Leslie Marino has spent the last 34 years cultivating brands across the L’Oréal portfolio, establishing a reputation for elevating products and driving innovations that set unprecedented standards.
Now, as the first female U.S. president of L’Oréal Professional Products division, Marino is leveraging her wealth of experience to shape an extensive portfolio of brands including Biolage Professional, Kérastase, L’Oréal Professionnel, L’Oréal Technique, Matrix, Mizani, Pulp Riot, Pureology, Redken and Shu Uemura Art of Hair. Her influence reaches far beyond these iconic brands as she leads transformative initiatives across commercial, digital, education and business development activities that are critical to expanding U.S. reach and driving global growth.
Under Marino’s leadership, brands have flourished with innovation. Redken Shades EQ became the number-one demi-permanent hair color for more than a decade after she instituted a business model that led to years of extraordinary sales growth; ultimately resulting in Redken becoming the number-one brand in the U.S. professional market today.
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Her tenure has also seen the redefinition of sustainability practices, championing of texture-inclusive education and technology-driven innovation.
Reflecting on the industry’s evolution, Marino told Fairchild Studio that especially in the last 14 years, she has “witnessed remarkable transformation across the industry,” and is continuing to shape the future of beauty by tapping into her collective experience with a new school mentality.
In this exclusive interview, Leslie Marino shares with Fairchild Studio the insights gained from her tenure at L’Oréal, her mission to empower the next generation of women in the industry, and her bold vision for the future of professional beauty.
Fairchild Studio: How does it feel to celebrate 34 years at L’Oréal?
Leslie Marino: In my 34 years at L’Oréal, I’ve witnessed remarkable transformations in our industry, it’s been a phenomenal journey. Starting in luxury and moving into professional, I’ve learned the importance of innovation, adaptability and community, as we strive to bring high-quality beauty solutions to all. In the professional industry, there has been a profound shift toward more sophisticated hair care routines for all hair types and textures. In our division, we always keep the stylist and our consumers at the heart of our efforts. Through programs like the Texture of Change, we have led historic legislative changes that have marked significant progress in our mission to serve every client with expertise and care. We’re also expanding beyond the walls of traditional salons with an omnichannel approach. Through B2B platforms, we increase proximity and better serve 1.4 million hairstylists. To satisfy premium hair care consumers, we’re scaling through e-commerce, specialty retail and Amazon.
Fairchild Studio: What has been your proudest moment during your time at L’Oréal?
L.M.: One of my proudest moments as president has been driving change for inclusivity through our education initiatives. Hair is deeply personal. All individuals deserve to be welcomed, understood and cared for when they seek out hair services. For too long, the care of textured hair has been left out of required training programs for hairstylists, leaving more than 65 percent of our U.S. population underrepresented. In 2021, we launched the Texture Mastery program, the first free cosmetology curriculum to upskill beauty school instructors and students in textured hair care.
By 2023, we expanded our efforts through the Texture of Change movement, providing open access to textured hair education and resources. This movement, in partnership with the Professional Beauty Association, has led multiple states to adopt texture-inclusive education standards and legislation that ensures all stylists are prepared to serve their clients.
Our role in passing new, inclusive texture legislation is not only a historic achievement, but it holds special significance for me in this role. It’s a major victory toward our goal to ensure that everyone in the U.S. can receive the expertise they deserve in every salon and from every stylist.
Fairchild Studio: Have you seen change during your tenure of women taking on leadership roles within the beauty industry? How do you work to empower other women?
L.M.: When I started at L’Oréal, there were very few female role models balancing executive roles and family life — I made the decision that I was going to do both without compromise. I became fiercely protective of my personal time, so I learned to be purposeful with my work time and focus my energy solely on what can create real progress.
My mentors exemplified how to successfully navigate a long-term career that requires a skilled understanding of the business and broader company landscape. I was inspired to follow in their footsteps and offer myself as a source to others and pay it forward, to continue building the path blazed for women in our company. Today, I treasure those personal exchanges and moments of truth with other women and hope to inspire the career trajectory of the next generation of leaders.
If not for mentorship, I would not be in my position today. As a woman in this fast-paced business, there is a responsibility to champion and endorse other women through pivotal career moments. For me, it’s a truly personal and reciprocal experience, uplifting one another during the most vulnerable times.
Fairchild Studio: Having worked with several brands across L’Oréal, what do you think makes a brand successful with today’s beauty consumer?
L.M.: Listening to your consumer. Placing the customer at the center of all conversations is the only way to drive revenue and sustain growth in today’s crowded marketplace. Our teams spend countless hours in meticulous research to ensure we have the best market insights, in order to understand what the consumer is looking for and how to continuously delight them. When taking on a new brand or responsibility, we need to understand the customer data to inform our strategy. Our goal is to be accessible wherever consumers choose to shop. It’s essential to seamlessly connect with a diverse and expansive customer base through an omnichannel approach.
We are winning in the market due to the strength of our premium brands and consumer connection. We produce four of the top 10 selling consumer brands in prestige. Redken — a 10-year industry leader focused on efficacy and built on the science of hair — became the number-one professional hair care brand in both pro and consumer channels. Kérastase became the top hair brand at Sephora and launched in 2023 as an Amazon 3P retailer with state-of-the-art luxury brand stores and pages.
We’re not just leading the market — we’re setting the standard for excellence at every touchpoint.
Fairchild Studio: How are you working to foster a sense of innovation?
L.M.: Professional products founded the L’Oréal group more than 110 years ago with the first safe synthetic hair dye. A young chemist with an entrepreneurial spirit formulated the dye and sold it to Parisian hairdressers, which the founder of the Groupe used to forge the first link in what is still the DNA of L’Oréal: “research and innovation in the service of beauty.” Today, we continue the legacy of servicing and reinventing the professional beauty industry with an entrepreneurial spirit.
We are modernizing the industry with superior products, powered by research and advanced technology. Today’s salons and stylists are looking for solutions that are timeless and sustainable, but also provide the best experience for their guests.
As the industry leader, we have a responsibility to be a catalyst for change by preparing stylists for tomorrow’s clients. We remain focused on identifying new trends, creating opportunities that benefit all communities and helping to pioneer the next generation of talent.
Fairchild Studio: How would you describe this younger, next-gen consumer that is gaining in purchase power and how are you reaching them?
L.M.: In PPD, we foster relationships and lasting loyalty with the next-gen consumer by prioritizing an accessible digital presence. Our goal is for shoppers to easily discover our brands through a social and advocacy strategy. We’re embracing authentic influencer marketing, delivering detailed product education with transparency, and creating personalized experiences, online and offline.
Social media, especially TikTok, has become pivotal in driving beauty product popularity. Today is a digital era where influencers and viral content can make or break beauty trends. We’re driving revenue by meeting the consumers where they are with high-performing and award-winning hair care formulas. Pureology is a great example of this, engaging with its shoppers through social media with relatable, user-generated content and creator collaborations with their bestselling color protection treatment systems, generating a new level of reach.
Fairchild Studio: What trends do you expect to see take hold of the beauty industry going forward?
L.M.: We are more cutting-edge than ever, shaping the future of professional beauty, providing accessible solutions specific to the changing consumer lifestyles and adapting to the evolving market. The industry will increasingly focus on digital advancements and technology. So we will continue to leverage data to provide personalized options and enhance customer satisfaction across this $70 billion professional market. AI will play a crucial role in boosting personalization and education quality for salons and stylists. It’s important that through our partnerships, we continue investing in inclusivity, sustainability, tech-enhanced solutions and holistic wellness for the growth of our professional beauty community. Because after all, our people are our future.