Unless you live under a rock, you’ve heard of Marianna Hewitt: tastemaker, style icon, and co-founder of popular skincare line, Summer Fridays.
With over 1 million followers, Marianna has established herself as a leading voice in social media.
Hewitt began her beauty career in 2012, starting as an influencer with the highly popular blog Life with Me (Marianna Elizabeth).
Later on, she added a YouTube channel to share product recommendations, before ultimately deciding to create her own.
In 2018, alongside her partner Lauren Ireland, Marianna launched Summer Fridays with the ever-so-popular Jet Lag Mask, which is still a best seller for them today.
Hewitt also hosts Life with Marianna, a weekly podcast where she chats with her network of influencers, brand founders, and personalities to inspire you to live your best life.
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In addition to her beauty expertise and Summer Fridays community, Marianna has become a go-to source for entertaining advice for her followers and podcast listeners.
Just in time for entertaining season, we sat down with Marianna to discuss her essentials for hosting, her partnership with Astral Tequila, and more!
Not only are you a widely-recognized content creator, but co-founder of popular skincare line, Summer Fridays. How do you juggle wearing so many different hats?
I’m able to do all my various jobs because of the incredible team of people who help me in all areas of my career. Within our company - Lauren Ireland and I are the founders of Summer Fridays, but we have the best of the best team working to make all of our dreams and the vision for the brand possible. We spend time each day working on the brand, but our teams fully dedicate their time to make everything you see possible.
With my influencer and podcast work, it’s always a juggle of trying to fit everything into my schedule. Unlike a brand, this work is a personal brand so you naturally cannot delegate as much. The best way I’ve found was advice I learned on my podcast. A few guests including Emma Grede and Barbara Corcoran shared that they plan their days by a certain type of work. I started doing this over a year ago and it really helps me focus on what I have to do that day and then also makes it easy to schedule which type of work goes into what day on my calendar.
How does your role as a digital influencer provide you with the proper tools for entrepreneurship?
Being an influencer you wear many hats. You are the social media manager, community manager, copywriter, photographer, videographer, editor, accountant, marketing team, and many more roles. Often creators are a team of one, or maybe a handful of additional people who work alongside them to create content but it's often small teams and you’re working on various projects, with tight deadlines and lots of briefs to follow.
From a decade of doing this as a career, I learned to be scrappy and do many things with a limited team which was so essential to us when we started our company. Being able to be our own social media team and marketing experts led us to create a brand that would resonate with us.
Your social media influence dates all the way back to 2012. How have you remained authentic to your roots, while continuing to evolve and adapt to the times?
I’ve always shared beauty products and some of the first brands I posted about (Laura Mercier, BeautyBlender, Anastasia Beverly Hills) all still remain in my beauty routine today. I was genuinely sharing the things I loved online, not knowing at the time that it would be a career, but because I wanted my community to try the products I was so obsessed with.
That core belief still remains true today, and it brings me so much joy to recommend something that makes someone feel more confident, happy, or joyful. That same love of other products led us to create our own brand. But as my career has evolved and I’ve grown from my 20s to my 30s, I wanted to create content that inspired me in an even more meaningful way which is when my podcast, Life with Marianna, was born.
As the co-founder of Summer Fridays, what is one piece of advice you would give to aspiring female entrepreneurs?
There is no perfect time, so when you feel called to do something just start! And before starting a business, think about what your strengths are and that will help guide what the team around you may need to look like. We have no ego in knowing that there are so many things we don’t know, so in time we grew a team to support us in all the ways we needed.
In addition to your beauty expertise and Summer Fridays community, you’ve become a go-to source for entertaining advice. Can you share some hosting tips for the upcoming holiday season?
I like to pre-plan as much as possible so that when guests are over, you aren’t prepping things as they arrive. One of my favorite things to do is to mix and batch my cocktails ahead of time and create a little area where guests can help themselves. Amazon has really beautiful pitchers that you can pre-mix different drinks and all they have to do is pour! You can make small plates with garnishes for guests to customize.
Tell me about your partnership with Astral Tequila.
I love to host my friends and family, so I’m so excited to be partnering with Astral Tequila to share some of my favorite entertaining tips. My go-to drink is a spicy margarita, it’s something I enjoy all year long and the citrus notes of Asral make for a perfect taste in my favorite drink. Astral also upcycles the leftover agave from their production into bricks which are then used to build homes in Mexico, so not only is it delicious, I feel good supporting their company!
What is your favorite cocktail recipe for the holidays?
The only cocktails I’ll drink is something with tequila, so thinking about a variation of a Paloma was something I thought my friends would love this holiday season. We created a Bruleed Paloma with Astral Tequila Blanco that’s easy to make but still will wow your guests. This cocktail is garnished with a bruleed grapefruit which is so delicious (and Instagrammable!).
Can you share some of your favorite items to gift and entertain with?
I love all things Jenni Kayne home, I have so many things from pillows to plates. I love their leather coasters and glasses.
In Los Angeles, my favorite bakery is Sweet Laurel and I always get my cakes and desserts from them. But if you’re not in LA, you can make some of their cakes at home with their baking mix. It makes for a great gift for gluten-free friends!
What’s next for you?
I’m really excited about new Summer Fridays launches coming in 2023 and creating more meaningful content with inspiring guests on Life with Marianna.
Ingredients:
Garnish: Brown Sugar Rim + Brûléed Grapefruit
Glassware: Highball Glass
Preparation: Combine Astral Tequila, grapefruit juice, and lime juice in a cocktail shaker. Add ice and shake. Rim a highball glass with brown sugar and pack with crushed ice. Strain shaker into the glass and top with sparkling pink grapefruit soda. Garnish with a brûléed grapefruit slice.
Enjoy!
Photography by: Courtesy Astral Tequila
