She's Just Getting Started
An interview with Julia Grieve of Preloved & Change Beauty
We decided that it would be easiest if I went to Julia’s home to conduct the interview. A cafe seemed too loud and interruptions would be plentiful as we are both well known in our small town. I showed up early, mostly because I was nervous but also because the traffic was light, speaking of small towns. She told me to slip in the side door of her historic 4 story home in beautiful Port Hope, Ontario. She was on the phone with a television producer when I arrived. She smiled and waved while walking out of the kitchen and into her beautiful dining room for some privacy, her voice turning into muffled words as she walked. I looked around at her beautifully styled kitchen which was cream and white and clean. There was no evidence that children lived there, which I find out later, that that is because there are not. Julia and her husband Doug, are parents to teenagers and young adults, who are away at University or at boarding school. I envied her tidy space and the stillness of that moment, until I interrupted by laughter from the hallway. Her energy seems endless and infectious.
Julia wraps up her conversation with, “I’ll look at my calendar! I’m so excited! This is going to be great!” I don’t know what they’re talking about but I also feel the excitement. We do a quick personal catch up. Julia and I met years ago when I owned a clothing shop in the small town which she now resides and I started carrying her brand, Preloved. Preloved hand-picks quality vintage clothing, or uses deadstock or recycled fabrics, and sustainable manufacturing techniques like sustainable printing. They deconstruct or reimagine each piece to be reborn as an original Preloved garment.
When the catch up is done, and we finish giggling about getting older but not actually feeling any older, we officially start the interview. This interview is about the path, the people and the influences that lead Julia to become the person she is today, an “Accidental Environmentalist” and successful entrepreneur.
I love an origin story and Julia’s didn’t disappoint. Julia started modeling in high school. She negotiated a contract to go to Milan, all while her parents were negotiating with her to finish high school early and with top grades, no less. After 4 years at Stephen Leacock Collegiate, she earned her diploma, celebrated her straight A’s as an Ontario Scholar and with the permission of her family, flew off to Italy to start her life as a model at 17 years old. It wasn’t soon after a brave and transformative year in Europe that she was home again explaining to her parents that University was officially off the table because she had just signed another large contract to continue modelling, but this time in Japan. Julia never did attend university, she proudly says she attended the “University of Life”. After five years of professional modeling that took her around the world, Julia finally returned home with a passion for fashion, make up and self expression that would unknowingly be a guiding theme throughout her life.
Julia started thrifting before thrifting was cool. She would buy fabrics on her travels and alter thrifted clothes to make them more wearable. Her lightbulb moment came when she was approached by someone on the subway in Osaka, Japan asking her where she had bought her outfit because they adored it. After explaining where each piece was from, exhausted by her own long explanation, she simply responded, “I made it”. That moment, defined by Julia, is how the idea of Preloved began.
Preloved was officially founded 30 years ago on May 1st, 1995 in Toronto, Ontario. Having no formal entrepreneurial training, Julia was given the book, “The Entrepreneurial Myth” (now known as The E-Myth by Michael Gerber) and devoured it. At the back of the book there was a phone number and an ad that invited readers to take a “free class” to learn more about what it means to be an entrepreneur. Julia called the number. The southern bell who answered, asked questions about Preloved with a sweet and understanding twang in her voice. Young Julia answered the questions but caught herself bragging to this woman on the other end of line that she was certain that, “I am the best sales person and no one could sell better than me!” The line went quiet and this sweet sounding southern lady said in response (not so sweetly), “you’ll be out of business by the end of the year!”
“The biggest problem that entrepreneurs have is their ego! They believe that they can do everything themselves”.
Thinking you can do everything better than every one else and doing every single job within your business is your downfall, Julia finally finds out. Julia doesn’t lose her business by the end of the year and instead finds talented people, who are better than her at sewing, better than her at designing and just as good as her in sales, to support her dream. To this day she doesn’t forget the southern advice: “The biggest problem that entrepreneurs have is there ego! They believe that they can do everything themselves”.
Julia expanded her business to have three major flagship retail locations; one in Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, all while raising young children and shooting a television show. She quickly realized that three stores were too many and after some sound advice from Joseph Mimran (Joe Fresh) she closed Vancouver and soon after Montreal to focus her efforts in Toronto. Toronto also raised some challenges, like rebuilding and relocating her business after her store was decimated by fire in February of 2008. Julia has seen her share of challenging times and has overcome them all.
Julia finds inspiration in other women’s stories, including citing her daughter Mimi and her friends as beautiful sources of motivation. Julia is so proud of her family and surviving business ownership for the past thirty years, she reflects, “if you had told me at 24, that I would still be doing this, married with kids and living in Port Hope, are you kidding?”, also stating just how pleased that, “I am still here”. Not only is Julia still here but she’s more relevant than ever. As we celebrate all the success that Preloved has had over the past 30 years, we also have to acknowledge she is just getting started in the world of beauty.
In early 2025, Grieve launched a line of make up called “Change Beauty”, saying that the hardest part was landing on the right name. Julia recognized there was a massive gap in the beauty market, noting that make up was either too difficult to understand and apply (why are there so many steps? who knows what your over tone or undertone is?) or too boring and repetitive in their product offerings (her mother, 81 had been buying the same products forever!) She designed a make up line that is fun and easy and for anyone to use.
Change Beauty is a complete line of make up that wants to make you change the way you think of aging. “You’re not aging, you’re just changing, and change is good!” This brand is making it easy to navigate the world of make up with simple, effective products that work. With products like the “As You Are Complexion Perfector” or the “It’s Giving Perfect Skin Tint”, and the “Doubling Down” mascara, Julia’s line is uncomplicated and affordable and made in Canada.
And just like Julia Grieve, Preloved and Change Beauty are inspired by distinctive experiences in travel, exposure to sustainable fashion, the modeling industry and the creative world of makeup artistry. Her journey has been highly influenced by her passion to follow her heart from the time she was 17, always following the path that was less traveled, but knowing which advice to take to keep her steering in the right direction. It’s clear Julia’s entrepreneurial journey isn’t even close to being finished. As our interview comes to a close and I am about to pose my last question, Julia reflects on her long time career and how quickly life flies by. Instead of making a comment about her age, or how many years have ticked by, what she says next, surprises me. "You accumulate all this knowledge. Like, do you know how much shit I know?! I know so much!” And, she wasn’t showing off. She was realizing, in real time, in her shiny white kitchen, that after more than thirty years of being an entrepreneur she’s amassed a lot of knowledge, more than any University course could ever offer. The University of Life. The Entrepreneurial Myth. The Accidental Environmentalist. Julia Grieve is just getting started…