How to Lead With Clarity, Curiosity, and a Bit of Surf Wax

The world needs more leaders like Jeff Shardell. Shardell is the founder and CEO of Humble Brands, a naturally-derived personal care company based in Taos, New Mexico, that’s been doing something rare in the $500 billion global personal care industry: growing without compromising. No flashy marketing gimmicks, no synthetic ingredients, no VC funding, and no race to blitzscale. Just a clear sense of purpose and the patience to let it work.

Before launching Humble, Shardell spent years in tech at companies like Netscape and Google, where he joined when it had barely 100 employees. That background shaped how he thinks about scale, focus, and leadership. What makes his story worth telling isn’t just the growth of the company; it’s how he’s quietly built a team, a culture, and a product strategy that more leaders could learn from.

Simplicity Is Not the Same as Easy

Shardell didn’t set out to start a CPG brand. After leaving Google, he was trying to detox his life—eating cleaner, living healthier—and one day realized the deodorant he was using didn’t fit the bill. The “natural” options on the shelf at the time were full of questionable ingredients, and worse, they didn’t work.

So he went to his kitchen and started experimenting. What came out of that was a formula with just four clean, recognizable ingredients. No preservatives, no synthetics, no marketing fluff. That formula is still the backbone of Humble’s product line.

It’s easy to get caught up in the complexity of business and product development. But Shardell took the opposite route. He stripped things down to the essentials and built trust by being radically transparent. That trust has become the foundation of the brand’s growth.

What Google Got Right (and What Most Startups Forget)

Shardell’s time at Google left an impression. One of the first lessons he learned was about restraint. “For a long time, we didn’t build a browser or OS,” he said. “The focus was to do one thing better than anyone else.”

That thinking carried over to Humble Brands. Before launching soaps or lip balm, Shardell wanted to win on one thing—deodorant. He kept the company focused on doing it exceptionally well before considering expansion.

In today’s culture of more, faster, louder, that kind of patience feels almost revolutionary. But it works. Credibility opens doors. You don’t need to be everything to everyone. You just need to be the best at something, and then build from there.

If You Must Work With Celebrities, Make It Real

Celebrity partnerships in CPG are nothing new. Most are transactional and, frankly, kind of hollow. But Humble Brand’s most high-profile partnership came from a very different place.

Jason Momoa was filming near Albuquerque and kept buying Humble Brands’ deodorant from a local shop. Eventually, he reached out directly on Instagram and asked about collaborating. “He wasn’t looking for a licensing deal,” Shardell said. “He had thoughts on scent profiles and packaging. He cared.”

The end result was Humble Brand’s paperboard packaging line and one of its most successful scents, Rockrose & Cedar. The relationship wasn’t about slapping a name on a box—it was real, creative, and built on shared values. That made it meaningful, and more importantly, it made it sustainable.

Shardell’s advice for working with celebrities? Don’t chase them. Let them find you. If the relationship isn’t authentic, it’s not worth it. The audience can tell the difference.

Don’t Just Hire for Experience. Hire for Curiosity.

Running a company out of Taos, Shardell didn’t have access to a deep bench of consumer product veterans. But that didn’t bother him. At Google, he had worked with people from all kinds of backgrounds—philosophy majors, pro athletes, artists. What they had in common was curiosity and a strong work ethic.

At Humble Brands, the hiring philosophy has stayed the same. Bring in people who think differently. People who ask questions. People who care about the mission. The technical stuff can be taught.

Too many companies chase résumés instead of people. Shardell’s team is proof that if you find the right mindset, the rest usually works itself out.

Step Back So You Can See the Whole Picture

Shardell splits his time between Taos and the Big Island of Hawaii. It’s not for show. It’s how he stays sharp.

“Taos is where I build. Hawaii is where I reflect,” he said. That space to think helps him stay focused on the big picture, make better decisions, and avoid the tunnel vision that can creep in when you’re too close to the day-to-day.

That balance has also forced him to build a team that’s empowered to make decisions. He’s not hovering over every detail, and that’s the point. He focuses on what excites him; sales strategy, product innovation, and storytelling, then gives the rest of the team room to own their work.

The result? A more resilient company that doesn’t crumble if the founder takes a week off.

The Next Chapter (and the Packaging That’ll Get Us There)

Humble Brands is growing. New products are in the works, though Shardell’s marketing team would rather he not spill too many details just yet.

But what excites him most isn’t a new scent or product, it’s packaging. Yep, packaging.

“We’re moving away from single-use plastics. Our goal is to go fully biodegradable,” he said. That means paperboard tubes, post-consumer recycled materials, and even experimenting with bioplastics.

It may not sound glamorous, but it’s a big deal. Packaging is often the first interaction a customer has with a product. It shapes perception and drives buying decisions in ways most people don’t even notice. Get it right, and it can set you apart. Get it wrong, and you might lose trust before anyone even tries what’s inside.

Final Thoughts

Shardell isn’t trying to disrupt the personal care industry. He’s trying to build a business that feels good to run. A company people can believe in. A team that likes coming to work. A product that earns repeat purchases because it’s simple, honest, and effective.

He’s proving you don’t need to move fast and break things. You just need to move with intention. And if more founders operated with that mindset, we might end up with fewer unicorns—but a lot more companies worth keeping around.

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