The Hudson Valley has gained its own seeming equivalent of a New York City bodega: a beef tallow shop offering natural beauty products and a rotating assortment of cookbooks, syrups, jewelry and vintage clothing.
Such is the essence of the inaugural store from My Neighbor’s, a beef tallow balm brand launched in Hudson, N.Y., by former Wall Street trader Harri Magaldi.
The brand got its start in May 2024 when Magaldi, on maternity leave after having her second child, packaged and labeled jars of the beef tallow balm she’d been using to manage her eldest daughter’s eczema to sell at the Hudson Farmers’ Market.
She sold $4,000 worth of product that Saturday — and, two years later, My Neighbor’s has surpassed the $2 million sales mark.
“I was making [tallow balm] in my kitchen and giving it to local moms in the community, who were like, ‘I’m putting this on my face, I’m putting it on my baby — you should package it up and sell it,’ and I was like, ‘maybe I will,’” said Magaldi.
The store, located at 702 Columbia Street, is roughly 280 square feet in size, though it’s connected to My Neighbor’s larger, 1,700-square-foot production space. It is officially open Thursday through Sunday, but customers can ring a cowbell during business hours Monday through Wednesday and the production team will help them in to browse.
Harri Magaldi, founder of My Neighbor’s.
Courtesy of My Neighbor’s
“Consumers, in general, want transparency and ‘less is more,’” said Magaldi. “We have six ingredients in our Rose & Sea Buckthorn balm, five in the Blue Moon balm, and then pretty much everything else has five ingredients in it. We have great relationships with our farms in the Hudson Valley, and are within a 20-mile radius of those we work with.”
Beef tallow — a dense fat derived from cow suet sometimes used in cooking and now skin care products — has become increasingly popular of late.
Its rise has been bolstered by growing interest in natural beauty, as well as prominent proponents like U.S. Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr., whose controversial dietary guidelines released earlier this year position beef tallow alongside dairy, fruit and vegetables at the top of the food pyramid.
Other tallow-powered skin care brands have similarly emerged in recent years, including Primally Pure, which ruffled feathers last year for a campaign calling competitor SPF products “poison,” as well as Hearth and Homestead, which has sold more than 20,000 units of its $30 whipped tallow balm on Amazon in the last month.
The My Neighbor’s production space, which is conjoined with the Hudson store.
Courtesy of My Neighbor’s
“People can be very political when it comes to beef tallow, and it doesn’t need to be that,” said Magaldi. “We’re not trying to make any claims; [customers] can make their own decisions on beef tallow…it can just be something that’s better for you, safer for your family and can be used on everyone.”
My Neighbor’s signature balms, which retail for $38 for a 2-oz. jar, are 75 percent beef tallow. Other ingredients vary by product, but include jojoba, blue tansy and rose hip oils. The brand also offers tallow-infused bar soaps, hand balms and candles, ranging in price from $20 to $62.
Its non-tallow products include hair and face oils and liquid soaps.
“Our customer split is 80/20 [women to men],” said Magaldi, whose team at My Neighbor’s includes two other full-time employees. “I think most of the time, men are not buying skin care, but they gravitate to beef tallow because they think it’s ‘manly,’ but also because it has less ingredients.”
In January, My Neighbor’s launched online at Ulta Beauty. Its U.S. retail footprint has separately reached 365 doors, including Anthropologie stores as well as boutiques, spas and more.
My Neighbor’s hand balm.
Courtesy of My Neighbor’s
“The cool thing about being a beef tallow brand is that we’re very omnichannel; we can be in a cute café or a boutique, but then we can also be in a natural grocery or an Ulta or Sephora,” said Magaldi, adding that wholesale accounts for 70 percent of the business, and will be an avenue the brand expands further into this year.
In the Hudson store, many of the brands sold alongside My Neighbor’s are similarly helmed by mothers based in upstate New York. Those include fragrance line Maison d’Etto, maple syrup brand Laurel & Ash and vintage curated by Flora Vintage and other indie businesses.
“Some of them we met through those vending days; it’s been nice to help other people that have a side hustle and hopefully help them grow, too,” Magaldi said.
Elsewhere on the horizon, My Neighbor’s will be launching a direct-to-consumer subscription service, and leaning further into the “better-for-you home” category.
“Things like diffusers and linen sprays that are a more healthy alternative are on sale now in the store. We also launched tallow and beeswax candles two weeks ago, and in five days they all sold — [those] are definitely something we’re going to be focusing on,” Magaldi said.
