Heather Rae El Moussa has grown accustomed to juggling multiple professional titles. Though she’s best known as a real estate maven who spent six seasons closing deals on Netflix’s “Selling Sunset” and a budding designer on HGTV’s “The Flipping El Moussas” and “The Flip Off,” El Moussa’s newest title — beauty boss — may be her biggest professional achievement yet.
After nearly four years in development, El Moussa launched her new beauty line — Heather Rae Essentials (HRE) — by introducing her first shade of “Lippie Gloss” on February 14, 2025. When the product sold out in just two days, she crumpled into tears, El Moussa told EntertainmentNOW.
“When my team was like, ‘We’re sold out,’ I just started crying, because it was such a moment of excitement and relief,” she shared. “Because, I didn’t know how it was going to go. And there were times when I just wanted to give up.”
Heather Rae El Moussa Was Determined to Create ‘Clean’ Beauty Products, Despite Many Challenges
For El Moussa, who has been married to fellow HGTV star Tarek El Moussa since October 2021, creating her own cosmetics line has been an emotional journey, including facing many stumbling blocks as she worked to develop clean products she could feel good about.
“I am not the type of person that can just slap my name on something and pretend like it’s mine,” El Moussa told EntertainmentNOW. “So I really started doing a deep dive into ingredients and products and what they are made of. And I started realizing that a lot of these brands are not transparent with the ingredients they use.”
El Moussa, who has been vegan since she was 22, wanted to ensure her beauty products’ ingredients were also vegan, cruelty-free and made without synthetics, while also delivering “the best results,” she told EntertainmentNOW. But that wasn’t the easiest process.
“I started working in the lab with chemists and working with different fragrance houses,” she explained. “And I didn’t want the scent to be synthetic, so it took me about a year to find the natural vanilla (ingredient) that I wanted. It was really challenging for me to find that scent … working with five different fragrance houses.”
“I was very, very deeply involved,” she continued. “I went to the labs. I worked with the chemists. Learned about ingredients along the way.”
Heather Rae El Moussa Says She Had to Overcome Her Fear of Failure Before Successful Launch
Once El Moussa finally settled on a formula and product design, including testing 10 different applicators, she didn’t rush the new lip glosses to market or share it with her millions of social media followers. First, she needed to overcome her fears of it flopping versus flying off the shelves.
“I was so nervous to launch because you don’t know how people are going to respond,” she told EntertainmentNOW. “And even though I do have a strong following, which I’m so grateful for, you just don’t know. So after everything was created, I did kind of sit on it for a while and try to figure out the best plan.”
El Moussa continued, “Finally, I was just like, ‘You know what? I’m doing it regardless. I’m doing it. If I sell 10, I sell 10, you know?’ And I ended up selling out so fast. I sold thousands and thousands of units in just two days!”
One of Heather Rae Essentials’ earliest fans was her husband’s first wife, fellow HGTV star Christina Haack, who wrote a glowing review for El Moussa’s website, declaring she was “absolutely obsessed,” and has appeared with her in social media promos for the product.
“I didn’t even ask her to do a testimonial,” El Moussa said. “She just loves the product. It looks so beautiful on her. Having her support is huge. And I would do the same for her. You know, we’re in a really great place … when you’re friends with someone, and you care about them, you know, you do things like that for them.”
Two additional shades of Lippie Gloss have since launched, making El Moussa “busier than ever” between filming with HGTV, juggling her family life and preparing to launch more beauty products for Heather Rae Essentials.
“I was busy already and now having this company, it is just like my brain is never shut off,” she told EntertainmentNOW. “But I love it.”
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Heather Rae El Moussa Reveals Emotional Journey to Her New Career: ‘I Was So Nervous’ (EXCLUSIVE)