The Perfect Cover Girl

How does she do it? JESSICA ALBA lives the five rules to sell, sell, sell.

- Laura Brown

Jessica Alba has been sitting in a booth at the Beverly Hills Hotel for about five seconds— barely enough time to put down her personalized red quilted-leather Valentino handbag—when she is approached by two breathless tweens. “Can we, can we, gurgle … blah … eek,” they say while Alba poses gamely for pictures. They let out a squeak and flee.

You see, Jessica Alba is really popular. And she knows it. But her capitalizing on her popularity, stemming from an acting career that started in her teens, is not like something out of a sorority—it’s much more conscientious, more type A, than that. While Alba, 37, knew a while ago that she was big-screen beautiful and charismatic (and looked damn fine in a bathing suit), she was already diligently calibrating a more global and lasting success.

So here she is, married 10 years to longtime love Cash Warren, a mother of three (Honor, 10, Haven, 6, and the brand-new Hayes, 7 months), and the founder and face of one of the most colossal born-from-celebrity-mama-hood business successes, The Honest Company. Alba may go back to TV too, having recently filmed the pilot for L.A.’s Finest, a Bad Boys spin-off, with Gabrielle Union. But right now she’ll just have a vodka soda and some self-analysis, please.

LAURA BROWN: In the magazine world you are quite literally consumer marketing’s favorite cover girl. When did you realize you were not only attractive but also “commercially viable”?