NEW ORLEANS, Monday, July 1, 2024 — Dreka Gates, with BeautyCon and Essence, announced today, that she and her namesake beauty and wellness brand, DREKA will participate in the highly popular and anticipated BeautyCon event at the 2024 ESSENCE Festival of Culture, July 5-7 at booth #8355 in the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center, New Orleans.
This year’s festival will celebrate Essence’s 30th anniversary with four-day events both in-person and virtually alongside star-studded performances. BeautyCon attendees can look forward to firsthand DREKA experiences with opportunities to sample signature products.
Demos include the ever-popular Release The Day Cleanser and DREKA Blue Tansy Moisturizer, along with additional products from the collection that offer a unique blend of natural ingredients known to nourish skin, leaving it soft, smooth and rejuvenated.
“I am thrilled to be a part of BeautyCon at the Essence Festival,” Gates said. “DREKA is about promoting whole body wellness and helping individuals embrace their authentic selves. The best part is sharing it with My Lovhers in my home state.”
Gates is also joining Essence’s Food & Wine Festival with Keshia Knight Pulliam alongside Clarence Stanley and Dr. Bill Releford, on Friday, July 5, 2024, at 1:40 p.m. for a panel on Freedom In Farming. The discussion, moderated by Pulliam will discuss the impact of food deserts on Black families. It will also touch on farming and preserving traditional cooking and recipes.
“These conversations are an opportunity to learn to embrace whole body wellness, starting with what we eat,” Gates added.
AFROPUNK BLKTOPIA on Saturday, July 6, 2024, “Edible Utopias will also welcome Gates as a panelist for an in-depth discussion on Food From the Source alongside moderator Adman McFarland and panelist Madera Rogers Henry. The conversation touches on the blooming affordable, sustainable eating and how connecting directly with the source of meals can transform health, community and impact on the earth.
For more information on DREKA and its participation in BeautyCon at the Essence Festival, please visit www.dreka.com or follow @DrekaGates.
About Dreka Gates
Leading with love is exactly how Dreka Gates approaches life. Raised in a Southern Baptist family, Dreka said goodbye to the church at 13 against her parents’ wishes. It was a pivotal moment in her young life and paved the path for her own spiritual journey. With her newfound independence, along with an innate instinct to help people, Gates discovered a talent for building commerce with holistic healing at the forefront. The multi-hyphenate mother, wife and entrepreneur encourages people to reach higher levels of consciousness and awareness by simply BEing better BEings. Dreka unearthed a passion for health and found her true calling. Strategically, she’s built an empire of businesses, each with the intention of human betterment through a deeper connection to self. With whole-body wellness in mind, the collection is committed to being kind to yourself and the earth. DREKA is learning to love.
Leading with love is exactly how Dreka Gates approaches life. Raised in a Southern Baptist family, Dreka said goodbye to the church at 13 against her parents’ wishes. It was a pivotal moment in her young life and paved the path for her own spiritual journey. With her newfound independence, along with an innate instinct to help people, Gates discovered a talent for building commerce with holistic healing at the forefront. The multi-hyphenate mother, wife and entrepreneur encourages people to reach higher levels of consciousness and awareness by simply BEing better BEings. Dreka unearthed a passion for health and found her true calling. Strategically, she’s built an empire of businesses, each with the intention of human betterment through a deeper connection to self. With whole-body wellness in mind, the collection is committed to being kind to yourself and the earth. DREKA is learning to love.
About DREKA
DREKA is a brand created by Dreka Gates to promote whole-body wellness, so you can look and feel your best IRL. It is deeply rooted in DREKA’s unwavering quest to BE her authentic self and truly learn to love. By allowing herself to flow with and integrate the powers of nature, she has formed a deep connection to herself through different mind, body, and spiritual practices, that she now shares with the world through DREKA.
DREKA is a brand created by Dreka Gates to promote whole-body wellness, so you can look and feel your best IRL. It is deeply rooted in DREKA’s unwavering quest to BE her authentic self and truly learn to love. By allowing herself to flow with and integrate the powers of nature, she has formed a deep connection to herself through different mind, body, and spiritual practices, that she now shares with the world through DREKA.
About BEAUTYCON
Beautycon is the preeminent global platform for the internet’s most influential beauty and fashion icons and their ever-growing number of fans. Created to inspire and cultivate a new generation of online fashion and beauty trendsetters, Beautycon™ brings fans and influencers together across a global network. Beautycon™ launched in 2012 with its first event in Los Angeles and was acquired by Essence Ventures, LLC in 2021. For more information, please visit beautycon.com.
Beautycon is the preeminent global platform for the internet’s most influential beauty and fashion icons and their ever-growing number of fans. Created to inspire and cultivate a new generation of online fashion and beauty trendsetters, Beautycon™ brings fans and influencers together across a global network. Beautycon™ launched in 2012 with its first event in Los Angeles and was acquired by Essence Ventures, LLC in 2021. For more information, please visit beautycon.com.
About Essence Ventures
A multi-faceted ecosystem that uplifts the Global Black experience through frictionless, borderless economic advancements at the intersection of community and culture, ESSENCE Ventures is a member of the Sundial Group of Companies and is the parent company for ESSENCE Communications, Inc., AFROPUNK, Beautycon and Essence Studios.
About Essence Communications, Inc.
Essence Communications is the number one—and only 100% Black-owned—media, technology and commerce company at scale dedicated to Black women and communities. With a community of more than 31 million Black women, ESSENCE inspires a global audience through diverse storytelling and immersive original content rooted in Culture, Equity and Celebration. The brand’s multi-platform presence in/ publishing, experiential and online encompasses its namesake magazine; digital, video and social platforms; television specials; books; and signature live events, including Black Women in Music, Black Women in Hollywood, ESSENCE Black Women in Sports, Fashion House, Street Style and the ESSENCE Festival of Culture™.