Jo Malone

This founder was putting food on the table at 11, lost her sense of smell to cancer, and still sold her perfume brand to Estée Lauder for millions.

Jo Malone grew up in a two-up, two-down council house in Bexleyheath.

By age 11, she was her family’s breadwinner.

Her father was an artist… and a compulsive gambler.

Her mum had a stroke before Jo hit her teens.

She sold her dad’s paintings on Saturdays.

Read poker cards for him on Sundays.

And during the week?

She replicated her mum’s face creams and sold them to clients in London for £4.50 a pot.

She didn’t know the word “entrepreneur.”

She just needed to make £20 to keep the lights on.

In her 20s, she became a facialist.

But scent was always her secret weapon.

She hand-mixed fragrances for clients and launched her first official scent (Nutmeg & Ginger) in 1990.

That was the beginning of Jo Malone London.

She introduced the world to fragrance layering.

And in 1999, Estée Lauder came knocking.

They bought the brand, and her name, for “undisclosed millions.”

She stayed on as Creative Director.

But in 2003, Jo was diagnosed with an aggressive, life-threatening breast cancer.

The chemo saved her life. But it wiped out her sense of smell.
Imagine being a painter who can’t see.

Or a singer who can’t hear.

That’s what scent was to her.

She walked away from the business she built.

And due to a non-compete, she was legally locked out of the fragrance industry for five years.

She calls them her “wilderness years.”

But one morning, five years to the day, her sense of smell came back.

Everything smelled different: the walls, the sheets, her own skin.

She was ready to create again.

In 2011, she launched her second act: Jo Loves.

The first fragrance? Jo by Jo Loves, the first scent she ever put her name on voluntarily.

She introduced the Fragrance Paintbrush™, a gel-based, brush-on scent.

It went viral.

In 2025, she also launched Jo Vodka: a luxury spirits brand built like a perfume house.

Three vodkas.

The Purist (101), The Bohemian (102), and The Artist (103).

Each designed with scent notes, storylines, and scent strips.

You smelled them before you sipped them.

She calls it her “gap year” at 60.

Living in Dubai. Traveling the world. Meeting distillers. Exploring ingredients.

Creating from scratch. Again.