Samantha Huemer, a master’s-trained nutritionist, spent her career helping women understand what was changing inside their bodies and understood that underlying health and skin health are deeply connected, and that supporting one without considering the other misses the bigger picture.
Midlife brings The Skin Shift, a term coined by Samantha Huemer to describe the hormonal changes that can alter women’s skin during this stage of life. When she looked at the products designed to support these changes, she saw ingredient lists filled with red flags and routines that weren’t evolving with women’s changing biology. She didn’t just see a gap in the market. She saw a problem she already knew how to approach. Tréve was created to support women through The Skin Shift with thoughtful, high-performance skincare rooted in skin health and well-aging.
She built Tréve for this reason. The name means truce in French. The philosophy is simpler than most beauty brands will admit: healthier ingredients and higher standards. Absolutely no compromise on either.
The Method
Tréve is built around three products.
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A gentle cleanser designed not to strip the skin barrier that midlife hormonal changes already challenge
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A peptide essence featuring two different clinically proven upcycled silk-derived peptides that signal the body to produce more collagen and support the skin barrier.
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A nourishing facial serum formulated to work in concert with the first two
Samantha formulates and manufactures each product herself. That's a quality control decision, not a marketing angle. When you're building a brand around transparency, you can't outsource the part where the product actually gets made.
Sustainability as Operating Logic
Most clean beauty brands treat sustainability as a badge. For Tréve, it's the logic behind every decision.
A 100% post-consumer and FSC-certified paper was used to manufacture the unit cartons for Tréve's secondary packaging. Primary packaging is clear frosted glass chosen over the more common darker amber specifically because clear glass is more recyclable. The frosting happens in California under the strictest environmental standards, avoiding acid etching that could compromise formulation integrity. Labels use environmentally friendly UV ink.
Roughly 70% of Tréve's ingredients come from women-owned farms around the world. The brand is a 1% for the Planet member, donates 2% of revenue to environmental and women's health organizations and holds pending B Corp certification which is uncommon as a pre-revenue company. Customers can download a free shipping label from the FAQ page to return beauty empties to the Pack Collective for proper recycling. Environmental Working Group verification is currently in progress.
This isn't performative. It's just how Samantha believes a beauty brand should operate.
Calitho + Tréve Partnership
Getting a product to market is rarely linear. None of it came easy. A last minute change forced a packaging redo mid-launch prep. The kind of setback that can derail a small brand when the wrong partner is on the other end of the phone. This required us to act fast and Calitho supported Tréve every step of the way.
Dhara from Calitho was the right partner. Focused on getting it right rather than getting it done. Modifications were made in time and hand-delivered the next business day. The finished packaging drew immediate attention: spa directors at some of Northern California's best spas praised both the quality of the unit cartons and the overall brand aesthetic.
Samantha put it plainly:
"You guys have been such a pleasure to work with. Dhara was such a delight and so supportive and understanding and patient and really wanted to make it right for me, which speaks volumes, especially in this industry. When you're a small beauty brand, it's tough. There are a lot of people who are not as understanding, and so I really appreciate that."
— Samantha Huemer, Founder of Tréve
That experience matters more than it might seem. For a founder who built Tréve on the idea that integrity should be non-negotiable, working with a packaging partner who shares that standard isn't a vendor relationship. It's a reflection of the brand itself.
What's Next
Tréve is launching direct-to-consumer, which is a deliberate choice. It's designed for customers who already think carefully about what they put on their skin and are looking for a brand that thinks as carefully as they do. Available starting September 1st at treveskincare.com.
