minus 3 percent. Which post-pandemic doesn’t seem that traumatic,” said Amin. On the time, though, the CEO needed to implement some significant changes, including closing E.l.f.’s own stores, doubling down on digital, rethinking its product development strategy and launch cadence, and bringing in recent blood to higher leverage E.l.f.’s core strengths of speed and value.

“The most effective time to innovate is while you’re on top versus while you hit a struggle,” he said, when asked the most important and most enduring takeaways from that point. “I’ve asked every one in all our directors and above to reply the questions: What has to alter? What stays the identical? What else do we wish to maintain? What do we’ve so as to add?”

Kory Marchisotto was one such addition when she was brought on board as chief marketing officer of E.l.f. and president of Keys Soulcare, in 2019. A beauty veteran with experience totally on the prestige side, Marchisotto is daring, brash, fast and fearless, adept at breaking ideas down into easily digestible and repeatable sound bites.

One in every of her very first actions when she joined the corporate was to dig deep into the community, “the die-hards, the super fans, the never-leaves, the lifetime E.l.f. enthusiasts,” as she calls them, to know what they loved most concerning the brand.

The following step was to create an E.l.f. lexicon — ‘elfing amazing,’ etc. — which has since change into a shared language each with employees and the community at large, which was deployed across the corporate’s content universe.

Nevertheless it was a likelihood meeting along with her 16-year-old nephew’s girlfriend, who told Marchisotto that Instagram was the social media platform she went to when she desired to feel bad about herself, while TikTok was the place she went to be herself, that basically sparked a fireplace.

That was in 2019, and while today, TikTok is essentially the most influential platform for Gen Z and wonder, back then, only a number of brands were participating. Marchisotto decided to go all in, commissioning a branded #Eyeslipsface anthem, which proved to be so popular it hit the Billboard charts and catapulted E.l.f. directly into the hearts and minds of Gen Z.

“If you must serve your community you will have to be a part of it. It sounds easy. It’s not,” said Marchisotto, who scans E.l.f.’s social platforms each day. “I read 1000’s of comments weekly. I stay tuned in with their wants, their desire. We don’t wait for reports, decks, proposals. Are reports vital? After all,” she continued.

“But when you must be in lockstep with the community, you will have to feel the vibe, feel the energy — and translate that into motion in real time. We keep the community engaged by transcending the transaction. We create an orbit people wish to be a part of, which is a really different thing than waking up day-after-day and saying, ‘I need to sell people product.’”

Since that first campaign, E.l.f has created quite a few TikTok initiatives, garnering greater than 10 billion views and nearly 7 million user generated videos, in line with The Shorty Awards, which honor outstanding achievement in social media, and has been early — often first — on emerging platforms like BeReal and Twitch.

“We’ve created a relentless drumbeat of thumb-stopping creative,” Marchisotto said. “A continuing drumbeat — not a bit of content and push it out.”

E.l.f. has also significantly increased its marketing spend from 7 percent of revenues in FY 2019 to 16 percent in FY 2022, still barely lower than lots of its competitors.

“They’re willing to take greater bets with respect to promoting and brand support,” said Olivia Tong, managing director, senior consumer and wonder analyst at Raymond James. “They’re growing, but they’re also investing of their business, and that provides you a chance for sustainability.”

While E.l.f. is continuous to leverage TikTok, it’s also actively exploring other areas, and being first is as vital as being fast. “The patron is continuously desiring innovation and something that may enable you to have interaction with them in recent ways,” said Ekta Chopra, E.l.f.’s chief digital officer, who outlined three key areas her team is concentrated on.

The primary is gaming, with platforms like Twitch, and the evolution of the metaverse and Web3.0. The second is generative AI, particularly Jasper.ai for copy writing, Dall-e 2, which might create images and visuals from language,  and ChatGPT, a synthetic intelligence text generator.

The third is data, which Chopra likens to grease. “You continuously must refine it,” she said. Probably the most robust source of actionable data is E.l.f.’s 3.5 million loyalty club members, who spend 10 minutes on average on the brand’s app versus 2 minutes for a nonmember and who purchases twice as much on the app.

“They tell us exactly what they like, what they dislike, how they feel, what we should always do. My response is to construct that trust and ensure that we don’t break it, in the shape of giving them the personalized experience they’re searching for, the products they desire, talking to them once they wish to be spoken to in the shape they’ve chosen,” said Chopra. “They assist us understand the products we’ve to construct. What are consumers actually buying? What are the complementary products? Where are the problems? Then we leverage this data to optimize how we spend our paid money dollars.”

While Chopra consider’s E.l.f.’s speed in testing and learning across digital platforms to be a key component of its success, that doesn’t mean the brand is jumping on every recent platform. “We’re the primary Gen Z brand, because we take heed to them and we show up within the places where they wish to go and already are,” she said.

Currently, which means experimenting with the metaverse and understanding what value the brand’s involvement delivers to consumers. “Many individuals consider NFT’s as a collectible for individuals who can afford it,” said Chopra, “but for us, we’re pondering — if an E.l.f. loyalty member has an NFT or their loyalty card is an NFT, what’s it unlocking for them? Identical to our rewards system enables them to redeem their points in quite a lot of ways, like a third-party retailer gift care, possibly with this we give them an experience, like tickets to Coachella. So it’s connecting the physical to the digital — that’s what I mean by value.”

While the give attention to experimenting and results resonates well with analysts, E.l.f. just isn’t necessarily proof against outside aspects, increased competition and the continued volatility of the economy. “You get to a certain size and you will have to do more — what used to have the option to maneuver the needle is not any longer enough,” said Tong. “The stock did incredibly well last 12 months so it’s on loads of radar screens and the multiple has come up. The road has higher and better expectations and it’s going to be harder and harder to fulfill those.”

