AS a kid, Josh Lawlor could be found mooching around inner-city Newcastle where his late father, Paul, worked as a projectionist at the now defunct Lyrique Theatre, then as a city entertainer.
"I grew up at Dad's half the time and it was spent in town. I used to hang in Darby Street and he worked at Newcastle Elderly Citizens Centre, tucked behind the [Hunter Street] mall, he was the entertainer organising bingo and acts. I'd help him out and on breaks just wander," recalls Josh.
Lawlor also crossed paths with his life and business partner, Jason Moore, in the same 'hood.
"We met on a drunken night out while walking opposite directions through the mall way back in 2004," recalls Moore, a qualified chef and full-time high school teacher.
The duo are again back on city turf, having signed a five-year lease for a 185-square-metre space in King Street for their beauty business Scrubba Body.
"The mall ended up being a wasteland for so long but now walking down there, in the East End Stage1 area, it's funky and cool again," says Lawlor, standing in the newly tarted up city store, once the Newcastle Jets merchandise store.
Here, he and his friend and employee Brookie Candy make by hand most of their 145 products - from lip balms and bath milk soaks to face scrubs and candles. They sell their range wholesale to 140 national stockists, and retail via their website and an outlet leased monthly at Stockland Green Hills (they'll also pop up at Charlestown Square before Christmas).
Their new city shop is a big investment amid a hectic schedule in a period which Lawlor acknowledges is economically challenging for many.
"This time of year our wholesalers are ordering for Christmas and we have had nothing like we normally do. When we were setting up the new shop it took a lot of money, those four or five weeks I didn't take a wage. Jason was buying everything and his wage was covering our living. I have got my fingers crossed for Green Hills but I am noticing people are a lot more conscious of what they are spending," he says.
Scrubba Body's roots hark back to 2016, when Lawlor and Moore stood in the kitchen of their Garden Suburb home and made their first beauty product - a coffee body scrub - to help a cousin suffering eczema, which also plagues Lawlor.
"We read about coffee scrubs being good for it, and we wanted to see if our scrubs would fix it," he recalls.
"The scrub we made included ground Arabica coffee and raw sugar to exfoliate and then coconut oil and almond oil to moisturise. Then we added essential oils to make five different 'flavours' which had their own benefits."
Moore's chef qualifications came in handy as they mixed up new formulations.
"Researching what goes together and the benefits of each ingredient - I really nerd out over that," he says.
The cheeky brand name, Moore says, was "all Josh."
"He tells me it was what he called people back at school. I was actually against it at the start, but I have come around now that I can see that it adds to the 'fun' side of the business. Plus it's a definite conversation starter," Moore concedes.
TAKING THE PLUNGE
The pair made their debut at the Christmas markets of Hunter & Gather in Newcastle East in 2016.
"We underestimated how much we would sell and sold out in an hour and a half and had to stand there and look pretty for the rest of the night," recalls Lawlor, then working as a service manager at Church Air Conditioning.
"We thought, 'This is amazing, we could leave our day jobs'. But of course it was the Christmas rush. But we were like, 'OK ... maybe there should be a business'."
Growing their business online and at local and interstate markets, the pair made their first move into bricks and mortar trade by sub-letting a space in Darby Street within an existing business. In mid 2017, Lawlor became vegan and the entire Scrubba range followed suit.
In March, 2020, they took the plunge and opened their own store at Marketown West, also doing pop-ups at Green Hills and Charlestown shopping centres.
Opening a second store in late 2020 at Westfield Kotara was ambitious but Lawlor was inspired by a podcast by Boost Juice founder Janine Allis [he also read her book and saw her speak at a seminar].
"It'll sound weird but ... she's big into getting into shopping centres. That's what we started to do and then COVID ruined it," he says. "It is on the backburner, but that's still the goal."
During the pandemic, Scrubba Body's website sales "went nuts" as Australians working from home did more online shopping.
