Business of Beauty
Mona Kattan on Stepping Out of Huda Beauty's Shadow
At the Business of Beauty Global Forum 2026 in Napa Valley, Kayali founder Mona Kattan discusses leaving Huda Beauty's shadow and building a long-lasting vision.
Mona Kattan is done operating in her sister's shadow. At The Business of Beauty Global Forum 2026 in Napa Valley, California, the founder of luxury fragrance brand Kayali spoke with BoF about finding the courage to build a brand and a long-term vision that belong to her alone.
The conversation covers three threads: her departure from the orbit of Huda Beauty, the megabrand she helped build and that made the Kattan family name a beauty-industry fixture of the 2010s; the creation of Kayali as a standalone luxury fragrance house; and the work of constructing a durable, long-lasting vision for herself as a founder.
Kayali, which means "my imagination" in Arabic, launched as a fragrance venture under the Huda Beauty umbrella before Kattan pushed to establish it as an independent identity. Her forum appearance frames that separation as a personal and strategic turning point — the moment she stopped deferring to the family brand's gravity and began building equity in her own name.
For an industry still digesting the collapse and quiet reinvention of several 2010s megabrands, the case is instructive. Brands that scaled fast on influencer attention have had to reshape their businesses for a harsher climate; one such label, after emerging from bankruptcy, has rebuilt its makeup business for new market conditions but still needs to regain its place in the cultural conversation to become a true legacy player. Kattan's bet is that fragrance — with its higher price points, slower trend cycles and emotional durability — offers a sturdier foundation than the social-media-driven makeup boom that made her family famous.
The wider context sharpens the point. Chinese manufacturing strength, visible in everything from cars and batteries to hair extensions and acrylic nails, continues to reshape beauty's supply side, even as trade friction looms over this week's presidential summit. Founders building for the next decade, Kattan's appearance suggests, will need independent identities and disciplined long-term visions rather than borrowed momentum.
The full episode is available on The BoF Podcast.
Source: Business of Fashion
Amara Osei
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Staff writer covering media and advertising at Eurasian Beauty Journal.
