Dawn Myers built a hair tool called Mint after years of frustration with the time and effort required to wash and style textured hair. Myers, who normally wears her hair in an afro, said her own wash-day routine takes roughly an hour and 20 minutes once detangling, product application, and styling are counted. Her company, Richualist, says Mint cuts that styling time down to between seven and 10 minutes.
Mint detangles, conditions, gels, and styles hair in a single stroke using refillable product pods, and it applies warming technology to gently heat the product before it reaches the hair. Myers said the device also reduces shedding and breakage by up to 70 percent because users no longer have to pull repeatedly on their strands. A travel-size version is also available.
Myers traced the idea to a Shark Tank episode she watched about eight years ago, when a pitch for another curly-hair product prompted her to consider how existing tools such as blow dryers and curling irons straighten textured hair and alter its chemistry. She sketched a business concept on a legal pad and assembled an early prototype from parts she bought at Ace Hardware and CVS. She later built the product with the materials science company Dow, which had started a textured hair care unit and provided engineering help and manufacturing guidance after seeing a prototype during a startup accelerator program.
Funding the early development required personal risk. Myers sold her home and liquidated her 401(k) retirement account, and she said the company ultimately raised about $1.4 million to commercialize and validate the product. She is one of the first 100 Black women to raise more than $1 million in venture funding, and she said hardware is difficult to fund, especially when the problem is viewed as niche. Development took about five years, and her team had to conduct its own research because data such as how much product the average person with textured hair uses did not exist.
In 2022, as she prepared to expand and go to market, Myers was diagnosed with stage three colorectal cancer. She closed her funding round during treatment, working from a chemotherapy chair at Johns Hopkins. She applied to Shark Tank in 2023, appeared later that year, and the episode aired in 2024; she wore a compression binder under her dress during the experience. She secured a deal from investor Mark Cuban and entrepreneur Emma Grede, which helped launch the product, and Grede later helped it expand onto Ulta's online website earlier this year. Myers said the company is about to market itself as sold out while mapping further expansion.
Richualist was selected as one of TechCrunch's Startup Battlefield 200 startups for this year, earning a spot at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference. Myers said she first heard about Disrupt the way most people in the industry do, and that as an introvert she is preparing for the volume of people and conversations at the event. She said her greatest excitement is seeing textured hair share a stage with sophisticated technology.
More company and startup news from TechManNews.
