Estée Lauder

Estée Lauder Estée Lauder co-founded the Estée Lauder Companies and built a global cosmetics empire through relentless personal salesmanship and an early mastery of gift-with-purchase promotions. Starting from a single skin cream recipe developed in her uncle's chemistry lab, she created a company that today owns over 25 prestige brands and generates nearly $16 billion in annual revenue.