Briana Williams. (Courtesy With Wonder Creative Co.)
Months after her Richmond cosmetics brand ceased operations last year, Briana Williams is back with a new venture, this time in the marketing sphere.
The founder of lip care products startup LipLoveLine recently launched With Wonder Creative Co.
The Richmond-based firm officially opened for business earlier this month and offers branding, communications and marketing services geared toward small startups and “emerging brands” just getting off the ground.
“I like to think of With Wonder as being built for the dreamers at the starting line, like myself,” Williams said.
Williams said she knows what it feels like to be starting a company from the ground up. She started LipLoveLine in the spring of 2020 and rolled out more than 20 products such as lip glosses and lipsticks during its lifespan.
She closed the business in December 2024, citing factors such as inflation’s effect on customer spending, rising production costs and difficulty securing investor capital, despite LipLoveLine participating in several startup accelerator programs like Richmond-based Lighthouse Labs (now Lighthouse Network) and the Amazon Black Business Accelerator.
Williams said that after the beauty brand shut down, the past six months have been all about determining her next steps. Talking with peers she’d gone through past accelerator programs with, she saw a need from small companies looking to find their footing branding-wise.
“A lot of brands and founders that I was meeting throughout my entrepreneur journey going through accelerator programs … (they weren’t) confident. They didn’t really understand what they wanted to say, they didn’t know how to connect with their target audience,” Williams said.
Before LipLoveLine, most of Williams’ background was in the marketing and PR world. She previously worked as a communications strategist at VCU’s Wilder School and as the director of creative strategy and communications for local health practice The Well Collective.
She has also concurrently been the VCU da Vinci Center visionary-in-residence since 2023, teaching courses at the school specifically about entrepreneurship and branding.
With her background, Williams decided to pivot from the beauty industry and get back to her marketing roots.
“It was something I was passionate about, it was something I could really speak to because of my background,” Williams said.
With Wonder, which started taking clients Aug. 1, also offers social media strategy, editorial art direction, media relations, corporate partnership strategy and event management consulting.
The company offers both in-person services for locally based companies and virtual services for those out of town.
With Wonder is self-funded by Williams and she said she’s the company’s only full-time employee.
Though based out of Richmond, With Wonder operates without a physical headquarters. Williams said she is looking to find a physical office for the company by the end of this year.
As for what lessons she’s bringing from LipLoveLine, Williams said half a decade of building the beauty brand, networking and building relationships across the startup world has put her in a good position for the With Wonder launch.
“Being able to experience every aspect of building a brand, not just the things that are pretty but the things that you lose sleep over at night,” Williams said. “I had the time of my life building that brand. … I think it’s positioned me very well to take up this work.