It’s 4 p.m. on a Sunday. You’re at the nail salon because you have a meeting Monday morning that requires you to look polished and put-together. In theory, this is supposed to be a relaxing part of your weekend. But in practice, you’re thinking about how this is eating into time you’d spend grocery shopping and prepping your kid’s lunch for tomorrow. To add insult to injury, when you finally pay, the mani-pedi comes to more than $100 with tip.
For a large share of American women, this isn’t a splurge: A recent survey found that 96% of them regularly polish their fingernails, and 47% of them do so at a salon. It’s a fashion statement, for sure, but many women also believe that an unvarnished nail reads as unprofessional.
Katia Beauchamp—best known as the cofounder of Birchbox—is on a mission to make the regular manicure optional. Today, she’s debuting Buff Beauty, a brand that allows you to maintain nails that are so healthy and attractive, you won’t miss the salon visit. Buff launches through its official website, with a range of 21 products spanning both tools and treatments. “We will never make a polish,” Beauchamp says.
The Birchbox Lesson
Beauchamp (pronounced “beach-um”) co-founded Birchbox in 2010 with Hayley Barna, a fellow Harvard Business School student at the time. The service mailed subscribers beauty samples for $10 a month. It was initially seen as one of the winners of the direct-to-consumer movement, raising $90 million in capital, with a valuation of $485 million in 2014, and reaching more than a million subscribers.
Birchbox struggled to keep its momentum, as other players—from Ipsy to massive retailers like Sephora and Ulta—rolled out similar sampling boxes. By 2016, Birchbox was conducting layoffs. Majority investor Viking Global took control in 2018, and FemTec Health acquired the company for $45 million in 2021 before selling it to Retention Brands in 2023. Beauchamp left Birchbox to serve as CEO of Victoria Beckham Beauty for two and a half years until 2025.
But Beauchamp has been itching to launch another startup, one that leverages her extensive insight into the beauty industry. The idea for Buff began germinating while she was running Birchbox. In 2017, she posted a blog announcing her decision to embrace completely bare nails. It turns out that she was ahead of a trend. Bare nails have become something of a status symbol.
Part of the desire to ditch polish has to do with the fact that the beauty industry has shifted toward a more natural aesthetic, epitomized by Glossier. There’s been a movement to treat skincare as beauty, such as using serums to give your cheeks a glow. Beauchamp wants to bring this approach to everything below the wrists and ankles, creating products designed for the health of nails and skin that also make hands and feet look beautiful.
And importantly, she saw a need for innovation. Nail clippers, files, and buffing sticks haven’t changed in decades. She saw the opportunity to develop a suite of products that are more functional and effective than what currently exists. “This category just feels like an afterthought,” Beauchamp says.
Skincare for Your nails
The product line is organized around a three-step regimen borrowed from skincare—exfoliate, hydrate, seal—plus the tools to execute it. She worked with a chemist who focuses on keratin to develop the formulations, which include a glycolic-lactic exfoliant treatment meant for once-weekly use. Water and oil-based treatments follow, the latter finished with apricot and olive oil.
Each of these comes in a tube that you apply directly onto the nail and cuticle. The applicator is designed so you never touch the formula with your other hand, ensuring the process isn’t messy. It’s so convenient, she says, that she’s used the products while on the train. The goal is something “that feels kind of like lip gloss that you throw in your bag.”
To create a shine on the nails, the brand makes flexible buffing sheets that are very different from the blocks that have been made in the past. This format makes them easier to manipulate, so you can get to every part of the nail—but the company warns that you mustn’t overuse them. “You can only buff your nails twice a month max,” Beauchamp says. “You don’t want to thin your nail plate too much.”
While Birchbox remained a direct-to-consumer brand, Buff is going into a mass retail chain on August 30, although the company cannot yet share which one. Beauchamp says her goal is to make these products widely available and affordable. She also points out that Gen Zers, the demographic she’s trying to reach, are getting married and having children, which means they are spending a lot of time at big-box stores.
Beauchamp says that many people prefer the look of natural nails. But for many others, this new Buff Beauty process means saving time and money. It eliminates visits to the salon and scrambling to get your nails done before a big weekend. “You might still sometimes want to get your nails done,” Beauchamp says. “But imagine not feeling like you always have to.”