Maureen Kelly, CEO of Tarte Cosmetics, Tells Us Her Must-Haves For Summer Fridays

We have summer Fridays in the Tarte offices, which means if you’ve been here over a certain period of time, you get every other Friday off—believe me, I’m taking them!

I live in Spring Lake, New Jersey. Since it’s the Jersey Shore and my two boys, Sully (7) and Finn (5), are off from school, we basically live at the beach. It typically means surfing, paddle boarding, and some sort of sand sport every Friday that I’m off, and on the weekends.

My typical off-but-still-working Friday looks like this: I wake up around 6 a.m., check my email for any urgent fires, then immediately check Instagram. I’m obsessed with it (my husband will be the first to point that out). It’s such a great way to connect with our “tartelettes” and I often post a lot of @tartecosmetics pictures myself. Then, I take a quick shower before the boys get up. Always in my routine: I wash my face with my Clarisonic and Simple face wash (sidenote: what did we do before the Clarisonic?), wash my hair with Alterna bamboo volume shampoo, which makes my hair feel fuller, and then apply the anti-frizz conditioner which works really well in the summer. Then I step out, apply our Maracuja C-brighter™ eye cream, which makes me feel instantly awake thanks to the light-reflecting particles, smooth a few drops of Pure Maracuja Oil over my face, and top it with our bb tinted treatment 12-hour primer SPF 30.  I’ll comb in some Dry Bar Cream Soda smoothing cream through my damp hair and then let it air-dry.

By that time, the boys are usually up and wandering around our room, asking about breakfast. My husband is a great cook, so we’ll all gather in the kitchen and the boys will hand him all of the ingredients and cook together. Pancakes, eggs and fruit are typically on the menu. Following a delicious breakfast, the beach questions start. So I tell them they have 20 minutes to get their suits on, grab their beach towels, toys and then line up for sunscreen. I slather the Honest Company SPF 30 over both of them—I love that it’s natural and broad spectrum, and they love that it’s not “slimy” feeling. I’ll throw on my Vix suit, Havaianas, and Tom’s sunnies, and then we walk to the beach. In between playing with the kids, I check e-mail on my iPad. It’s great for approving new art concepts and designs, checking out sample displays of new products, and approving and revising an e-newsletter to share with our tartelettes. We’re about to launch our mobile site at the end of June (YES!), so we’ve been spending a lot of time testing it on all mobile devices.

After a few hours, we head in, as it’s time for me to go to QVC. I have an amazing hair and makeup team that preps me. I’ll chat with the host of the hour and go over the new products, different shades and ingredients. I usually get home around 11pm from QVC, pour a glass of wine and then sit with my husband to unwind for a bit—something I look forward to all week. Then, it’s game-on for the weekend.