Meghan Markle just wants to make others “happy.”
The Duchess of Sussex explained in a new podcast interview why she didn’t get into the fashion or beauty business as expected — instead choosing to put out her lifestyle brand, As Ever — after her and Prince Harry’s exit from the royal family.
Markle, 43, acknowledged that while the “natural inclination” was for her to get into those spaces, that’s not what she wanted to do daily as it wasn’t her passion.
“I knew that I wanted to put something in the world for years — and we’ve been out here for five years now — really trying to decipher, ‘What do I want to share?’ What do I really want to authentically, organically share and how do I translate that?” she said on Tuesday’s episode of the “Aspire” podcast.
The answer was her much talked-about raspberry jam.
“Truth be told, I had just been making a lot of jams and preserves at home and I was sharing them as holiday gifts with friends. … So many friends at the same time texted, saying, ‘I don’t know what it is but your jam makes me so happy!’ And I go, ‘Maybe that’s the thing.’”
She noted that she’s always loved cooking and being in the kitchen. While her initial plan was to start small with As Ever, it was taken to a global level when she partnered with Netflix for her lifestyle show, “With Love, Meghan.”
“[It went] far beyond my ideas of, ‘Oh I can sell locally, like, get a farmer’s market,’ like, I thought that would be cute,” she said with a laugh. “So suddenly it just changed quite a bit and the offerings will expand to meet that same demand and that interest, which I’m grateful for.”
The mother of two also shared on the podcast that she’s had an entrepreneurial spirit from a young age. She sold scrunchies she made out of fabric she bought in downtown Los Angeles with her allowance when she was in the fifth or sixth grade, charging $1.
Now, As Ever is quickly expanding. She could be planning to add hotels and restaurants to her brand after trademarking it for “hospitality services,” according to documents obtained by Page Six earlier this month.
And she hasn’t ruled out branching into fashion in the future. Her style choices are still closely watched and often later sell out.
Markle has had her own strong opinions on her fashion and beauty looks even before becoming a royal. She recently revealed that she chose to sport her natural hair on “Suits” instead of taking the professional advice that she wear a wig on set to protect her strands.
“I was on ‘Suits’ for seven years, and I remember so many other actresses — especially if you’re in that grind — they said, ‘You are going to fry your hair.’ Everyone was recommending that I should start wearing wigs,” she told Beyoncé’s mother, Tina Knowles, on her “Confessions of a Female Founder” podcast earlier this month.
Markle said she “never ended up doing it,” though admitted she might have considered it had she been “in that industry longer.”
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