Lesa Milan credits Beyoncé with helping to make her Mina Roe maternity wear and care brand an overnight success.
The Real Housewives of Dubai star recalls when she first launched her brand and was trying to get celebrities to wear maternity pieces to help with promotion and brand exposure. But she found herself hitting dead ends with managers attempting to charge upwards of $50,000 for a celeb to wear her pieces.
“I started reaching out to the celebrities myself, but I got nothing back,” Milan recalled on Hot 97. “They would just ignore it, and then if they didn’t, it would be like a manager requesting like $50,000 or something for them to wear my stuff.”
“And I was like, ‘I can’t afford that. That doesn’t work,” she continued. “I can’t pay them to wear my stuff. So what can I do? Because I don’t have the budget.’ So I said, ‘You know what, the stylist, I need to go through the stylist because it’s tough to find trendy clothes that fit and are comfortable. And I’m sure they would appreciate Mina Roe.’”
Milan contacted Beyoncé’s stylist, Ty Hunter, who helped introduce the brand to the music superstar.
“He reached out, and he’s like, ‘OK, Beyoncé’s gonna choose the ones she likes.’ And I was like, ‘Beyoncé is gonna choose it herself?!’ And she chose five pieces, and we’ve only seen her being photographed in two different dresses,” Milan said.
“It was so major. It changed my brand forever. The Beyoncé effect. We went from unknown to known overnight… Beyoncé put me on the map.”
Since launching her maternity wear line, Lesa Milan has expanded her Mina Roe brand to include skincare products for pregnant and postpartum mothers. In addition to stylish maternity fashion, Mina Roe now offers belly masks, oils, and serums designed to support and protect the skin throughout motherhood.
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