Tara Fela-Durotoye is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, House of Tara International, Lagos, which develops makeup, perfume, accessories, and products for women.
At 21 in 1998, she was already on her way to becoming a lawyer when she launched House of Tara as a makeup studio, at first specialising in makeup designs for brides and wedding parties.
Her beauty artistry, which jettisoned the Western tastes of big cosmetics firms in favour of homegrown products, proved a hit with Nigeria’s middle class and, today, the company employs over 3,000 beauty representatives across West Africa, CNN reported.
Motivation
Fela-Durotoye was drawn to the business by her step-mother and the Tara beauty range was born out of her frustration at the lack of suitable cosmetics in Nigeria.
“Importers didn’t know exactly what was right for Nigerian women,” she says.
She explored a business opportunity and realised that her products could fill the gap.
She was also motivated by the desire to make a difference in life and defy the economic gloom in her environment.
Mentoring to make a difference
She teaches students, mainly women in their 20s and 30s, how to shape eyebrows, apply eye shadow, and other stuff. She also mentors them on the importance of making a difference in life.
Making a difference in young lives is part of the mission, they are being taught that makeup artistry can be their passport to a business of their own.
“There are certain things telling you that you cannot make it; that you will not make it; that Nigeria is not a place where people make it. I beg to differ,” Fela-Durotoye told CNN.
“A lot of the Tara products are named after either beauty icons or beauty philosophies in Africa. For us it’s about sharing the world and sharing our culture to the world.”
The past few years have seen the company expand into catwalk and film makeup design as Lagos fashion and cinema scenes have flourished.
When French pharmaceutical giant, L’Oreal, came to Nigeria looking for a partner to help introduce its Maybelline range to the country, it signed up with House of Tara, earning Fela-Durotoye a spot on Forbes’ list of “20 Young Power Women In Africa” in the process.
Playing teacher
She remembers visiting her grandmother as a child and gathering with the children from the village to pass on lessons she had learned at school.
“She always teased about how she expected me to be a teacher. And I would say that she was correct. Grandma was correct.
“I am still a teacher, the only thing is this time I’m not teaching maths or English. I’m teaching enterprise: I’m teaching makeup artistry as a platform for enterprise.”
Fela-Durotoye’s 14 schools teach a range of courses, from short personal makeup course to professional diploma.
She says when she founded the schools a decade ago, few considered makeup to be a serious career prospect, with parents pushing children toward professions like law, medicine, and accountancy.
But with Nigeria’s economy growing, the market for “little luxuries” such as cosmetics and demand for trained makeup artists for weddings, film and everyday life has seen a rise.
Today, Fela-Durotoye makes the lofty estimate that 80 per cent of the country’s makeup artists were trained by House of Tara.
Grooming entrepreneurs to change lives
She sees each student as a potential small business owner and her courses teach knowledge of the beauty industry, plus customer service and business ethics skills, in addition to practical beauty essentials.
The aim is to equip graduates with everything they need to launch their own beauty store.
She does not consider her hundreds of graduates as competitors. Instead she considers them as part of her mission to change lives.
“What drives me is living purpose. I think my business is a vehicle to change lives.”
Past graduates of Tara’s schools have gone on to start small firms that employ other makeup artists.
