The supermodel co-founded the non-alcoholic beverage brand Kin Euphorics. What exactly does the job entail?
Since the Great Resignation triggered a vast labour shortage and sent us hurtling towards an economic collapse, many brand owners have had to resort to the unthinkable, and recruit from a pool filled with those most in need of employment: celebrities. In the past six months, a radical shift has taken place, whereby famous people have been installed in the C-suite of corporations to boost sales.
Call it the boardroomification of celebrity. Kendall Jenner was named as a creative director of clothing company FWRD, Cardi B is Playboy’s “creative director in residence” (as opposed to at-large? In absentia?), and ASAP Rocky is guest artistic director of PacSun. These are no longer vanity titles, but denote some kind of girlbossery on the part of the dignitary hired on to breathe some interest into these otherwise dull companies.
When asked on a recent Zoom call what her role at Kin Euphorics, the non-alcoholic adult beverage brand that helps the brain’s cognitive function, entailed, Bella Hadid enthusiastically responded, “I am the self-proclaimed ’deck human’ of the business.”
She listed all of the different presentations she has put together (one on new products, one on an eventual merch line, one on future marketing ideas). More tangibly, perhaps, lavender grown on the Hadid farm in Pennsylvania is being harvested for use in Kin’s smattering of drinks. They are sold at LA’s most popular hangout-slash-grocery store, Erewhon, and its adaptogens provide the drinker with a feeling of euphoria not unlike the one you experience when an elevator bounces a bit before the doors slide open.
Hadid’s actual title at Kin is co-founder, as she owns an undisclosed percentage of the company alongside Kin’s other founder Jen Batchelor. “Bella has killer business instincts,” Batchelor said during our Zoom. “She thinks big picture. And we’re both futurists.”
Kin is slightly different to other brand’s tapping the famous, as it has crested the wave of non-alcoholic spirits – a category whose sales shot up 290 per cent on Drizly last year – into becoming, as Hadid started calling the drinks, a “routine”. And a co-founder like Hadid, who is mostly in the press for “cutting a slim figure” in a fluffy bucket hat and flared trousers or joining pal Hailey Bieber for a Pilates session, is not exactly needed to boost the profile of a company already enjoying mainstream success. However, she appears game to take the flak of detractors if only it will get a can of Kin in everyone’s hands. Hey, it’s tasty on its own, says Hadid, or pairs well with a ginger-cayenne shot. And its benefits are innumerable; it offers a special mix of relaxation and stimulation.
For Hadid, the Louboutin heel-turn from model – which, in the late 90s was synonymous with partying – to wellness boffo, much like her mother Yolanda, makes a lot of sense. “I really had trouble getting my foot out the door to go do anything social because I just had such anxiety. And it really, really helped me just to be able to push myself out of the door,” the 25-year-old explained. “Pretty much my whole life besides modeling is my wellness journey and how I’m trying to cope with these things going on in my head.”
“I want people to be able to drink [alcohol] with this, and I want people to be able to be sober with this,” she added. “I have dealt with alcohol, good and bad, my whole life trying to deal with my anxiety and my depression. This is the first year where I really don’t think about alcohol the way that I used to.”
Batchelor clarifies that she didn’t recruit Hadid, but rather Hadid, whose obsession grew after she mysteriously discovered Kin in her fridge in 2019, approached her asking how to get involved. Now, Batchelor praises her as “the perfect fit for somebody to come in and really shake shit up when it comes to innovation at Kin.” That may be what all brand founders are looking for in a famous freelancer, but Hadid, supermodel, French speaker and the hardworking co-founder of a non-alcoholic beverage brand has proven to be the ne plus ultra of C-suite celebrities.