Richualist Mint Cuts Textured Hair Styling Time to 10 Minutes
Richualist's Mint cuts textured-hair styling from 80 minutes to 7 to 10, while reducing breakage and shedding by up to 70% using warmed refillable product pods.
Summary
Dawn Myers conceived Richualist about eight years ago after watching a curly-hair pitch on Shark Tank, then assembled an early prototype from Ace Hardware and CVS supplies. Its Mint tool detangles, conditions, applies gel and styles textured hair in one stroke using refillable pods and gentle warming. Myers says Mint cuts her 80-minute routine to 7 to 10 minutes and reduces shedding and breakage by up to 70%. A travel size is also available. Dow provided engineering and manufacturing support after discovering the prototype through an accelerator, while Richualist conducted missing research on textured-hair product usage during five years of development.
Myers sold her home and liquidated her 401(k), ultimately bringing in about $1.4 million to commercialize and validate Mint and becoming one of the first 100 Black women to raise more than $1 million in venture funding. She faced investors and beauty executives unfamiliar with wash day and R&D teams lacking people with her experience. After a stage 3 colorectal cancer diagnosis in 2022, she closed funding while receiving chemotherapy at Johns Hopkins. Myers applied to Shark Tank in 2023, appeared that year, and secured backing from Mark Cuban and Emma Grede when the episode aired in 2024. Grede helped formally launch Mint and bring it to Ulta online in 2026. Richualist is preparing to market itself as sold out, planning further expansion, and joining the 2026 Startup Battlefield 200 and Disrupt in San Francisco from October 13 to 15.
Positives
- Mint reduces an approximately 80-minute wash and styling routine to 7 to 10 minutes, according to Dawn Myers.
- Shedding and breakage fall by up to 70% because Mint reduces repeated pulling during detangling and styling, Myers says.
- Dow supplied engineering and manufacturing expertise after encountering Richualist through a startup accelerator.
- About $1.4 million in funding enabled Richualist to commercialize and validate Mint after five years of development.
- Mark Cuban and Emma Grede backed Myers on Shark Tank, with Grede later helping Mint reach Ulta online in 2026.
- Startup Battlefield 200 selected Richualist for its 2026 cohort and a Disrupt appearance in San Francisco.
Risks & concerns
- Myers sold her home and liquidated her 401(k) because hardware serving textured hair proved exceptionally difficult to finance.
- Beauty executives did not understand wash day, while R&D teams lacked people sharing Myers's experience with textured hair.
- Richualist had to generate basic product-usage research because relevant textured-hair data did not exist.
- A stage 3 colorectal cancer diagnosis in 2022 forced Myers to close funding while undergoing chemotherapy at Johns Hopkins.
- Further expansion still requires scaling an expensive hardware product built for a market investors previously considered niche.