Amber Fillerup Clark On The Struggle For Influencers To Be Taken

Описание: Amber Fillerup Clark has been sharing her life online for over a decade, dubbing her an “OG influencer,” a role which often overshadows her other role as a beauty entrepreneur. After launching a line of hair extensions called bfb hair in 2016, she expanded her haircare empire when she debuted dae hair with Sephora in May 2020. Just last month, dae raised a $2.6M seed round led by Willow Growth. I spoke to Fillerup Clark about the evolution of the influencer industry and the challenges she’s had to overcome, even as more women in this space are finally getting recognition for building lucrative businesses that essentially support their families and communities. Amy Shoenthal: You’re one of the original Instagram influencers who started in this world at a time when your discipline wasn’t taken all that seriously. What was that like, and how has “influencing” changed since you got your start? Amber Fillerup Clark: It’s wild to see how much it’s changed. People were so snarky back in the day, but it came from a lack of understanding. The concept of a selfie was so new to people, it seemed so surface level. People were like, why is Amber is taking pictures of herself? For me it was so much more than that, I was being creative in my own home, and there was no one else home to take a picture so I just took it myself. Then I wanted to share it with people, inspire them to try new hairstyles or new outfits that really spoke to their personal style. Now, it’s less off putting for people to get out there and say, ‘I got ready, I look good, I want to take a selfie.’ Even back then there were still a lot of people who connected with what I was trying to do. The connection part made it easy to overlook the negativity. I thought it was so cool that as a mom I got to be in my home, with my kids, making money. I didn’t go to business school and I was running a lucrative business from home and getting to spend so much time with my kids instead of doing the traditional 9-5. Back then, no one had influencer departments. Now every company has an influencer marketing department. Now what we do is so much more respected. Shoenthal: Should the term ‘influencer’ be retired? Fillerup Clark: Depending on who we are talking to, I always say my husband is a photographer, or we’re creative directors for brands and we do creative campaigns. The term ‘influencer’ feels icky sometimes. You don’t want to believe your worth is tied to influencing people. You’re influencing as a byproduct of what you’re actually doing, which is creating. I think it would be great if that term went away. Shoenthal: Tell me about dae. This isn’t your first foray into beauty, you had hair extensions as part of Barefoot Blonde, so what’s new about what you’re doing now? Fillerup Clark: We started our hair extension company six years ago. I learned so much from that. My husband and I always talked about launching a haircare brand but it felt like a very distant goal.


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