Ep 23: Hannah Diop, Sienna Naturals - Creating Clean High-Performance Hair Care

May 18

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Growing up in a community where textured hair is misunderstood and labeled difficult to tame is an experience many textured hair women can relate to.

In today’s episode, I chatted with Hannah Diop, Founder, and CEO of Sienna Naturals, a clean, planet-based textured haircare brand. Hannah’s story is quite intriguing, and we chatted about how her hair care journey led her to create a solution for the challenges many textured hair women experience.

Raised by a white mother, who didn’t quite know how to manage Hannah’s hair but who encouraged her to embrace it was a great foundation. In addition, Hannah had several allergies and sensitivities as a child and her mother made sure that health and wellness were priorities in their household.

In a bid to help her daughter get a grip on her hair, Hannah’s mother purchased natural hair care products, yet nothing seemed to work for Hannah’s hair texture. Being a child athlete living in Minnesota did not help matters as she constantly had to wash her hair, and usually ended up with a dry and brittle mess.

After a family visit to Kenya, Hannah discovered the versatility of textured hair. She was introduced to relaxers and convinced her parents to let her get a perm at twelve, The outcome was unhealthy hair.

After losing her mother to cancer while pregnant with her first child, she was motivated to start the business she had nursed for years. A business was born out of her personal hair struggles, inspired and propelled by a personal loss. Sienna Naturals, named after a beautiful brown clay representing femininity and cleanness, was created with Hannah’s family and future generations in mind.

Hannah’s goal is for people who purchase her products to own the narrative around their hair. She truly believes that hair is a huge part of Black and Brown people's identities. While in elementary school, she experienced two extremes: people were either fascinated by her hair or teased her about it.

I call Hannah and her brand sleeping giants because she has been in business for about nine years and still going strong. She is the prime example of a forerunner. She dared to be different and brought her vision of revolutionizing the textured hair industry to life. It took Hannah two years to develop and launch her first set of hair products.

In 2020, Sienna Naturals experienced a rebirth when Hannah partnered with Issa Rae as a co-owner of the brand. Through it all, Hannah has remained loyal to her goal of creating products that were not only made for performance but with healthy hair as the ultimate goal.

Her story is one of resilience and she describes the entrepreneurial journey as a marathon and not a sprint.

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About Hannah Diop:

Hannah Diop is the founder and CEO of Sienna Naturals. Sienna Naturals is setting a new standard for clean, plant-based performance in the textured hair care industry, one that is focused on hair and scalp health. Just like a skincare regimen, Sienna Naturals products create Wash Day Rituals that keep textured hair and scalp healthy, enabling customers to see immediate improvement and wear their hair in all of the magnificent and diverse ways people with kinks, curls, frizz, waves, and texture choose - without compromising on ingredients.

To create Sienna Naturals, Hannah harnessed the values of her upbringing and the skills of her business background. She spent weekends researching ingredients found in nature and proven by science to improve wellness outcomes for textured hair and scalp. She worked alongside cosmetic chemists, made, tweaked, and tested product formulations until a line of clean products that significantly outperformed competitors was born.

Hannah Diop holds an MBA from Wharton and was a strategy consultant at McKinsey & Company, where she worked for clients in big box retail and OTC Pharmaceuticals. Hannah is also a mother of two young children and is proud to lead a more than 80% woman-led company. She lives in Los Angeles, CA.

To connect further with Sienna Naturals:
Visit the Sienna Naturals website: https://www.siennanaturals.com/
Follow Sienna Naturals on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/siennanaturals/?hl=en
Follow Sienna Naturals on Twitter: https://twitter.com/siennanaturals
Follow Sienna Naturals on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SiennaNaturals/
Connect with Sienna Naturals on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/sienna-naturals/

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