‘You not the SKU’ | Blank Beauty is the first cosmetic innovation company to create custom foundation
Following a $6.5 million capital raise and partnerships with Epson and Kirker Enterprises, Blank Beauty has quickly established its presence on the international scale for cosmetic innovation.
About one month ago, Knoxville-based Blank Beauty quietly rolled out its latest product offering: custom foundation.
The company, founded by Charles Brandon, has long been known as a custom nail polish mixing company. Any customer could scan any color on the rainbow to get a custom-matched nail polish color. In 2025, Blank Beauty opened a manufacturing facility in Knoxville, putting the Scruffy City on the map as one of the largest nail polish manufacturing hubs in the world.
The unique approach to custom nail polish caught the attention of EPSON and Kirker Enterprises, leading to a partnership that made headlines worldwide. EPSON, largely known as a printing company, is also one of the biggest robotic manufacturing companies in the world. And, Kirker Enterprises specializes in paint mixing and the manufacturing of nail polish.
In our previous reporting, we shared how Brandon had been working on his vision for Blank Beauty since he was 19. After eight years of behind -the-scenes development, his innovation took off in a big way. The company’s flagship robot, “Huey,” was rolled out in select Walmart stores as a pilot, gaining popularity with customers who love its cutting-edge technology and personalization options.
Now, through a concentrated effort with Seiko Epson Corporation, Epson America Inc., and APTUS DesignWorks, Blank Beauty has created something new. Something completely untapped in the beauty industry to date.
Brandon is calling Blank Beauty’s custom foundation the “holy grail of cosmetics.”
The liquid foundation can match more than 400 skin tone variations.
“With Blank Beauty, you are no longer a bottle on the shelf,” Brandon said on LinkedIn. “You are you – not a SKU.”
How does Blank Beauty’s custom foundation work?
The company debuted the product about one month ago at the Cosmoprof North America in Miami. During the Conference, Blank Beauty’s spectrosopic scanning technology examined the skin tones of dozens of customers and created ‘Custom Complexion Kits’ on the showroom floor in real time.
Blank Beauty’s technology, which they’re calling ‘Vivi,‘ conducts a multi-point facial analysis to precisely identify skin tone, undertones, and more. All of this analysis happens in under one minute.
Brandon said that for every customer, Vivi creates five custom shades: an exact match, a warmer tone, a cooler tone, a deeper shade, and a lighter shade –so your foundation can match you all year long.
Opportunities for growth
Given that Blank Beauty is the first company to establish a custom-mixing model through spectrosopic scanning technology, Brandon said that they intentionally built the system to be formula-agnostic. This means there is an existing pathway via partnership where cosmetic brands could leverage the technology to create similar customized product offerings for their customers.
“The future of beauty is personal,” Brandon said.
Connect with Charles Brandon here.
Check out Blank Beauty products.
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