All in the Family: Building Upon A Mother's Beauty Legacy

The meaning behind Skincare line Tu’el name is a quirky and creative one – it stands for “two L’s,” since its current co-founders are Lisa and Lori Nestore. In actuality, the brand was created over 30 years ago by the Nestores’ mother, Eva Friederichs. Friederich had created Eva’s Esthetics, and was one of the first American professional skincare lines used by estheticians at spas and salons across the world. Friederich was a legend in her industry, and founder of the first advanced training institute for estheticians in America. Her signature line contained natural and botanical ingredients, and set the bar for skincare products.

Lisa and Lori Nestore

After Friederich retired, her daughters Lisa and Lori took over, modernizing the brand and naming it Tu’el. Growing up with their renowned mother, the sisters know the ins and outs of the business, and inherited a healthy dose of their mother’s passion for beautiful skin. Tu’el uses high performance botanicals to treat all skin types and conditions. The products balance and improve skin health and overall appearance, with an emphasis on not just making you see the difference, but allowing you to feel it as well.

What makes Tu’el stand out from the litany of other skincare lines is their focus on pores and the integral role they serve in having healthy skin. “We like to refer to ourselves as The Pore Stars,” says Nestore. “For us, it’s all in the pores, and our mother showed us that determinijg skin types is the first step to setting the stage for healthy skin. She taught us to determine skin types by looking at your face in a mirror.” Since everyone has different pores, each skin type must be treated with differing botanical plant extracts to result in perfectly balanced and glowing skin.

The Nestore sisters reveal that the methodology behind the pore analysis was taught by their mother. “The skin along your jawline has no visible pores and looks relatively smooth with little texture. Compare the skin along your jawline to the skin next to your nose,” instructs Nestore. “Does the texture look the same or do you see larger pores next to your nose? Now look at your entire face excluding your nose and choose your skin type from the images on our website. Now you know your skin type!” By determining the exact skin type through pore analysis, they enable customers to effectively treat their skin condition. A lot of the frustration that customers might otherwise have from not knowing their skin type is then solved.

The family truly takes on business endeavors together. Not only is Tu’el birthed from the Nestore sisters’ mother, but there is also a related company, Youth to the People, that is run by Lisa Nestore’s son, Greg, and their nephew, Joe. Youth to the People is based on a similar concept as Tu’el, but combines superfoods and science. Working with family in such close quarters, however, doesn’t come without its share of conflict. However, their family dynamic is strong enough that petty arguments don’t last long.

“We get in one good argument about once a year that lasts about ten minutes and then we’re over it,” says Nestore. “We have such different roles in the company and have total respect for each other’s position. There is a lot of passion here at Tu’el.”

The Nestore sisters grew Tu’el mainly from profits, with an occasional mom loan. They were able to do so in part because it was an extension of their mother’s line, which had been used by professionals for over 30 years. Her name garnered some serious hype within the upper echelons of beauty. Their greatest challenge in launching the skincare line, remains to be capital requisition however - an inevitable obstacle for most lines in the saturated beauty industry.

“Being raised in beauty salons, we’ve worked in a female-dominated industry, so neither of us have had much gender discrimination at all,” explains Nestore. “We both feel that if women were to truly come together we could rule the world. We love empowering women.”

The most rewarding aspect of owning a successful skincare line isn’t the profit they pull in, but the reactions they get from their satisfied customers. “It’s the overwhelmingly positive reaction Tu’el products and its formulations, and our approach to treating skin that is most gratifying,” says Nestore. “It’s seeing what our mother originally created and seeing that evolution, while retaining what the core of the brand is.” And that core is central to Tu’el products and to its success: clean products without any fillers or harsh chemicals.

Deep Pore Cleansing System

The brand isn’t stagnant, however – the team already has its eyes set on the future, with plans for new products and different directions. Their ongoing goal is to improve their formulations by making them more natural. Tu’el recently launched two new acne products: Rehab Acne Serum and Make Amends Cream. These two new additions are supplements to their acne line and are targeted to help heal and clear up the skin, without damaging it. They are also delving into the realm of anti-aging products, since it is a burgeoning market.

Their success can be in part attributed to the fact that they always had a philanthropic cause they tried to achieve: to make everyone feel good about their skin. And with their emphasis on all-natural, specially formulated botanicals, it’s clear that they’ve achieved this objective.