bitchy | Duchess Meghan explains why she’s hit ‘pause’ on restocking As Ever products

The final episode of Confessions of a Female Founder Season 1 has been released. Last week’s episode was originally supposed to be the last episode, but then the Duchess of Sussex surprised everyone by announcing that Tina Knowles contacted her and wanted to be on the pod. Ms. Tina is mostly promoting Cecred, the haircare line Tina founded with her daughter Beyonce. Tina is also talking about her memoir! This was a great episode. “Tyler talks about you all the time” – as in, Tyler Perry talks to Beyonce’s mother about Meghan all the time! I looooove that they talk about their signs right away – Beyonce is a Virgo, Prince Harry is a Virgo, and Ms. Tina ends up surrounded by Virgos! Meghan loves Virgos too (Virgos feel differently about most Leos). During the conversation, Meghan and Ms. Tina also spoke about what’s next for As Ever.

Ms. Tina on her hair salon in the 1990s: Knowles, who opened Houston hair salon Headliners in 1990, told Meghan she “learned to be a boss” through her decades in the hair industry. “I think that you start your business and then you find yourself,” she said during the episode. “It gives you confidence that you didn’t have before.”

Launching Cécred: It was a longtime goal to create her own beauty products. “It has been a dream of mine forever, and Beyoncé, it’s been a dream of hers,” she told the duchess. In fact, Knowles revealed that Beyoncé “could actually be a hairstylist” since she grew up watching her at the salon.

Beyonce always wins: “You know you have disagreements, and you have to—I’m the one to always cave,” Knowles admitted. “If my kids are mad at me, I can’t take it. I’ll cave.” She added that with Beyoncé, “If we have a disagreement, it’s her business, so she gets the win.”

Meghan on what’s next for As Ever: “For me at the moment with As ever, it was…great, we plan, we planned for a year, and then everything sells out in 45 minutes—which yes, amazing. Great news… And then you say, ‘Okay, we planned as best as we could. Are we going to replenish and sell out again in an hour? Or is that annoying as a customer?’” the duchess continued. Ultimately, Meghan said she decided to reassess rather than leave people disappointed. “I’m looking at it saying, ‘Just pause. That happened. Let’s wait until we are completely stable and we have everything we need.’” The duchess pointed out that a “scarcity mentality at the beginning might be a hook for people,” comparing it to “a sneaker drop.” However, she said in terms of a long-term customer experience, it’s not ideal. “I don’t want you to eat that jam once every six months!” she said.

[From Marie Claire]

You guys know I support Meghan’s endeavors, especially her commercial endeavors. But her indecisiveness about what to do next with As Ever is strange. This isn’t hard – she needs to restock most of the products as soon as possible. She needs to introduce new products and expand the line. Restock and grow – it’s not reinventing the wheel. “Are we going to replenish and sell out again in an hour? Or is that annoying as a customer?” She’s only sold one once, mind you! I have personal reasons for wanting a resupply – I’m obsessed with that raspberry spread and I’m annoyed that nothing has been restocked. As for Ms. Tina – one of my favorite things is seeing people on my timeline raving about Cecred. Ms. Tina put some hair-growing magic in those products.

Update: We’ll have a new story on this tomorrow, but As Ever’s Instagram just announced that new products will be coming “this month.”

Photos courtesy of Meghan’s IG, Avalon Red, screengrabs from The Jamie Kern Lima Show.