Octavia Morgan Is the First Black Woman to Launch Clean Fine Fragrances at Ulta (and They're So Intoxicating)

With a firm handshake, say hello to Business of Beauty—an exclusive, inside look at each of the incomparable journeys of entrepreneurs of color in the beauty industry. This series is anything but business as usual. It's a raw, honest look at the unique and often overlooked challenges that people of color face when starting their own beauty brand. Each founder will reveal the biggest hurdles they've overcome, their internal struggles, and their deepest thoughts about what needs to change in the beauty industry (and the world, really) to make it a more inclusive space for everyone.

This time around, we're diving deep with CEO and founder Octavia Morgan, who started her own clean eponymous fragrance brand. This month, Morgan became the first Black- and woman-owned business to enter the fine-fragrance category at Ulta. Read all about her journey to entrepreneurship below.

I'd love to talk about your journey into entrepreneurship. What inspired you to create your own brand?

Almost eight years ago, I started to develop fragrance sensitivity. But the thing is, I'm a fragrance girl. I've been wearing fragrances since I was 5 years old. So I started to get the common things that happen like headaches, a little nauseated—and then I noticed the welts on my skin.

So I went to the marketplace because I was like, okay, there has to be something out there because I refuse to not wear fragrance. Back then, the offerings that they had were very disappointing. They were single-noted; they had no power and no projection. People in our community, when we wear fragrance, we don't care. We want everyone to smell that fragrance when we're walking through the door. We want people to say, "You smell good." I wasn't able to get that from any other fragrances. It was very disappointing. I have a science background as a registered nurse and my grandmother was an herbalist, so I had working knowledge and put those things together and created the first four in our line. I never intended for them to be brought to market. They were always for me so that I had something to wear, and that began my journey with Octavia Morgan.

It's so disappointing to develop a fragrance allergy, but it sparked your journey in such a cool way! Talk to me about the steps you took to get your business off the ground. Did you ever feel like you faced any extra hurdles being a Black woman starting your own business?

For me, I'm not a perfumer. I'm not classically taught, so there's a learning curve, right? I have no connections within the fragrance space, so that's another challenge, and I thought, Where do you turn? So it started very grassroots . My business is a very grassroots, word-of-mouth company because I had nowhere to start, and I didn't know where to go. I like to pray and meditate every morning at 5 o'clock. During one of my prayers, I heard a voice that said, "Take it to the streets—take it to the people." So we started doing these highly curated pop-up markets, and during those markets, we were able to connect with people. It started to connect those dots. People would introduce me to , and I had a lot of Black women that took me under their wing. And they would say, "Octavia, I know this person," and would help me find mentors and with my business plan. Eventually, I was connected with a gentleman that has been a mentor to me. He has 25 years in the business—a good friend of mine connected me to him, and it was just a series of connections that led us to where things are now. Now, I can't tell you I purposely set out for this. But people really believed in what we were doing and everything I needed—the dots would get connected. And really what played a pivotal part for me, honestly, were Black women. Black women play a pivotal part in in our brand, like getting our brand out there and connecting a lot of dots.