OCMETRO – August 17, 2006

Packaging Maven
By Kimberly A. Porrazzo

Vonda Simon’s first job out of college, a sales position with a cosmetics packaging company, paid $20,000. Today, she owns a company with sales nearing $10 million. How did she go from repping other firm’s packaging products to becoming the CEO of her own company? Vonda will tell you it’s all about vision.

"I have a vision for the company and for our employees", Simon says. The 45-year-old mother of two (ages 2 and 4) owns SeaCliff Packaging, a leader in state-of-the-art commercial packing for major cosmetics manufacturers. Browse her Newport Beach showroom and you’ll see names such as Cindy Crawford and Susan Lucci, for whom she has either designed or sourced packaging for their private label skin care product lines. Simon’s company provides bottles, jars, airless containers, plastic or aluminum tubes, makeup cases and more to clients around the globe.

A shiny silver container for Revive sits in the showroom display case. Simon says it retails for $600. Yet, SeaCliff Packaging also helps companies package their cosmetics and fragrances for Wal-Mart and 99-cent stores.

"You can come to me as a huge corporation or as a mom-and-pop company", Simon says. "We do turn-key concept-to-market work".

To succeed in the competitive beauty industry, Simon says you have to look the part. That she does, but her expertise goes far beyond her own image or the design of a perfume bottle. There is the chemistry involved in the making of the plastics and how they interact with product formulations. Cindy Crawford’s line is an example. "She loves purple," Simon says, holding a bottle from Crawford’s line. "We had to find a pump with no metal parts for her day cream with sunscreen," Simon explains. "If the cream touched the metal it, would turn brown." Crawford was pleased and SeaCliff has had that line for more than five years.

Together with her husband, Simon has big plans for the company she founded in 1999. SeaCliff Packaging will soon be branding Simon’s own name as it launches affiliate companies under the brand Vonda Simon. With seven staffers and four outside sales reps, the company is poised for growth. "The whole thing is about hiring the right people," Simon says. "It’s incredible how word spreads."

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