When you’re starting a business, it’s easy to feel like everything needs to be polished from day one. A proper launch, paid ads, a perfect website, some kind of instant momentum.

I definitely felt that. But the reality of how I started Tenth Muse was much simpler.

I did a few markets and one small pop-up. Nothing fancy, just a table, the product, and a lot of explaining. It was the most direct way to get in front of people and see if anyone actually cared.

I spent hours talking to people, explaining what solid perfume was, why I made it, how to use it. You end up having the same conversations again and again, and that’s where things start to shift. You notice what people understand straight away and what you have to over-explain. You see which scents people pick up instinctively and which ones they hesitate on. You start to hear the same questions and the same reactions.

That’s where a lot of the brand came from. Not from sitting down trying to define it, but from simplifying things until they made sense to someone seeing it for the first time.

The pop-up felt like a step forward. It was more considered and closer to how the brand could live in a retail space. But the value was the same. Watching what people picked up, what they ignored, and what they came back for.

If you’re at the beginning, I’d really recommend doing something like this, even if it feels small. It doesn’t scale, but it forces you to get close to the customer early on. You can’t hide behind branding or a screen. If something isn’t landing, you’ll feel it straight away, and if it is, you’ll see that too.

Looking back, those markets and that early pop-up weren’t just about making a few sales. They were where the brand actually started to take shape.