Makeup Company, Shaina B. Miami, Is Being Run Right Here In College Park
By Ashlynn Shumer
October 4, 2022
Image Credit: The Campus Trainer
20 percent have already started a business of their own while in college, according to ZenBusiness. Here in Maryland, students are running businesses out of dorm rooms, apartment buildings, and more. Shaina Bassan, a junior marketing major here at the University of Maryland, is running her highly successful makeup business, Shaina B. Miami, right from her apartment in College Park.
Bassan got into makeup around age 13 when she began struggling with acne. She loved to experiment with different products and see what worked best for her. Her parents were in the beauty business growing up, selling perfumes and other cosmetics, so she was familiar with the field already.
“They’ve been in the business for over 25 years now, so I’ve always kind of been surrounded with the understanding of running a business,” says Bassan.
She brought the idea up to her family as a sort of joke but started to realize her idea could materialize into something special.
She released makeup brushes as her first product at age 15 and released her first eyeshadow palette at age 16. Bassan used social media as her main source of advertising, as well as reaching out to newspapers and subscription services including Ipsy.
Ipsy is a monthly subscription service that provides subscribers with a makeup bag of five cosmetics samples, including Shaina B. Cosmetics products.
“They really liked smaller products because… the bigger products are difficult to fit in these boxes,” she explains, “so what they ended up doing with a lot of our products is they would take like two or three shades from an eyeshadow palette and make … a mini for us.”
“I met Shaina last semester,” says UMD junior hearing and speech science major, Elinor Lugassy. “When I found out that she was the Shaina B. behind Shaina B. Cosmetics, I was so shocked, I literally had like three of her products sitting in my bathroom at the time.”
Bassan’s line currently offers a variety of products, including eyeshadows, makeup brushes, travel bags, value bundles, and more.
“She’s one of my closest college friends,” says sophomore psychology major, Alexis Silhavy. “I see how much she cares about the business and it’s really inspiring.”
Now that Bassan is a full-time college student, her involvement in the brand has changed a bit.
“When it first started, I was heavily, heavily, heavily, involved particularly in social media and product placement, product creation, product development. Over time, because we've grown so much, we've been able to expand the brand to where we have some people to help out with social media, developing the brand, and other day-to-day stuff.”
Balancing school and her involvement with Shaina B.Cosmetics has been a challenge for her, but one that she is confident will be worth it.
“At the end of the day, we all just have kind of like the same passions, which is to create qualitative products that everyone could just like love and enjoy.”