She left corporate. She flew to Asia. She came home with an idea that had never been done before.

Amber Olivier didn’t set out to build a skincare company.

She set out to breathe.

It was 2022, and she was exhausted. Not the kind of tired a weekend fixes — the kind that sits in your chest and follows you into every meeting, every inbox, every Sunday night. So she did something reckless by corporate standards. She booked a flight to Thailand and didn’t overthink it.

She ended up on a quiet stretch of beach on the Andaman coast. No itinerary. No laptop. Just salt water, warm air, and the sound of the tide doing what it’s done for millions of years.

“I remember sitting there and realising I hadn’t actually felt my skin in years,” she says. “I was just covering it, treating it, fighting it. Never listening to it.”

Something shifted on that trip. Not in a dramatic, movie-montage way. More like a slow thaw. She started noticing things — the way Thai culture treats rest as non-negotiable, the way salt and water are woven into daily rituals, the way nobody seemed to be in a hurry.

She flew home to Johannesburg with sand still in her bag and an idea she couldn’t shake.

The Note in Her Phone

Back in South Africa, Amber went back to work. But the idea stayed.

She started researching. Late at night, after everyone else had logged off, she read about sea salt — not the refined stuff in the supermarket, but traditional Celtic Sea Salt from Brittany, France. Hand-harvested. Solar-dried. Protected by geographic indication like champagne. Over 60 trace minerals. The same method for over 2,000 years.

“It was one of those rabbit holes where every answer led to a bigger question,” she says.

She learned that magnesium calms inflammation. That potassium hydrates at a cellular level. That calcium strengthens the skin barrier. All things her own skin had been quietly asking for while she was busy applying whatever the algorithm told her to buy.

She wrote a note in her phone:

“Skincare with Celtic sea salt. South African. Something that matters.”

Then she kept working. Because that’s what you do when you have a mortgage.

The Leap

She sat on that note for months.

In that time, she looked into sourcing. She spoke to manufacturers. She found out — to her genuine surprise — that nobody had built a full skincare line around Celtic Sea Salt. There were salt brands. There were skincare brands that used salt as one ingredient among many. There were bath salts and soap bars and one-off scrubs scattered across the internet.

But no one had said: this is the foundation. This is the whole point.

“I kept waiting for someone else to do it,” she admits. “And then I realised I was waiting for someone to do the thing I was supposed to do.”

In 2024, she resigned.

No safety net. Just a laptop and a growing certainty that she’d regret it forever if she didn’t try.

Building Something Nobody Asked For

The early days were unglamorous.

She worked from her dining room table. She learned about import regulations the hard way. She filled out customs forms at 11pm. She had conversations with French salt harvesters who’d been in the business for generations and didn’t quite understand why a South African woman wanted to put their salt on her face.

She tested formulations. She scrapped formulations. She did it again.

“It was not a beautiful process,” she laughs. “There were days I sat on my kitchen floor and thought, what have I done?”

But she kept going. Because every time she second-guessed herself, she’d remember that beach in Thailand. The salt air. The stillness. The feeling of coming back to yourself.

That’s what she wanted to bottle.

What Love Umi Actually Is

Love Umi launched with three products: the Ocean Mist Spritzer, the Ocean Sand Bar, and the Celtic Salt Serum.

French salt. South African soul. No ten-step routine. No complicated jargon. No pretending to be something it isn’t.

“We’re not trying to be the loudest brand on the shelf,” Amber says. “We’re trying to be the one you actually reach for. The one that feels like a pause instead of another task.”

The products are built around that idea. The mist is a sensory reset you can do anywhere. The bar turns washing your face into a ritual. The serum is deep, mineral-rich nourishment.

“We tell people our salt comes from France. We don’t hide it. It’s the best in the world for what we need, and I’d rather be honest than pretend otherwise.”

That honesty has become part of the brand’s identity. In a market full of vague claims and vague sourcing, Love Umi tells you exactly where things come from and why.

The Quiet Ones

The most unexpected part of Love Umi’s growth wasn’t the products. It was the people.

Amber started a WhatsApp community called The Quiet Ones, a private space for customers and like-minded South Africans who value the same things she does. Pause. Connection. Golf on Saturdays. Padel after work. Quiet mornings with nobody asking anything of you.

“We get together. We play golf. We talk about life. The skincare is almost beside the point,” she says. “It’s just the thing that brought us into the same room.”

There’s a golf day in the works. A padel social. A waiting list.

“I didn’t plan any of this,” Amber admits. “I just wanted to make good skincare. But people wanted more than that. They wanted somewhere to belong.”

The Hard Truth About Building Quietly

Amber is honest about the difficulty of building a brand that doesn’t shout.

“If you don’t have a big budget, you can’t buy attention. You have to earn it. You have to be so clear about who you are that the right people find you without being chased.”

She’s had setbacks. Delays. Quotes that made her eyes water. A warehouse quote that almost gave her heart failure. The endless, unsexy admin of running a business.

“I remember sitting in my storage space on my own, surrounded by boxes of product I’d just received, and thinking: there’s no one coming to help me do this. It’s just me.”

But she kept going.

What She’d Tell Anyone Considering the Leap

Amber pauses when asked what advice she’d give to someone sitting on their own version of a note in their phone.

“I’d say the idea doesn’t become real when you launch. It doesn’t become real when you get your first sale. It becomes real in the boring, quiet moments when nobody’s watching. When you’re packing boxes at midnight and you stop and look at what you built.”

“The people who make it aren’t the loudest. They’re the ones who don’t quit when it stops being exciting.”

She smiles.

“To anyone still waiting — keep going. Your moment is coming.”

What’s Next

New products are coming. Retail conversations are happening. The Quiet Ones are growing. But Amber’s vision hasn’t changed.

“Inspire people to pause. That’s it. If Love Umi becomes known for anything, I want it to be that.”

About Love Umi

Love Umi is a South African skincare brand built around authentic Celtic Sea Salt from Brittany, France. The range includes the Ocean Mist Spritzer, the Ocean Sand Bar, and the Celtic Salt Serum. Based in Johannesburg. Shipping nationwide.

Instagram: @theumihouse

Website: www.loveumi.com

About the Author

Amber Olivier is the founder of Love Umi. She lives in Johannesburg and is passionate about slow beauty, quiet leadership and the power of pause.