How AI is changing the product launch playbook

Today, we’re going to learn a powerful lesson about AI, thanks to some hand serum. Like many business leaders I meet, beauty and skincare entrepreneur Margaret Dabbs is excited about how AI is revolutionising old workflows.

But even with a tough retail climate on the horizon thanks to events in the Gulf, she doesn’t think AI will lead her to reduce her headcount. Rather, the technology is helping her teams work faster and secure more business. A recent example involves a new hand serum product, she explained to me, when I caught up with her at a Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses event.

If you don’t know her, Margaret Dabbs is a renowned British podiatrist, entrepreneur and the founder of Margaret Dabbs London, a luxury wellness and beauty brand. She runs both clinics and lines of retail products, which can be found in places like John Lewis and Liberty of London. One of her best-known products is the overnight balm known as Miracle Foot Cream.

Her new anti-ageing hand serum product hopes to follow in its footsteps (pun intended) and will launch in July. It’s called ‘AgeDefy, Pro-C Hand Serum Capsules’.

“We recently pitched this new [serum] product to a retailer,” says Dabbs, “and we were able to make a sale before we'd even made it, using AI to just design what it was going to look like. It meant that we secured an order for 10,000 units, before we had actually chosen the final packaging, but it was done and ready to go.”

In other words, she was able to secure an order before the physical prototypes were made. It’s not the way things are usually done.

So the key lesson here is that: “AI can make you quicker to market by allowing sales to happen at the conception stage.”

AI is also speeding up processes by replacing traditional photography, she points out to me. Instead of the multi-day process of sending items to a warehouse for professional photography, she uses AI to generate product visuals in about 20 minutes by showing the software similar photographs of the desired look.

Although she has a new product development team, she often likes to "jump in” herself to provide the starting point using AI tools, which the team then takes forward.

In her experience of implementing AI so far, marketing teams are more resistant than, for example, the finance department. This may be because we are more sceptical of AI’s ability to be creative, as opposed to speeding up number crunching.

Finally, here is another key lesson that Dabbs exemplifies: Like everything else in a scaling, mid-size business, the founder needs to personally model the behaviour they want, including the vital question of the attitude to AI.

This week’s episode of the Business Leader podcast is also all about the possibilities of AI (there’s no escape!).

But all the best AI applications have humans firmly in the loop and this one is no exception, as entrepreneur Nnamdi Emelifeonwu explains to Sir Richard Harpin.

Emelifeonwu left a top London law firm to set up one of the UK’s fastest-growing legal tech companies, called Definely. The legal world has seen some of the highest levels of AI-disruption, with new companies like Harvey in the US shaking things up (it’s now valued at over $10bn).

Emelifeonwu built his AI product by developing a tool to help his visually impaired colleague to navigate complex legal documents. His platform helps lawyers access definitions, clauses and key information from within Word documents and is used by some of the world’s leading law firms. It is also integrated into Anthropic’s Claude.

Guess the company

• It was founded in 1979
• It employs over 42,000 people
• Part of the company's name originates from a character in a popular TV show in the 1970s
• Its founder became a knight in 2023
• Despite being in hospitality, it doesn't believe in not playing music or showing live sports
  

You'll find the answer at the bottom of this page

1. As the US-Israeli war with Iran is about to enter its fourth month, analysts have warned of a 2008-style recession and $200-a-barrel oil if the conflict extends through the summer. Since the start of the war, global oil prices have risen by 43 per cent. If the Strait of Hormuz remains shut until the end of the year, oil prices could rise from about $94 a barrel at present to $200, triggering a global recession, according to estimates from Wood Mackenzie, an energy consultancy.
2. The UK could join a €4bn EU equity investment fund for start-ups by the end of this year as both sides seek to remove barriers that went up after Britain left the bloc six years ago, a top Brussels official has said. Ekaterina Zaharieva, European commissioner for start-ups, research and innovation, told the FT the move was in the “mutual interest” but would require an amendment of a protocol of the post-Brexit treaty to reverse a UK decision to exclude participation.
3. One in six young people will not be in education, employment or training within five years unless "urgent" action is taken, a major review has warned. The education, health and welfare systems are "no longer fit for purpose" in preparing young people for adult life, said its author, former minister Alan Milburn.
4. BP has removed its chair, Albert Manifold, with the oil company’s board saying it had serious concerns about “important governance standards, oversight and conduct”. The FTSE 100 company announced Manifold’s departure with immediate effect on Tuesday, without giving further details. He had lasted only eight months in the role.
5. Sir Tony Blair has warned that Labour risks consigning Britain to “relegation from the Premier League of nations” and cautioned the party against a leftward shift in the race to succeed Sir Keir Starmer. In his first intervention in Labour’s leadership battle, Blair accused ministers of lacking a coherent economic plan and argued that manifesto commitments on workers’ rights, net zero and taxation should have been abandoned after the election.

Weekend reading

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Barclays has released its Q1 2026 Business Prosperity Index, which is a reflection of 1,000 senior business decision makers. Major findings range from one in five business leaders saying that they are pausing overall investment in light of geopolitical tensions to 80 per cent of leaders saying they have confidence in their business's own prosperity over the next five years.

🤖 Delivery robots are spreading across LA. Residents ‘both pity and hate them’

Londoners may have got used to seeing the autonomous Waymos in the form of flash Jaguars cruising around the capital but the driverless taxi is a mainstay in Los Angeles. However, the City of Angels has seen the rise of another strange automated fleet in the last few years. Small robots delivering food, groceries and household essentials and the reception from locals has been varied...

And finally

Popes are used to electric vehicles, driving around in their famous pope mobiles, but I bet the current Pope has never seen one like this before.

In the week that Pope Leo delivered a strong warning about AI, Ferrari unveiled its first fully electric car - the $640,000 (around £475,000) Luce. It was designed with input from former Apple design chief Sir Jony Ive.

The Pontiff himself was given an early test drive of the Luce. So is this a sign that luxury car brands are finally embracing the electric revolution?

Lamborghini and Porsche have scaled back EV plans, sceptical that well-off car fanatics want to abandon combustion-powered cars. Ferrari's share price also took a tumble, dropping around 8 per cent since the Luce's unveiling.

While this American Pope may be a fan, in his homeland, President Trump’s reforms have scaled back demand for electric vehicles. PVs (petrol vehicles) have rebounded in sales.

But I don’t see this in the UK. In fact, I’ve noticed a surge in electric cars. I see many more in my street now in West London and the competition for on-street charging is heating up. Though, to be fair, there are many available these days.

I’m part of the phenomenon, as I’ve just gone electric with a Kia Niro, which I can now spot everywhere. Some dealerships have complained that government targets and incentives for electric vehicles (EVs) have caused problems for sales of used petrol cars and skewed the market.

They can, of course, increasingly sell EVs second-hand as long-term battery life improves. Maybe with Ferrari’s bold statement, backed up by the pope, maybe EVs might yet conquer the world.

By the way, if you have time for a 4-hour deep dive into the fascinating history of Ferrari, then check out the latest Acquired podcast.

The answer to our question is J D Wetherspoon.