Some brands begin with a business plan. Highland began with frustration—and a kitchen stovetop. Before he ever imagined launching a company, co-founder Boone Whiteside was simply a consumer searching for hair products that didn’t seem to exist. “I just wanted something that used earth-based, hair-health-friendly ingredients, was at least semi-sustainable or eco-conscious, and actually worked,” Boone says. It shouldn’t have been a tall order. Yet every product he tried either broke down by midday or came packaged in single-use plastic with a long list of questionable ingredients.
That gap—between what he wanted and what the industry offered—became the spark for Highland. “If you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself,” Boone adds. What started as a personal quest quickly crystallized into a three-part code that still defines the brand today: performance, health, and sustainability. “This code continues to drive every decision we make at Highland today,” Boone says.
Highland’s origin story feels almost folkloric now: a young founder meticulously studying botanical ingredients, experimenting in small batches, and cooking early formulas on a Denver apartment stove. “The early days were all about identity,” Boone remembers. “I first hit the stovetop in 2019… we didn’t even publicly launch until 2021”. Those two years of trial and error gave the founders space to define what Highland meant—and what it could become.
It was during that period that Boone, his co-founder Ben Medalie, and partner Jack aligned on the brand’s name. “We aligned on the name ‘Highland’ after the Boulder street I grew up on,” Boone says. “Which properly captured the higher values and nature-inspired image we sought”.
Even now, Highland carries the energy of its scrappy origins. The brand was born in defiance of the limitations the founders heard everywhere: that natural products can’t perform, that sustainability and growth don’t mix, that gender-neutral beauty is too niche. “In hindsight, I suppose the experimental, stovetop Highland history proved this to us from day one: There’s always a different, potentially better way of doing things,” says Boone. “And we’ll always keep looking for it.”
Ben, who spends much of his time listening to stylists and barbers, says the professional hair world has long struggled with a strange divide: products that perform well but are full of questionable ingredients, and products that are “clean” but unreliable for professional use. “Pros don’t use and stock ‘natural’ products because they don’t perform well enough,” Ben explains. “But needs and expectations are changing quickly.”
Highland aims to bridge this divide. The brand works closely with its professional community, starting every formula with clean, science-backed ingredients and refining them through rigorous testing. “Hair cutting and styling is a true craft,” Ben says. “The products that professionals rely on… need to nurture and support a healthy, great-looking head of hair long-term”.
If “clean beauty” feels like a marketing cliché, Highland is determined to change that. Instead of relying on loose definitions, the Highland team builds from botanical and earth-derived ingredients—compounds selected for both safety and performance. They scrutinize every ingredient against leading standards, then narrow further, avoiding petroleum derivatives, silicones, synthetic polymers, and other staples of the industry.
Their Glacial Clay Pomade, for example, replaces petroleum derivatives with beeswax, shea butter, arrowroot powder, and vegetable glycerin. Their cleansing products rely on gentle, coconut-based agents instead of harsh surfactants. And they’re exploring new innovations: beet-root alternatives to polyquats, pine-needle terpenes that outperform silicones, plant-derived polymers that shape and hold.
From the beginning, Highland rejected the hyper-targeted, gendered marketing typical of the industry. “We never wanted Highland to be a macho, hyper-masculine brand,” Ben says. Instead, they’ve built a line that emphasizes individuality and inclusivity, with minimal, universal packaging and a focus on results—not stereotypes. “Traditional beauty norms limit people… Highland exists to move beyond that—to make haircare feel accessible, relatable, elevated, and genuinely human,” says Ben.
As proud “1% for the Planet” members who give 1% of sales to organizations that protect our ecosystem, Highland bakes sustainability into its operations: infinitely recyclable aluminum packaging, eco-conscious ingredient sourcing, and partnerships with organizations working to reduce plastic waste and capture carbon. “We knew there had to be a better way,” Boone says. “We've got a long way to go, but our commitment to become an industry leader in this domain will be unwavering”.
Perhaps what surprises Highland’s founders most is just how many people felt the same frustrations they did. “We never dreamed that this many people would resonate with our mission,” Ben says. With new products in development for 2026 and an expanding community of both everyday consumers and pro stylists, Highland plans to keep questioning industry norms.
“We will continue nurturing our incredible at-home and pro communities and continue revolutionizing the hair and beauty industry with products, practices, and overall purpose that wows... hopefully for generations to come,” Ben says. “Onward!”
To learn more about Highland, go to Highland.Style, or follow on Instagram at @highlandstyleco.