While Harvard Business School grads Katia Beauchamp and Hayley Barna were looking for a business idea, they noticed that the beauty product industry was seriously behind the times on the online retail side. They discovered that some of the biggest pain points for customers included the overwhelming selection of products and the inability to get a hands-on experience with the items before making a purchase. With that in mind, they created Birchbox, a company that mails women a box containing four to five deluxe beauty products every month. Their customers can test out a handful of new products from home and brands benefit from follow up purchases when the samples run out.
And yes, the shipping is free.