"We had Charlestown, Green Hills, Marketown and Kotara [stores] and then gradually, one by one, we just brought it back to Kotara. It was not just that shopping centres were quiet but also the people coming in were spending less. I know - I was watching my money too," says Lawlor.
During the lockdowns, Lawlor and staff member Brookie Candy, kept up with demand by manufacturing at their Kotara store. When not on the tools, Lawlor cranked up the jokes on Scrubba's social channels. Being an entertainer comes naturally, perhaps because of his father's influence and that of his mum Sharen Richards, a local karaoke host.
"It was about wanting to get away from the sell, you know, 'Here's our product, you should buy this'. The name Scrubba is never going to be super serious, why not show we are fun," he says.
BODY AND SOUL IN CITY SITE
Lawlor and Moore began to look around for a bigger retail and manufacturing site than their small Kotara bolthole after realising most of their sales were happening online and wholesale rather than in their shopping centre.
The pair were considering a site in a shed at Steel River but then the King Street site came up.
"I love the space, I love the location," says Lawlor, who worked around the clock with Moore and helpers to rip up the blue office carpet, install timber vinyl flooring and shelving and more.
"I get a high from setting up but it costs a lot of money. We did two years at Kotara and it went quick, so I was like, 'This time around, let's do five years. I want to be somewhere long-term where customers can find me. It's an investment."
The King Street site will serve as Scrubba Body's retail and production base and a creative hub.
A self-described chatterbox, Lawlor will get plenty of chances to chew the fat when he resumes the business podcast Got A Queery, interviewing LBGTQIA+ business owners around Australia. Tucked behind the reception is a sound-proofed podcast room, inspired by his decision to attend the Newcastle Podcast Festival with his old friend and Scrubba staffer Hayley McDonnell, who co-hosts the podcast with him.
"While we were there we thought, 'Why don't we do something on small business and interview queer small business people, like how does being queer tie into running a business', and so on," he says.
So how does being queer tie into Scrubba for Lawlor?
"Predominantly in the field we are in it's women running businesses in self-care, bath and body," he says. "Over the years, people have mentioned that it's weird to see a guy running a beauty business. It'll sound stereotypical, but as soon as I put on the little gay voice and say, 'I'm not your regular guy!' They are like, 'Oh, I get it...'."
Interviewees on the Got A Queery Podcast included popular Hunter drag queen Timberlina, Secret Book Stuff founders Amy Lovat and Laura Kebby and The Amazing Race winners Tim Sattler and Rod Jones.
Podcasts aside, the King Street store has a retail shop, an area for workshops, and a production area that is split in two behind curtains - one room for making and packing products, and a kitchen area still being built.
Most of Scrubba Body's range - natural, vegan, cruelty-free and ultimately fun - is made by hand on site.
"We started to outsource a few things, then figured it's cheaper to do it in house, and we have more control," Lawlor says.
Last year Scrubba launched its sister vegan brand, Hey Hudson pet food, named in tribute of Lawlor and Moore's labrador, who died a year ago.
"He was with us 14 years, " says Lawlor, setting up in the production area to make some of its shampoo.
"We noticed that a lot of natural shampoos and conditioners had things that weren't vegan. It's a premium product."
He reckons Scrubba Body's point of difference, beyond being vegan and hand-made locally, lies in the fun factor upon application.
Some of their body scrubs and oils "leave you shimmery" using a naturally shimmery powdered stone called mica. "Then we have the lip balms which are fun because of the ball shape, so many people get excited when they realise that," he says. "Our lip scrubs are also sugar-based, so you can scrub them on and then eat/lick them off."
Sales have been strong at the new site as Lawlor and Moore finish the production space. Any big business decisions can wait until after Santa comes.
"That's as far as our goals go, just to see what Christmas brings," Lawlor says.
"In January, we'll sit down and figure out which direction the business is going in. Our stockists and online customers keep us going month to month. Do we focus more on that, or do we do permanent shopping centres again? We'll see."
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