Shane Parrish

The Pregnancy Discrimination Act was 15 years away, and the Women's Business Ownership Act would not exist until 1988.

Mary Kay decided to build a major corporation in an environment where many women couldn't legally access the basic financial tools they needed to run a business.

To her, these weren't obstacles.

They were motivators.

They were proof the system needed disrupting.

But first, she needed a product.

A decade earlier, at Stanley Home Products Party, Mary Kay had noticed the hostess had beautiful skin, and she asked what she used.

It was a homemade cream that her father had developed.

The father was a hide tanner in Arkansas, and he'd noticed that despite working with harsh chemicals all day, his hands remained remarkably soft.

He experimented with the formulation until he developed a cream that could be used on the face.

So Mary Kay began using it, and it transformed her own skin.

But she also noticed the products didn't smell good, and they were kind of packaged very immature.

The tanner had no interest in turning it into a business.

So now, in 1963, sitting at her kitchen table with her tulips, she remembered this cream.

So she contacted the Tanner's family.

The father had passed away, but his daughter and son-in-law still had the formula.

So after some negotiation, they agreed to sell her the proprietary formulation.

The price was nearly every penny she had.

If this failed, she would have nothing.

She took the formula to a manufacturer and ordered a small batch of skincare items, the cheapest packaging that looked professional.