About Us

Coy Hair was founded by two friends, one a beauty industry veteran and salon owner, the other a shrewd entrepreneur. Together they saw the need for a straightforward, high-quality, very functional and efficient hair care product line.

Tom Newell and Alison Etter feel that too many professional lines focus on editorial styling and unrealistic hairstyles. Instead, Coy is meant for real women who do their hair, themselves, every morning.

Meet Alison and Tom!

Alison Etter, Founder

Alison has been involved in the beauty industry for over sixteen years on all sides of the business. Alison began her career with Aveda as an Account Executive for the Northwest, where she focused on introducing the Aveda products and philosophies in both salon and spa's. This introduction into the beauty industry led to a love of the salon world and an expanded interest in Esthetics. She worked in general management with a variety of salons and spas while earning her Esthetician’s license. Her passion, although very focused on the practice of skincare and customer relations, lent more to the running of and management aspects of the industry.

In 2003 Alison opened Derby Salon, one of north Seattle most well known ‘hip and trendy’ spa/salons and Coy’s very first distribution partner. As sole owner she has been blessed with an amazing staff and six years of continued success. She is constantly in search of the perfect product lines to carry as well as inventive ways to creatively update ‘the Derby experience.'

Alison graduated from Santa Clara University with a degree in finance.

Tom Newell, Founder

Tom has a diverse background as an entrepreneur, including experience in finance, operations and general management. Prior to founding Coy, Tom was the head of the Food and Consumer Products team at a regional Investment Bank.

Tom has founded and led several companies in both the consumer products and technology space, most recently serving as CEO of ODS Software, an enterprise software company which was successfully acquired by an international software supplier. Prior to ODS, Tom founded and sold an e-commerce company in Dallas, Texas focused on fitness, personal training and nutrition and served as the head of Corporate Development for Mannatech, a direct marketer of nutritional supplements. Tom began his career as an investment banker with Piper Jaffray, focused on restaurants, consumer products and specialty retail companies.

Tom was honored as one of the Puget Sound Business Journal’s top 40 business leaders under the age of 40 for 2005. Tom holds a B.A. from Yale University and a J.D. from the University of Washington, School of Law.