It was built by two people who had been failed by systems they trusted, who decided to start something better.
Yvonne and Mike arrived here by very different paths, but with the same core belief: kindness isn’t a side effect, it’s the foundation. Want to know where madkind really came from?
Start with their stories.
yvonne's story.
madkind didn’t start with a business plan, it started with a question:
what if kindness came first?
For me, that question began in childhood, when I instinctively gravitated toward the kids no one else would sit with. Kindness wasn’t a strategy; it was survival, it was truth, it was my compass. It still is.
From corporate leadership to clarity
Before madkind, I spent years leading large corporate teams: 1,000+ tenants, 20+ direct reports, a million plus square feet. I loved solving problems, mentoring the under-confident, and creating space for people to thrive.
Then I was bullied. Stripped of authority. Let down by the very policies designed to protect people like me. That betrayal didn’t break me... but it woke me up.
At the same time, I was watching Mike’s story unfold – his strength, his integrity, and the systems that failed him. And I thought: If the whole thing is a lie, how can we change it? We weren’t broken.
And we aren’t the types that give up.
Beauty with backbone
I’ve loved beauty since I was 16, selling Avon door-to-door. But I watched the industry drift: celebrity lines, hollow promises, endless profit with zero give-back.
I turned our front room into a breaking bad lab during covid and really started to look at building on my childhood dream and I began asking: what if we could flip the model?
What if beauty could be clear and honest, designed for all, and generous by design? What if we could build the opposite of what we’d both endured?
We made the brand we couldn't find.
madkind is that answer.
What we’re building and why
madkind isn’t about selling perfection. It’s about creating joy, confidence, and products that give back – to your skin, your identity, and your community.
We ask questions first. We build based on what people want. And we hold ourselves to the commitments in our madifesto. We build everything - our products, processes and policies – based on these principles.
The beauty of purpose
When someone opens a madkind product, I want them to feel joy, recognition, delight. To understand that kindness lives in the formula, the packaging, and the pay-it-forward model behind the scenes.
A year from now, I hope people aren’t just loving the products – I hope they feel the values behind them. That maybe, just maybe, a little ripple of madkindness is showing up in their own lives – proof that pretty, when paired with purpose, can make noise in all the right ways. That we’ve started something quietly radical.
Because success, for us, isn’t about what we accumulate.
It’s about what we ignite.
Yvonne
CEO & Co-founder, madkind
mike's story.
from the cockpit to clean beauty with the same non-negotiable standards.
For most of my life, my office was 35,000 feet above the ground. In that world, accountability wasn’t optional – every system, every decision, every checklist mattered.
When the structures built to protect truth and safety all failed, I learned something harder: they weren’t broken. They were working exactly as designed.
You either take the blue pill and look away or build something better from scratch.
For Yvonne and I, that awakening came after corporate careers promising safety and fairness delivered betrayal, bullying, and danger all hidden behind glossy slogans and fuelled by greed.
By the time we walked away, we were financially secure. We could have chosen the easy option: retire, travel, tune out. But that’s not us.
Why beauty and why now?
madkind didn’t start as a business plan or a protest.
It started during COVID, when Yvonne revisited her childhood, Avon-fuelled dream and merged it with our shared determination to build something worthwhile – the opposite of everything we’d seen inside the system.
It became our purpose: let’s prove ethical business can thrive.
Not through or for perfection, but through transparency, generosity, and backbone.
The madkind way: A flight plan for change.
I wrote our madifesto the way I once wrote flight plans – with intention, safety checks, and integrity at every waypoint.
Our products are high quality, effective, vegan and not tested on animals.
Our give-back model is non-negotiable: 25 % + of net profits go straight to community causes.
No flashy PR - just receipts, proof, and follow-through.
madkind is built to be held accountable.
We don’t just invite it – we expect it.
The do-the-right-thing revolution.
We’re not here to shout about what’s wrong with beauty, business, or tech. We’re here to build what’s right – patiently, transparently, and with heart.
The next revolution won’t be powered by rage or dopamine hits. We believe it will be powered by awareness – emotional intelligence, conscious design, and collective care.
Every product, every decision, every act of kindness adds up to something bigger: a new kind of human algorithm – calm, compassionate, contagious.
Because doing the right thing isn’t loud. It’s consistent. And every act of kindness should create another.
If we live this madifesto every day – in our products, our partnerships, and our policies – others will start expecting the same.
That’s how change scales: not with outrage or perfection, but with awareness, purpose, and proof.
READ THE MADIFESTO
madkind is more than skincare.
It’s a test case – a challenge – proof that business can care and still succeed.
We want people to expect more from the companies they support, to stop tolerating doublespeak, to demand kindness as a baseline, not a tagline.
If we get this right, it won’t just change beauty.
It’ll show that ethical business – real ethical business – can spark a quiet, unstoppable revolution.
And if we’re still around to see it, the trees we’re planting now will give shade to every soul who stood with madkind.
Mike
CFO / COO & Co-founder, madkind
ps. I’m still pursuing the restoration of safety in aviation, but that’s a story for another time. ; )
