Trinny Woodall given nasty ageist advice by man when launching her own business

Trinny Woodall has reflected on the needless advice she was given by an executive when trying to launch what would become her £180 million business.

After six years fronting the series What Not to Wear alongside Susannah Constantine from 2001 until 2007, Trinny went on to launch her beauty brand, Trinny London, in 2017.

While it’s now one of the fastest-growing beauty businesses in Europe, Trinny, 59, has now said she struggled to get support at the start.

Reflecting on her business journey, the TV presenter and businesswoman said she had to ‘fight very hard’ to be taken seriously.

‘I was raising money to pitch the business and was pitching mainly to men and a lot of them didn’t understand it [the idea] and they said it would work for a millennial, but not middle-aged women,’ she said.

‘That was probably the biggest challenge, or being told “you’re 50, can you run a company” amongst other things, but there was then somebody who said they believed in me, and I got my first investor.

Trinny Woodall has spoken about the difficulties in getting support for her business when starting out (Picture: ITV)

‘It just takes one and I must have sent 300 emails and had 50 meetings and you get one breakthrough and from that you get some self-worth and confidence in what you’re doing, and somebody has belief in your idea,’ she added when speaking on This Morning on Tuesday.

She added: ‘And then you can go from next and next [milestones].’

Despite her huge career success, Trinny said her name and reputation didn’t usually make any difference.

‘Some people think it’s just “Oh Trinny she just touched women’s breasts, or she did this”,’ she continued.

‘They will pigeonhole me but it’s fine because I know where I am and this moment in time and I’ve spent eight years running this business.

She hosted What Not to Wear alongside Susannah Constantine (Picture: Evan Hurd/Corbis via Getty Images)

‘I think you’ve got to think where I am, and then know what it takes to get there and what tools will help me get there.’

Previously speaking about her brand, Trinny told Stylist Magazine in 2021 that she launched it because after all of her makeover shows, ‘the most relevant for me were the ones where I travelled the world and met women of every different skin tone, age and body shape who loved or disliked themselves’.

‘And, for those women, make-up was the first thing they saw before they saw clothing or hair. So I thought, let’s start with make-up.’

She said the mission of her brand was to ‘change how women feel about themselves’.

This Morning airs weekdays at 10am on ITV1.

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‘They will pigeonhole me.’