E.l.f. executives are confident that they’ve loads of room for growth. On a company basis, it has the brands Well People and Keys Soulcare, each of which enable it to play within the rapidly expanding universe of wellness-oriented offerings.

And even with the flagship brand’s stellar performance over the past two years, executive say there may be ample room for growth. “We now have an extended runway ahead of us. We’re just getting began,” said Mandy Fields, senior vice chairman and chief financial officer. “Within the U.S., we’re the number-four ranked brand in mass, however the runway to get to primary is very large — loads of white space opportunity.

“With skincare, we’ve lower than a 1 percent share in an enormous category that’s $5 billion at mass. We’re barely scratching the surface. And only 13 percent of our business is international, so there may be huge opportunity there.”

The U.K., where E.l.f. ranks eighth, and Canada, where it’s seventh, are currently the 2 largest markets outside of the U.S., and Amin believes that E.l.f. can achieve top-five status in each market. He can also be very bullish on India, and E.l.f.’s partnership with Nykaa. “We began with an e-commerce business in China, which is doing OK, but India is only a significantly better marketplace for us — it’s rather more oriented to the type of value within the mass market and being English-speaking helps with social media and engagement,” he said. Most recently, Amin hired a recent vice chairman for international and is constructing out the team within the U.K., to oversee a sequential expansion into Western Europe.

Expanding E.l.f.’s purview in skincare also represents a big opportunity. Last 12 months, the corporate carved out skincare to be its own vertical and “is seeing tremendous results,” said Amin, noting that E.l.f.’s skincare sales are growing at 40 percent, versus overall category growth of 6 percent.

When it comes to product launches, the corporate will duplicate its “holy grail” strategy for skincare coupled with the worth proposition that has worked so well, making products often available only within the prestige market accessible at mass for a fraction of the worth. “At once, our bestselling product is the Power Grip Primer, which sells for $10. However the only other thing prefer it is a $34 item at prestige,” said Amin. “Greater than two-thirds of Americans live paycheck to paycheck and loads of what they aspire to in beauty is inaccessible. We expand the category by bringing accessibility to tens of millions of consumers who otherwise wouldn’t experience such a product.”

When it comes to skincare, key launches this 12 months include Youth Boosting Advanced Night Retinoid Serum, $22, and Suntouchable! Whoa Glow SPF 30, $14.

“Tarang and his team have built the business through powerful, breakthrough innovation, each with the products they provide and the best way they connect and have interaction with the buyer, particularly Gen Z,” said Dave Kimbell, chief executive officer of Ulta Beauty, who characterised Amin as a “gracious, kind and humble leader.”

“Reflecting Tarang’s style, the E.l.f. team are exceptionally nimble and disruptive brand builders,” Kimbell continued, “while all the time rooted in deep understanding and smart strategic direction.”

That combination has proved a winning bet at retail, where E.l.f. continues to expand its space. This 12 months it would gain ground in select Walmart, Goal and CVS stores within the U.S. and Shopper’s Drug Mart in Canada. Amin cites the brand’s performance in Goal, where it’s number two behind Maybelline Latest York, as proof that E.l.f. isn’t near reaching peak performance.

“At Goal we’re on a trajectory where if we proceed the momentum that we’ve, possibly in the following 12 months or two, we’d even pass Maybelline,” he said, noting that while E.l.f.’s national share is a 7 on average, at Goal it’s 14. “That’s significant because, as our first retail account, Goal had a head start by years over other customers and we see other customers on that very same trajectory.”

Meanwhile, Goal continues to grow, too. “Once we were the primary retailer to hold E.l.f. in our stores back in 2008, we knew this was a special company and its incredible growth at Goal proves that,” said Christina Hennington, chief growth officer of Goal. “I’m happy with the platform Goal provides for emerging, purpose-driven brands. With today’s consumer, especially our Gen Z guests, that’s a competitive advantage. That’s why E.l.f. is one in all our fastest-growing beauty brands and why there’s a lot potential in front of us.”

Those that know him well describe Amin as a kind-hearted, empathetic and highly communicative leader. He doesn’t just talk the team talk — he lives it. Everyone who joins the corporate is given a Myers-Briggs Type Indicator test (Amin himself is an ENFP, which stands for extroversion, intuition, feeling and perception), to enable them to higher understand their colleagues.

“We would like you to know your preferences and people of your teammates,” Amin said, “after which we train them on learn how to give feedback. How do you foster that curiosity and conflict to bring up the very best results. We discover often those moments of healthy conflict is where the actual breakthrough is available in.”

Amin has been equally as intentional in creating a various workforce. It’s one in all only 4 public firms within the U.S. with a board of directors comprised of a minimum of two-thirds women and one-third minority representation; and its workforce of 330 is over 75 percent women, over 60 percent Gen Z and Millennials, and over 40 percent diverse.

“Our worker base is a competitive advantage,” said Amin. “Initially, every thing goes back to the community. The community we serve cares about greater than just the standard or price of a product.”

To that end, E.l.f. reformulated its entire line to be vegan and cruelty free and clean and was the primary beauty manufacturer within the U.S. to realize fair trade certification for a producing facility. It has issued an annual Impact Report detailing its environmental, social and governance initiatives and was named one in all Fortune’s best places to work in 2021.

No wonder that Amin is incredibly optimistic as he prepares for the 12 months ahead, despite the macro headwinds — and as all the time, there’s a vital query.

“Initially, I’m really quite bullish,” he said, when asked concerning the 12 months ahead. “We’re particularly well positioned with our fundamental value proposition, our innovation engine, our marketing.

“The largest challenge for me just isn’t the expansion that we’ve ahead of us. But how will we sequence it and approach that growth in a disciplined way?