Salt & Stone, the Los Angeles-based body care brand, has landed a minority investment from Humble Growth. Terms of the deal and the brand’s sales were not disclosed.
The brand was founded in 2017 by former pro snowboarder Nima Jalali when a knee injury made him more conscious about his overall health, leading him to explore creating nontoxic body products.
As well as being nontoxic, Jalali, a fragrance lover, strove to ensure the products had distinct scents, which today are Santal & Vetiver, Neroli & Basil, Black Rose & Oud and Bergamot & Hinoki — across deodorant, body mist, body wash and lotion.
With the investment, Salt & Stone plans to deepen its global partnership with Sephora, continue to build out Amazon and direct-to-consumer, and launch into a new category next year.
“We’re in a really exciting time for the brand, the growth has been really explosive, and now is the best time to ensure that we have all the tools that we need to build a brand that will be around for another 100 years,” said Jalali in an interview, who added that the brand had been profitable since Day One.
As for why he went with Humble Growth, he was attracted by the fact that it is founder-led. Cofounder Andrew Abraham previously built Orgain, the majority of which was sold to Nestlé Health Science in 2022.
“I found it really important to work with a fund that is founder-led. Having Andrew being able to understand and look at things from a founder’s perspective is super, super important. I felt just really strong alignment there, and that was the reason we chose them,” he said.
The feeling was mutual.
“The number-one thing we look for is a passionate founder. Nima brings a very unique and authentic brand vision, and he has that passion,” said Abraham in an interview. “As an entrepreneur myself, that passion is really what drives everything.”
He was also attracted by Salt & Stone’s dual body and fragrance positioning, two categories performing well across the board and becoming increasingly hot M&A targets.
“Salt & Stone operates within two of the fastest-growing categories within the beauty industry, and that’s really between body care and fragrance. Then the products are extremely well thought-through. They smell incredible. They look and feel extremely luxurious, and they work,” he continued.
While Humble Growth has made wellness investments before, this is its first in beauty, but according to Abraham, not its last. “It’s an area of hyper focus for Humble Growth. It’s an area that we’re looking into and evaluating companies on a weekly basis now,” he said. “We have very stringent standards on what we look for, and we want to make sure that we’re going to help catapult these businesses to reach their full potential.”