Estée Lauder (businesswoman)

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Estée Lauder (Template:IPAc-en Template:Respell; born Josephine Esther Mentzer; July 1, 1908<ref name="FamilySearch-NYCBirths-1908" /> – April 24, 2004) was an American businesswoman.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> She co-founded her eponymous cosmetics company with her husband, Joseph Lauter (later Lauder).<ref name=bio>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Lauder was the only woman on Time magazine's 1998 list of the 20 most influential business geniuses of the 20th century.<ref>Timothy Williams, Gates Among Time's Top 20 20th-Century Business Titans Seattle Times, November 30, 1998</ref>

Early life and education

Lauder was born Josephine Esther Mentzer in Corona, Queens,<ref name="NYTimes-EsteeLauder-Obit-2004">Template:Cite news</ref> New York City,<ref name="FamilySearch-NYCBirths-1908">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> the second child born to Rose Schotz and Max Mentzer.<ref name="Kent2003">Template:Citation</ref><ref name="evan">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Her parents were Hungarian Jewish immigrants.<ref name="FamilySearch-NYCBirths-1908"/><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Her maternal grandmother was from Sátoraljaújhely and her maternal grandfather was from {{#invoke:Lang|lang}} (now Holice, Slovakia),<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> while her father had Czech-Jewish ancestry. Lauder's claims of descent from European aristocracy were discredited in a biography, Estée Lauder: Beyond the Magic (1985) by Lee Israel.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Her New York Times obituary observed "she was a New Yorker and not an aristocrat at all", notwithstanding "the mythmaking that is so much of the magic of the beauty industry".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> Her "favourite story was that she had been brought up by her Viennese mother in fashionable Flushing, Long Island, in a sumptuous home with stables, a chauffeured car and an Italian nurse."<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In actuality, her mother Rose emigrated from Hungary to the United States in 1898 with her five children at the time to join her first husband, Abraham Rosenthal.<ref name="Kent2003"/> In 1905, Rose married Max Mentzer, a shopkeeper who had also immigrated to the United States in the 1890s.<ref name="Kent2003"/> When their daughter was born, they wanted to name her {{#invoke:Lang|lang}}, the diminutive form of the Hungarian first name Eszter,<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> after her mother's favorite Hungarian aunt, but decided at the last minute to keep the name "Josephine", which they had agreed upon. However, the baby's nickname became "Estee", the name she would grow up using and responding to. Eventually, when she launched her perfume empire with her husband, she added an accent mark to make her name look French and began pronouncing it the way her father had in his Hungarian accent.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

Lauder spent much of her childhood trying to make ends meet. Like most of her eight siblings, she worked at the family's hardware store, where she got her first taste of business, entrepreneurship, and what it takes to be a successful retailer. Her childhood dream was to become an actress with her "name in lights, flowers and handsome men".<ref name="evan"/><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>

File:Estee and Joseph H. Lauder at a Red Cross Ball at The Breakers in Palm Beach. BM00538 (cropped).jpg

Estée and Joseph Lauder in 1971

File:Estee Lauder with Ivana Trump.jpg

Lauder (left) with Ivana Trump in 1986

When Lauder grew older, she agreed to help her uncle, Dr. John Schotz, with his business. Schotz was a chemist, and his company, New Way Laboratories, sold beauty products such as creams, lotions, rouge, and fragrances. She became more interested in his business than her father's. She was fascinated watching her uncle create his products. He also taught her how to wash her face and do facial massages. After graduating from Newtown High School in Elmhurst, Queens, New York, she focused on her uncle's business.Template:Citation needed

Career

Lauder named one of her uncle's blends Super Rich All-Purpose Cream, and began selling the preparation to her friends.<ref name="Kent2003"/>Template:Rp She sold creams like Six-In-One cold cream and Dr. Schotz's Viennese Cream to beauty shops, beach clubs and resorts.<ref name=financial-inspiration.com>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> One day, as she was getting her hair done at the House of Ash Blondes, the salon's owner Florence Morris asked Lauder about her perfect skin. Soon, Estée returned to the beauty parlor to hand out four of her uncle's creams and demonstrate their use. Morris was so impressed that she asked Lauder to sell her products at Morris's new salon.<ref name="Kent2003"/>Template:Rp

In 1953, Lauder introduced her first fragrance, Youth-Dew, a bath oil that doubled as a perfume. Instead of using French perfumes by the drop behind each ear, women began using Youth-Dew by the bottle in their bath water. In the first year, it sold 50,000 bottles; by 1984, the figure had risen to 150 million.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Lauder was the subject of a 1985 TV documentary, Estée Lauder: The Sweet Smell of Success. Explaining her success, she said, "I have never worked a day in my life without selling. If I believe in something, I sell it, and I sell it hard."<ref name="financial-inspiration.com"/>

Awards and honors

Lauder received the Chevalier (Knight) class of the Legion of Honour from the Consul General of France, Gerard Causer, on January 16, 1978. She was the first woman to receive this honor.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

She was inducted to the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 1988. She received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2004.

Personal life

Estée met Joseph Lauter when she was in her early twenties. On January 15, 1930, they married. Their surname was later changed from Lauter to Lauder.<ref name=bio /> Their first child, Leonard, was born March 19, 1933.<ref name="Kent2003" />Template:Rp The couple separated then divorced in 1939 and she moved to Florida, but they remarried in 1942.<ref name="financial-inspiration.com"/> Their second son, Ronald, was born in 1944. Estée and Joseph Lauder remained married until his death in 1983, and she later regretted her divorce, saying that she married young and assumed that she had missed out on life but soon found out that she had the "sweetest husband in the world".<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Leonard became the chief executive of Estée Lauder<ref name="time queen">Template:Cite magazine</ref> and then chairman of the board.<ref name="CNN dies">Template:Cite news</ref> Ronald was a Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration and was U.S. Ambassador to Austria in 1986–87.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> As of 2021, he is the president of the World Jewish Congress.

Death

Lauder died of cardiopulmonary arrest on April 24, 2004, aged 95,<ref name="death"/> at her home in Manhattan.<ref name="death">Template:Cite news</ref>

References

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External links

Template:Estée Lauder Companies Template:Authority control

Estée Lauder (businesswoman)

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