"Feminine wellness, but make it sexy." - KETISH
The importance of self-care is on track in the Middle East under a partnership between Huda Beauty Angels and feminine, sexual wellness brand, KETISH. Arab moguls Huda Kattan of HB Angels and Emaan Abbass of KETISH take this female wellness industry to the next level by introducing products that encourage women to embrace anatomical empowerment and self-love.
Written by: Reefaya Noortaj
It is no secret that in the Middle East, female entrepreneurs are boosting the region’s economies. Al Masah’s reported that 25% of Middle Eastern startups have been launched by women. Additionally, a report by Global Female Leaders claims that 91.5% of the young female population within the Middle East is educated and working within corporate and business fields. According to UNESCO, 34% to 57% of female students in the Middle East major in fields of engineering, science or agriculture. What’s more, a woman in the Middle East is estimated to launch their business between the ages of 25-34. Huda Beauty Angels, an offshoot of Huda Kattan’s venture capital company, has just invested in KETISH by Emaan Abbass. KETISH is a woman-led startup supported by strong Arab business moguls like Huda Kattan to continue their journey for flourishing women empowerment in the Middle East.
Emaan Abbass’s journey as an Arab-American Muslim woman of Egyptian heritage, indirectly led her to launch KETISH. A brand first of its kind to promote feminine health and sexual wellness, offers education about the female anatomy that envisions a new sense of women empowerment not only limited to Middle Eastern women but to all women. Having been raised in a strict Muslim Egyptian-American home, Emaan often faced cultural adversities on her own, especially when she was diagnosed with cervical cancer caused by an undetected HPV. During the lowest point in her life, Emaan mustered the courage to deal with her bodily issue on her own for eight years. Her resilience against cultural taboo around the female body led to the discovery of KETISH, a feminine brand shaped from womens’ needs and desires, curated with her health and passion in mind. “I have always had a clear vision of what I wanted KETISH to stand for. I wanted to create a brand that I wish I had years ago when I started to tune into my feminine wellness journey. Bold, empowering, thoughtful and supportive,” says Emaan.
Emaan was inspired by two powerful ancient Egyptian female icons to curate the identity of her brand. Firstly, Queen Cleopatra’s ancient beauty regime and self-care routine symbolizes the strength of Egyptian women to her. Second, KETISH was derived from “QETESH”, the ancient Egyptian Goddess of sensuality and pleasure. A woman is unapologetically free of shame, free of guilt and no fear of self-love. “I wanted to create something that worked to break down these barriers to help and empower women with the knowledge they need to care for and honour their bodies” shares Emaan. KETISH products are made of highly effective, multi-beneficial formulas that are empowering, luxurious in every way and undeniable factors to have immediate effects on the body. The brand sprung to heights once Huda Beauty Angels announced their investment in the brand. Huda Kattan believes in the importance of feminine health and of comfortably buying feminine products without women feeling embarrassed. According to Kattan, her beliefs in women empowerment in this particular segment of female sexual care aligns perfectly with Emaan’s and meets one of the core visions of HB Angels, innovation.
From Huda’s perspective, KETISH is now the first enterprise backed by HB Angels, who will simultaneously continue to invest in innovative and meaningful founders. Aside from the firm’s investments in beauty, they have also invested in tech and consumer spaces to build up their small portfolio organically. HB Angels are focused on investing in the right founders and innovation that have the utmost potential to expand globally, aiding them with branding and marketing. KETISH aims to be bigger than just selling feminine products but also envisions to create a safe space for women, by women, encouraging women not to shy away from discussing female health and self-care. With HB Angel’s partnership, KETISH works to empower women to gain a deeper understanding of the female body and to break cultural taboos. “Our goal at KETISH is to replace this shame and stigma that surrounds the topic of feminine wellness and sensuality and instead replace it with self-care by creating a luxury experience around feminine wellness. Bigger than that, we want to empower women, by providing education and a whole community of other women she can learn to support,” says Emaan.
Ownership of the female anatomy and self-care is relatively still new in most cultures but KETISH’s presence in the Middle East underlines the region’s desire to establish gender equality and women empowerment. The KETISH female community grooms with the knowledge of feeling confident in their skin and with confidence comes self-love, the sincerest form of wellness.
About The Editor
Born in Bangladesh and raised in the Middle East, UAE and Bahrain, Reefaya is a postgraduate from The London School of Economics in U.K. and an undergraduate from Sussex University. Reefaya has an immense love for sustainable fashion, social development and art.