Aine Kennedy

Áine Kennedy is an Irish entrepreneur and the founder, director, and chief executive of The Smooth Company, a Dublin-based haircare brand she launched in February 2022 with €10,000 of personal savings originally set aside as a house deposit.^[1][5] The company's flagship product, the Smooth Stick — a hair-taming wand designed to control flyaways — went viral on TikTok, accumulating over 190 million organic views, and by 2026 the brand was sold in 92 countries through retailers including Brown Thomas, De Bijenkorf, H&M, and Holt Renfrew.^{[1][4][18][17]} The company has remained bootstrapped, with no external funding disclosed.^[3]

Kennedy spent eight years in the beauty industry before founding her company, working at Boots, Benefit Cosmetics, and TanOrganic, and holds a degree in entrepreneurship from Maynooth University.^[11][3] In 2025, she won the EY Emerging Entrepreneur of the Year award.^[2][20] In 2026, she was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe list in the Retail & Ecommerce category and received the Future Leader award at the Irish Times Business Awards.^[1][9] The Smooth Company achieved B Corp certification in July 2026, becoming one of approximately 110 certified B Corporations in Ireland.^[4]

Kennedy grew up in Lucan, a suburb of Dublin.^[7] Her father, Barry Kennedy, is the CEO of Irish Manufacturing Research, a state- and industry-funded body focused on advanced manufacturing, and her aunt runs a chain of coffee shops.^[12][3] Kennedy has cited this family environment as formative.^[12]

She attended Lucan Community College for secondary school before enrolling at Maynooth University, where she studied entrepreneurship from 2015 to 2019.^[11][3] Kennedy began working in beauty retail at age 16 as a customer care assistant at Boots, a role she has described as the start of her career in the industry.^[11][16] She subsequently worked as a beauty consultant and national trend team artist at Benefit Cosmetics, then as a marketing and communications executive at Sales Cosmetics Ltd., accumulating eight years of beauty-industry experience before founding her own company.^[11][3]

The Smooth Company is dedicated to Kennedy's late grandmother, Nana Carmel, who died in 2016 and whom Kennedy has described as someone who "always had a hair tip or trick up her sleeve."^[13][11] Kennedy's grandfather Billy Kennedy later became a central figure in the brand's viral social media content.^[11][2]

TanOrganic (2020–2022)

Kennedy's most senior role before founding her own company was as marketing, PR, and digital marketing manager at TanOrganic, an Irish organic self-tan brand.^[3][11] The position gave her direct experience managing a consumer beauty brand's digital marketing, social media, and public relations — skills she would apply to building The Smooth Company's content-led growth strategy.^[16]

It was during the Covid-19 lockdown in 2020, while still at TanOrganic, that Kennedy identified the gap in the market that would become her company.^[11] She spent two years researching formulas and packaging, contacting manufacturers and testing samples, while working full-time.^[11][16]

The Smooth Company (2022–present)

Kennedy founded The Smooth Company on 8 February 2022, investing her entire €10,000 in house-deposit savings as startup capital.^[5][1][16] She launched from her attic in Lucan, building the company's website herself and designing early packaging on Canva.^[16][5] Her grandfather Billy helped pack orders by hand in the early months.^[2][11]

The company's debut product, the Smooth Stick — a hair-taming wand enriched with biotin, vitamin E, and aloe vera — was designed as a brush-out alternative to stiff-hold flyaway products already on the market.^[13][16] Kennedy began posting behind-the-scenes content on TikTok, including videos with her grandfather, and the brand went viral.^[11][3] By mid-2024, the brand had accumulated 95 million organic TikTok views and customers in 54 countries; by late 2025, those figures had grown to 150 million views and 70 countries; and by mid-2026, the company reported over 190 million organic views and sales in 92 countries.^{[16][2][4][1]}

The company was profitable from its first year, generating approximately €250,000 in revenue and €37,000 in profit in 2022.^[5][3] Profits rose 85 percent in the second year, reaching €215,000 in 2023.^[5][3] Kennedy told The Irish Times that 2024 revenues tripled those of 2023, with approximately half of all sales generated overseas.^[3][2]

The product range expanded from a single item to more than ten haircare products and tools, including the Smooth Dream 11-in-1 Styling Cream and the Mane Master Curved Smoothing Brush.^[13][14] Brown Thomas was the brand's first retail partner, and Kennedy has said the Smooth Company became one of the best-selling brands in the retailer's Planet Beauty section.^[15][3] The company subsequently secured listings in Arnotts, 72 Peter Mark salons across Ireland, McCauley Pharmacy, and on 432 Aer Lingus routes.^[2][3][14]

International expansion followed. The Smooth Company became the first Irish beauty brand to secure a listing at De Bijenkorf, the Dutch department store chain.^[18] The brand also entered H&M Beauty in the Nordics and Holt Renfrew in Canada, with Kennedy hosting a founder masterclass at the retailer's Toronto location.^[1][17] Products have been featured in Vogue and Elle.^[4][13]

As of mid-2025, the company employed eight people in Dublin.^[3] Products are manufactured in Ireland, China, and Korea — a deliberate multi-country strategy Kennedy has described as a way to mitigate supply-chain risk.^[3][4] In July 2026, The Smooth Company achieved B Corp certification, becoming one of approximately 110 certified B Corporations in Ireland.^[4] Kennedy's sister Eimear also works in the business.^[3]

In 2022, the Smooth Stick won Best New Product at the Hi Style Awards in the brand's launch year.^[18] Kennedy was named Young Entrepreneur of the Year at the Irish Women's Awards in 2023.^[10]

In 2024, she received the Young Businesswoman of the Year award at the Image PwC Businesswoman of the Year Awards, and The Smooth Company won Best Hair Brand at the Image PwC Beauty of Business Awards.^[3][10]

In November 2025, Kennedy won the Emerging Entrepreneur category at the EY Entrepreneur of the Year awards, announced at a ceremony at the Powerscourt Hotel in Enniskerry, County Wicklow.^[2][20] The same year, The Smooth Company won the retail category at the SFA National Small Business Awards, and the Mane Master brush won Best Smoothing and Anti-Frizz Tool at the Marie Claire Awards.^[14][4] The Smooth Stick won Best for Flyaways at the Women & Home Awards, and the brand was named Best Irish Beauty Brand at the VIP Awards.^[4]

In February 2026, Kennedy won the Future Leader award at the eighth annual Irish Times Business Awards, held at the Mansion House in Dublin.^[9][7] She was shortlisted alongside Niamh Donnelly of Akara Robotics and Shane Curran of Evervault; the award was presented by Anne Sheehan, general manager of Microsoft Europe North.^[9] In April 2026, Kennedy was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe list in the Retail & Ecommerce category, one of ten Irish founders on the list that year.^[1][6][8]

Kennedy lives in Lucan, County Dublin.^[7] She was 28 at the time of her Forbes 30 Under 30 listing in April 2026.^[6] She has cited Irish beauty entrepreneurs Pamela Laird and Suzanne Jackson as early inspirations.^[11] In a 2025 Irish Times profile, she described her screen time as "outrageous" and said she did not have a work-life balance during the company's growth phase.^[3]