Jessica Alba used to believe she was “dumb” for not going to college but her views gradually changed thanks to her successes. She eventually went on to found The Honest Company, an American consumer goods company focusing on non-toxic household items.

Alba told The Observer Magazine: “I thought I was dumb because I didn’t go to college. I felt if you didn’t have a degree you’d never be respected or considered intelligent. Now I realise I’m perfectly capable of doing lots of things.”

The actress struggled to speak up about objectification, but later found the courage as she aged and had children.

She said: “Success in entertainment used to be purely financial for me. Once I was in my mid-20s and had achieved some degree of security, I started looking for something more substantive to focus on. Then when I got pregnant a few years later, I came up with the idea for my company.

When I was young I didn’t know how to speak up [at work] and say, ‘I don’t like this.’ I wasn’t that person [a sex symbol] people were portraying me as. I come from a pretty conservative background; I was a tomboy wearing baggy clothes. But you’re being marketed in a movie to sell it – I understood it was the characters I was playing.”

Alba, however, did not initially mean to create the billion-dollar empire known as The Honest Company.

“As a new mum, I found it challenging to find effective products without things like synthetic fragrances. I wanted to create a consumer goods company that stands for transparency and is actually profitable. Hollywood can be hard for the faint of heart. People hustle to be successful and then that moment when they feel they’ve made it, it disappears in an instant.”

She also explains that growing her company is more substantial and important than acting.

“I don’t feel like my persona in entertainment defines me. I’ve never put a whole lot of importance on it. When I was on every magazine cover and in all the new movies, I knew a lot of it would go away.

I spend a lot more time on my business than acting. When I can find the time and it’s entertainment, I’ll do something,” Alba stated.