Sephora, A New CCO And A Celebration Of Latinx Roots: Babba Rivera Is Building A Haircare Empire With Ceremonia

Jul 08, 2023

Babba Rivera, founder and CEO of Ceremonia, Photo Credit: Rebecca Alaniz

When Babba Rivera had the spark moment to launch Ceremonia, it was the result of identifying a void in the market for a haircare brand focused on getting to the root cause of hair challenges — and treating haircare with the same ritual-based habits as skincare.

"There's so many parallels with skincare and haircare," Rivera shares. "And I think part of the reason that hasn't been so clear in the past, is because the haircare category has operated more like ‘makeup for your hair’ by covering up issues, versus care."

Rivera had also spotted a disconnect in the market: Latinx folks are among the biggest demographic of consumers in the beauty industry, yet are not represented on the shelves.

"I felt like a lot of what was happening in beauty was not happening with the involvement of Latinx folks — I wanted the Latinx community to get a seat at the table," Rivera explains.

Ceremonia launched in October 2020 with a mission to celebrate the richness of Latinx culture through clean, sustainable hair products powered by natural ingredients, and the power of strong community.

Ceremonia is now the first Latina-owned haircare brand at Sephora, a huge step for the Latinx community as a whole.

And Founder and CEO Rivera is just getting started.

With tripling year-over-year revenue, and a flourishing line of 20 original formulas and products, Ceremonia is entering a new stage of growth.

Two and a half years since launching, the brand is officially expanding into more than 500 doors nationwide with Sephora as part of the beauty retailer's "Hair's Next Big Thing" curation.

Today also marks another milestone for the brand (even more meaningful, on the first day of Women's History Month): it's announcing its first C-Suite hire, Dana Onyewu, joining as Chief Commercial Officer to oversee the brand's expansion with Sephora.

(Onyewu most recently served as Vice President of North America Sales at skincare brand Tatcha; she also held roles at DevaCurl, Redken and Pureology.)

This next chapter for Ceremonia symbolizes how far the brand has come, in a short time.

When Ceremonia first launched in 2020, it went to market with a single SKU, the Aceite de Moska (Silicone-Free Scalp Oil). Today, the brand boasts a wide assortment of intentionally designed products that go deep into the scalp and care for the hair: essentially, the root of the issue.

"The reasoning here actually was pretty thoughtful," Rivera explains. "A lot of these startups come and go, and launch with a whole routine. But it's a pretty big ask to come in and say to consumers — here's your new skincare or haircare routine, change everything and replace it with this brand. So when we were thinking about Ceremonia, we asked questions like, What are the biggest hair woes that our community is facing? What would have the biggest impact for them? What would be the product that has the lowest barriers to entry?"

They landed on the scalp remedy oil. For starters, it's tied to Latin culture as its heritage stems from the Dominican Republic. It also works on all hair types, so it's universal. Finally, most people don't have a scalp ritual implemented as part of their beauty routine, even though that's actually going to have the biggest impact on overall hair wellness.

"The scalp remedy oil was a fast track to gain consumer trust because it's such a powerful, potent formula," Rivera explains.

Scalp remedies and oils have previously been less talked about — and less sexy — products. Rivera flipped the script with Ceremonia's Aceite de Moska, and doubled down on the ritual by launching the scalp massager as the second product, also packaging it together as a bundle. Today, the bundle is among Ceremonia's best-selling items.

"This was an incredible opportunity to establish ourselves as a hair wellness brand and help people establish that scalp ritual," Rivera continues.

(Ceremonia's bestseller at Sephora is the Papaya Scalp Scrub, which also won five beauty awards in less than one year since launch. The brand has already garnered 18 industry awards.)

Rivera, who has built a steady career in marketing and branding, and whose strong POV in this realm earned her a spot as a Forbes 30 Under 30, class of 2016, was always especially passionate about the brand building aspect of agency life. Now she gets the chance to do this every day, with Ceremonia.

While Ceremonia is the ultimate tribute to her Latin heritage and the importance of rituals like haircare, it also gets personal for the founder.

Her father, who was originally a hairdresser in his native Chile, had trouble finding work at a salon as a result of the language barrier when the family moved to Sweden. So he set up shop in the Riveras’ living room: "He practiced his love for hair on me and all of our family members who would swing by our house," Rivera reminisces.

Her mother was a prime example of self-care and beauty as a ritual: her haircare time was sacred and wouldn't dare be interrupted.

Rivera's deep-rooted love for her heritage is now stronger than ever and can be seen in every element of Ceremonia, from the colorful, splashy packaging (a contrast from the usually monochromatic beauty brands) to the ingredients used in the product assortment.

Ceremonia also created a headband called "The Frida," a nod to one of the most compelling women in history and an icon in the Latinx community — the braided headband has become "signature Ceremonia."

The journey was paved with some challenges too, which have fuelled Rivera's fire to keep going and listen to her intuition, as well as the insights shared by focus groups (folks within the Latinx community that Rivera turned to for feedback, pre-launch, as well as Ceremonia's loyal customers).

"As much as retailers, investors and customers strive to be early adopters, they still want reassurance from someone else that ‘this brand is indeed the next big thing.’ So as a founder, it feels demotivating to get rejected — but you really just have to keep pushing."

Today, Ceremonia has a lot to celebrate — and there's a lot more on the horizon for the haircare brand.

As a clean brand, Ceremonia got the seal of approval from Credo, which is one of its stockists.

Ceremonia's gradual distribution in international markets is thanks to being available on Net-A-Porter and Revolve. And as an ode to her Scandinavian roots, Ceremonia is also now available at Nordiska Kompaniet — a.k.a. NK Sweden — an iconic retailer in Sweden.

Mostly, Ceremonia is Rivera's way of serenading her culture.

"This is a huge moment, not just for me, but for the Latinx community at large," Rivera asserts. "My two driving forces when launching Ceremonia was to introduce a wellness approach to hair, which for the longest time had been solely focused on styling, while also fighting for much-needed representation in the beauty category. Becoming the first Latina-founded hair brand to enter Sephora nationwide is therefore a huge deal for me — it directly touches on my mission and I truly believe and hope that we’re paving the way for many more minority founded businesses to follow."