Who are the Beauty Brains? - episode 288

Valerie George (0:00)

Hi, I'm Valerie and you're listening to The Beauty Brains.

Welcome to The Beauty Brains, a show where real cosmetic chemists answer your beauty product questions and give you an insider's look at the cosmetics industry. This is our second episode of the year, episode 288 I'm your host, Valerie George, and with me today is Perry Romanowski. Hi Perry.

Perry Romanowski (0:28)

Hi Valerie, good to see you.

Valerie George (0:30)

So good to see you, yeah, again. On today's show, we are not going to cover a bunch of questions and beauty science news. I wanted to do a little something a little different.

Perry Romanowski (0:41)

Oh, well, it's new year, a little change. What do we got planned here?

Valerie George (0:46)

Well, we've been doing this show for a few years together.

In fact, we've done over 120 episodes together, and we continue to get new listeners. There's a lot of people who don't even know about the origins of the show, the origins of you, the origins of me. So we thought we would do a short show about what's this show about? Who are we?

Perry Romanowski (1:08)

Wow.

Valerie George (1:08)

Who are the beauty brains?

Perry Romanowski (1:10)

We do this every 288 episodes. A lot of people don't know that.

Valerie George (1:16)

Well, it's just a nice way to get everyone acquainted with us, especially if they're new to the program and don't understand maybe some of the jokes that we have that some of our more seasoned listeners get. So I thought it would be a lot of fun. What do you think?

Perry Romanowski (1:29)

Oh, exactly. Like people are wondering, what's all this porch kitty he keeps talking about? Why are there cats at the end?

Valerie George (1:36)

Exactly. And who is Mr. Cosmetic Chemist?

So first, I thought we could introduce ourselves and talk about our background and how we got started in the cosmetics industry.

Perry Romanowski (1:47)

Well, I guess I could go first. I am the senior member of the staff here.

Valerie George (1:52)

And by senior, he means his age. Also, he means older member on the show.

Perry Romanowski (1:57)

By a decade at least. So I've been doing the Beauty Brains since 2006, I believe. I started it when I was working at Alberto Culver, but I started it anonymously because the reality is, if you work for a company, you can't always just say what you want.

And I wanted to say what I wanted. So back in those days, you could do kind of an anonymous thing, right? And my partner and I, Randy, who had been on the show for a long time, and he's left, he's since retired. But we were writing as LeftBrain, RightBrain. It was a blog. And then in 2014, I believe, we started the podcast and we sort of switched over. But it's always been answering consumer questions about beauty products. I had this experience where I'd go to parties and people would find out that I'm a cosmetic chemist and they'd say, they'd start asking me all these questions.

Valerie George (2:46)

It's excellent party fodder, huh?

Perry Romanowski (2:48)

Exactly.

Oh, this would make a great blog. And then that was when blogging was sort of just starting out and we liked to write. And then when podcasting started out, I was like, oh, I want to try out podcasting. And so that's always fun. But my background is I got a degree in chemistry from DePaul University. Studied biochemistry on the master's level, but then landed a job at Alberto Culver, working and formulating haircare products, shampoos, conditioners, styling products. I did a stint on working on St. Eyes, which was skin products. I worked in the claims department, the innovation department. I was kind of all over there.

And then eventually tired of it and said, hey, you know what, I'd love to just do Beauty Brains and teach people cosmetic chemistry for a living. And that's what I've been doing since 2008 when I left corporate America.

Valerie George (3:39)

Well, I am still in corporate America, which I really enjoy, but sometimes, not all the time. I mean, I'm very fortunate I can say things or maybe not sometimes say things, but I started in the cosmetics industry in 2010 I studied biochemistry in undergrad at Kent State University in Ohio, and I'm very well connected within the university still because it was such a great experience for me. And I'm actually from Kent, so I feel a real connection with the hometown.

I went on to graduate school in chemistry at Marshall University in West Virginia, but grad school wasn't for me, so I dropped out. Taught high school chemistry for a year chemistry and biology, and it was a lot of fun.