Jenni Österlund on how leaving the world’s biggest beauty retailer for an emerging local indie brand felt completely natural, and the road to taking it to a global arena.
Österlund has a background in category management and has worked across beauty, lingerie, jewellery, and watches. She has more than 30 years of experience in retail, combining commercial leadership with brand building and customer experience. Before joining LH cosmetics as CEO, she was General Manager of Sephora Scandinavia.
– Throughout my career, she says, my passion has been creating inspiring brands and exceptional customer experiences, while helping people and teams grow.
How come you joined an indie brand after working for the biggest global chain?
– What attracted me was the opportunity to work for a brand itself and help shape its next chapter. At Sephora, I worked with many different brands; at LH cosmetics, I can bring that retail perspective into building one brand with a strong creative identity. When I met (founder) Linda Hallberg, I was amazed by her creative and inspiring vision of makeup as a tool for creativity and self-expression that really appealed to me. She is also an extremely picky MUA when it comes to quality, so everything we create must have top quality but still be at an affordable price level; I believe that is a great combination. The opportunity to combine that vision felt like an exciting next step.
What are the main differences?
– Scale, resources, and how directly you influence the business. In a global organisation, you have established structures, specialist teams, and significant brand recognition. In an independent brand, you work much closer to everything, from product development, packaging, and marketing to sales and cash flow. That creates a strong sense of ownership, but it also requires clear priorities: you have to choose carefully where your time and investment will make the greatest difference.
What’s the state of indie beauty in the Nordics as of 2026?
– My view is that it is a crowded market, but there is still room for brands that offer something distinctive. Consumers remain curious, while becoming more selective about where they spend their money and what value a product delivers. For an indie brand, that means you have to follow your vision and stay true to how to create something different, qualitative, with the expertise you have.
– Shelf space and consumer attention are both competitive. Getting a retail listing is only the beginning; you also need to create demand, educate customers, and support the retailer in selling the product. I see opportunities in products that answer a clear need, communities that build trust, and content that helps people understand how to use what they buy. The challenge is being heard in the crowd with very limited resources, turning that interest into repeat purchases while managing margins, inventory, and cash flow.
What are the three keys to growing a beauty brand from Sweden to a global audience?
– First, a distinctive identity. You need to explain clearly what you stand for and why someone should choose you, in a way that resonates beyond your home market.
– Second, exceptional products supported by education and community. A strong story attracts attention, but product performance earns trust and repeat purchases.
– Third, focused expansion. Choose the right markets and partners; don’t go too wide, understand the local customer, and invest enough to support each launch properly. International distribution creates an opportunity; building demand is what turns it into a sustainable business.
Tell us about your new launch. It took a while!
– Ctrl+ SKIN is a foundation whose development journey began in 2019. Linda wanted to create a foundation that met the demands of a professional makeup artist while enhancing the skin’s own character.
– It combines a lightweight, serum-like texture with buildable coverage, a natural finish and skincare benefits, and comes in 25 shades. What makes it special for us is how those elements work together: performance, comfort and versatility in one formula. The development took time because Linda is extremely accurate; achieving that balance required extensive testing and refinement. Finding the exact shades is a very time-consuming achievement.
– At Sephora we had so many amazing foundations from WW Brands, but we still had gaps within high-performing formulas in shades that worked well for all skin tones.
Jenni Österlund’s extra industry insights:
– One of my biggest learnings from Sephora was the importance of offering an inspiring and diverse assortment – and recognising that small indie brands and large international brands need different approaches to investment and marketing. Sephora found ways to back smaller brands and give founders without large budgets opportunities to become part of its ecosystem. This helped build a strong community connecting brands, beauty professionals and customers. Many of those initially small brands grew into major names and became important contributors to Sephora’s worldwide growth.
– For me, it shows why investing in emerging brands matters: it brings fresh ideas to the industry, keeps the assortment relevant and creates opportunities for both brands and retailers to grow.
– I also believe beauty brands can benefit from working more closely together, sharing insights, experiences, and ideas. As independent brands, we face many of the same challenges, and supporting one another can create new opportunities and strengthen the industry as a whole.
Words: Johan Magnusson