#INTERVIEW: Inside The World of The Middle East’s Homegrown Powerhouse

In an already flourishing beauty market that is often defined by rapid trends and salon-finish perfection, it takes a certain X-Factor to be able to stand out. With her roots in Lebanon and vision strongly anchored in the UAE, Youma Khoury brings forward: Youmi Beauty. From a loyal digital following to a high-performing product line spanning lenses, lashes, hair extensions and body care, her trajectory reflects her hold-held passion for the art and craft of this business. Here, Youmna opens up about her brand’s rise, her rock solid ethos and the future of beauty.

Delna Mistry Anand: Starting at the grass root level of the beauty business, you built a loyal digital community and then evolved into a full beauty brand. What key mindset or skill helped you shift from service-based business to product-based entrepreneurship?

Youma Khoury: The mindset that guided my transition was understanding that authenticity is a long-term strategy. I built my community by showing up consistently as myself and sharing my style, my routine and my passion for beauty. That transparency created trust long before any product existed and became the foundation of Youmi Beauty. Transitioning from a salon environment to a product-based brand required a different level of discipline. In a service business, you perfect an experience and in a product business, you perfect a solution. What helped me grow was my ability to understand my audience deeply and translate their needs into high-quality products with speed, precision and intention.

I have always been Youmi Beauty’s first customer. I only create products I personally use and love. My audience trusts my taste because I’ve shared my daily life with them for years, and that trust made the evolution from creator to founder feel natural. My business background and the experience I gained collaborating with global luxury brands such as Cartier, YSL, Level Shoes, FARFETCH and MAKEUP FOREVER gave me a strong foundation in branding, product quality and customer experience. And my early life experience growing up in an orphanage taught me resilience, consistency and the ability to build something from nothing. Those values shaped my approach to entrepreneurship more than anything else.

The Middle East beauty market is booming, and with Dubai positioning itself as a global beauty hub, what opportunities and challenges do you see building and scaling your brand?

Dubai is a city built for ambition. It gives founders visibility, access and a sophisticated consumer who is curious, trend-aware and eager to try new things. That kind of environment accelerates growth because it pushes you to deliver excellence at every level. For a beauty brand, that energy is unmatched, but the same pace that creates opportunity also creates pressure. Trends evolve overnight, competition is global and standards are exceptionally high. You cannot slow down and you must innovate constantly, refine your logistics, keep your content fresh and operate at a world-class level every single day.

Relocating Youmi Beauty to the UAE in 2020 allowed us to scale faster while staying connected to our Lebanese identity. The GCC was key to our growth, especially Saudi Arabia, which represents more than half of our audience. This region truly embraces homegrown brands, but it demands consistency, quality and real innovation. So in that sense, what makes this landscape challenging is also what makes it exciting.

Each Youmi Beauty product line has earned strong consumer trust. Can you walk us through the inspiration, development journey and performance promise behind your contact lenses, lashes, hair extensions and now body and care?

Every Youmi Beauty product begins with a personal experience, I have always created what I wished existed! I could never find natural-looking lenses that complemented different skin tones, including shades inspired by my father’s blue eyes, so I created them. I wanted lashes that offered volume and drama but felt lightweight enough to wear all day, so we perfected them. My obsession with voluminous, full-length hair inspired our extensions, designed to maintain the same thickness from root to tip. And the body-care line came from wanting everyday essentials that feel luxurious, sensorial, and still accessible.

The development journey is very hands-on. We test relentlessly, focus on formulas that perform, and ensure every texture, shade, fit and detail meets international standards. My experience working with global luxury brands taught me the importance of refinement. Nothing launches unless it is something I use myself and something that genuinely elevates a woman’s confidence.

The performance promise behind every Youmi Beauty product is consistent: authenticity, comfort, quality, and high performance. Women trust us because they know every product is created with intention and built to deliver results.

Has any specific feedback or customer moment impacted you to shape or influence your product standards going forward?

The feedback that impacts me the most is when women share how our products make them feel. A customer once told me she finally found lenses that look naturally beautiful on her skin tone. Another shared that our lashes gave her salon-quality results at home. Many comment on details that matter to them, like extensions that stay full, from top to bottom or packaging that feels luxurious and thoughtful.

These moments remind me why every detail is important. They shape how I approach product development and push me to keep refining until something feels perfect. I read feedback every day because I see customers as collaborators. They help guide what we create next and how we improve. Their trust has shaped the standards Youmi Beauty stands for today.

With global brands constantly mushrooming in this region, how do you stay focused and grounded in this buoyant landscape?

What keeps me grounded the most is my upbringing. Growing up in an orphanage for 12 years gave me discipline, perspective and an understanding of purpose. It inspired the Youmi Beauty Charity Foundation, where we donate 25 percent of profits to support orphanages and humanitarian causes in Lebanon and Syria. Giving back is not marketing for me, it is extremely personal. When you are driven by service, competition becomes background noise. I didn’t create Youmi Beauty to compete with global brands, I created it to serve a community of women who weren’t being represented or spoken to directly.

I remain fully involved in every detail of the brand. I oversee textures, shades, formulas, packaging, campaign direction and the storytelling behind every launch. This hands-on approach keeps me deeply connected to our identity and the consumer who helped build this brand alongside me.