The Beautywell Project

Nonprofit profile at a glance

EIN
830718160
IRS 990 coverage
2020–2025
Forms available
Form 990 2025, Form 990-N 2019
Location
Saint Paul, MN, USA
Phone
6122504263
Rating
72
Verdict
SUPPORTED
Rating confidence
Moderate
Sector
Ethnic Studies

Official website

Reported finances

Revenue
$382,003
Expenses
$297,780
Assets
$222,498
Liabilities
$0

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Amounts in USD.

Leadership & pay

5 people listed

Highest reported compensation

  • AMIRA ADAWE (EXECUTIVE DI): $105,311 total reported compensation

Source: IRS Form 990. Selected filing: tax year 2025. Names and roles reflect this filing, not necessarily current officeholders.

Overview

Mission

The beautywell project addresses the critical issues of skin-lightening practices and chemical exposures within immigrant communities and communities of color. Our mission is to foster healthy individuals, families, and communities through education, wellness, and leadership initiatives, such as our young women's wellness and leadership cohort.

What it reported doing in 2025

We have developed the beautywell project database that addresses the problem of skin-lightening products, chemical exposures, and colorism in the cosmetics industry. This database contains skin-lightening products that beautywell has tested in labs and identified to contain harmful ingredients that pose significant risk to individual and communities health. This will give individuals and communities to learn about this toxic skin-lightening and other cosmetics products that contain high levels of toxic chemicals. This will help individuals and communities to make informed decisions about their health and advocate for safer beauty practices and stricter regulations within the cosmetics industry. Last year we have tested more beauty products including skin-lightening products which showed elevated levels of mercury. Last year we have increased our partnership and collaborated with the university of Minnesota school of public health on the healthy beauty salon project which is community-based participatory research project that helps beauty salon owners deliver the healthiest experience for their clients and workers. This project helped us working with several salons and learned the type of products they use and we were able to collect samples to test the products that they use. This learning also helped us develop education and training materials for the salons. We have trained students and professionals to effectively work with salons and conduct community-based participatory research in salons and communities. Beautywell has been working with some salons to prepare them for green business certifications.

Operating model

Revenue model
Grant-funded. 61% of the money available for current operations came from government grants.
Distribution model
Direct operator. The filing allocates 100% of reported program-service expenses outside its grant, affiliate-payment, and member-benefit lines. This expense classification does not rule out separately announced grant awards.

The verdict

SUPPORTED - The filed numbers largely add up and most voting board members are independent. A relatively small share of available resources goes toward mission work and some filing-based governance responses are negative or unanswered.

Rating breakdown

  • Financial Efficiency: 58
  • Transparency & Controls: 90
  • Accountability: 69
  • Sustainability: 54
  • Growth: 100

Detailed rating inputs

Financial Efficiency

  • Mission deployment rate: 58.7%; rating input score 59
  • Program expense ratio: 75.4%; rating input score 75
  • Fundraising efficiency: Limited

Transparency & Controls

  • Consistency checks: 100%; rating input score 100; 64th percentile among comparable filings
  • Pay-setting controls: Limited
  • Foreign activity oversight: Limited
  • Grant itemization coverage: Limited
  • Major donor itemization: Limited
  • Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

  • Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 64th percentile among comparable filings
  • Governance controls: 2 of 8 controls in place; rating input score 25
    • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
    • Whistleblower policy: Fail
    • Document-retention policy: Fail
    • CEO compensation review process: NotApplicable
    • Other executive compensation review process: Fail
    • Form 990 shared with the board: Fail
    • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
    • Audit committee oversight: Missing
    • Independent financial-statement audit: Fail

Sustainability

  • Operating margin: 22%; rating input score 73; 73rd percentile among comparable filings
  • Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.75; rating input score 34; 34th percentile among comparable filings
  • Liabilities to assets ratio: 0; rating input score 77; 77th percentile among comparable filings
  • Officer compensation ratio: 35.4%; rating input score 8; 8th percentile among comparable filings

Growth

  • Program expense growth: 24.6% per year; rating input score 100; 87th percentile among comparable filings
  • Revenue growth: 22.9% per year; rating input score 100; 89th percentile among comparable filings
  • Asset growth: 20.5% per year; rating input score 100; 83rd percentile among comparable filings

Details

  • Where the money goes: 58.7% of revenue deployed · 75.4% of spending went to programs
  • Governance: 5 of 5 board members independent · 2 of 8 filing controls reported
  • Programs: 4 filed program accomplishments · $224K in reported program spending
  • Leadership: top reported pay $105K · 5 people listed
  • Consistency: 20 of 20 current checks pass
  • Schedules: 2 filed schedules
  • Filing history: 6 filing years from 2020 to 2025
  • Contacts: How to reach this organization
  • Money network: 1 filed money-flow record
  • Related organizations: Filed and resolved organization relationships.
  • Grant readiness: Federal tax and exclusion status, award history, and grant-maker relationships.
  • People: Everyone the filings name, and which of them the filings identify by more than a name.

Key Signals

Signals prioritize questions for review. They are not findings of misconduct.

  • Review — Financial Efficiency: Mission deployment rate scored 59/100.
  • High — Accountability: Governance controls: 5 of 7 not reported.
  • Moderate — Sustainability: Total-asset coverage ratio scored 34/100.
  • High — Sustainability: Officer compensation ratio scored 8/100.