Linda Thompson has always been a brand storyteller. Throughout her career in marketing, she’s helped luxury brands like Cartier and American Express communicate with their consumers and create premium experiences. It wasn’t until an unlikely discovery in a Canadian pharmacy that she knew it would be her own brand’s story to tell next.
Enter Biography, Thompson’s New York-based personal care line, created during her time as a Malin member. The products rely on plant-based, minimalist formulas to both enhance the skin’s natural beauty and deliver a luxurious experience. Biography and The Malin have come full circle, with products stocked in locations across the country.
In the spirit of Earth Month, Thompson reflects on Biography’s origin and its inspiration from both the natural world and The Malin.
What makes you say, “okay, I want to start this new thing?”
I was going to Montreal in February—which is the sh***iest weather ever—and all my stuff was taken at TSA. I went to a pharmacy and I said, I’m looking for these kinds of things. The pharmacist handed me this—voila—little bottle of oil with neroli and jasmine.
I started to use it and I thought “what a spectacular experience.” My skin looked great. It had an airbrush effect that an ordinary moisturizer could never do, you know?
As you were developing Biography, how did you think about differentiating yourself from other clean beauty brands out there?
We really started to think about our story. What are we going to stand for? What do we want it to look like, aesthetically?
There are many paths that an oil can take, and I knew immediately that I didn’t want Biography to be brown, green, and leafy like the other big clean beauty brands at the time. What was interesting to me were all the stories, the faces and the bodies that used it — how we impacted people’s experiences and how we transformed their routine.
What role does the Earth play in Biography’s products?
We only use recycled — and recyclable — glass. Each bottle is covered with a UV protectant that shields the oils inside, since they’re light-sensitive. Our hand and body washes come in a recycled resin, and our face cleanser comes in glass.
We know where our ingredients come from; we use fair trade suppliers. There’s nothing synthetic; no alcohols, no PEGs. We don’t use artificial stabilizers. We opted for a more natural, sustainable, safer-for-the-skin option.
That’s the beauty of the Biography experience: we understand what the ingredients can really do, so we don’t bury them in synthetics and fillers and all that.
What does working at The Malin look like for you?
Sometimes, when you’re running a business, you’re a little disconnected from your users. So when I’m introduced to somebody at The Malin and I say, “I created Biography, the soap in the bathroom,” and they have an opinion, it reminds me, Oh, this is what we do when we ship things out. There’s a connection between what you’re doing and the people who use it.
A lot of those hands are doing big things at The Malin, and it connects to me, symbolically. Those hands who are all using our products 20 times a day are doing all kinds of stuff. They’re starting businesses. They’re taking interviews. They’re from different cultures and speak different languages. Just being in that environment reminds me that we’re doing this for other people.
CREDITS
Katie Stone is a brand strategist & freelance writer with expertise in brand direction & positioning, content strategy, copywriting, and community building. She is currently the writer of Plant Based, a weekly newsletter offering her thoughts on the wellness industry. Katie has also contributed to publications like New York Magazine, Vogue, Bustle, and more.
You can follow her on Instagram here.
Photographer: Christopher Zapata
