Meet the twentysomething nepo baby who built a $1bn beauty brand
Forget about the lipstick index – it's all about the lip gloss index in 2025. It's something that nepo baby and influencer Hailey Bieber was canny enough to realise when her peptide lip treatment was one of the hero products to launch her beauty brand Rhode back in 2022. And now, on the eve of its third birthday, Rhode has become a $1 billion beauty brand, after news broke on Wednesday that Bieber had sold it to Elf Beauty (though she will stay on as chief creative officer and head of innovation).
It certainly puts paid to any of Bieber's naysayers and cements her status as a future businesswoman to watch. As Elf chairman and chief executive officer Tarang Amin told WWD: 'In less than three years, going from zero to $212 million of net sales, direct-to-consumer only, with just 10 products – I would never believe that if somebody told me.'
Raised in New York, Bieber is the youngest daughter of the actor Stephen Baldwin (best known for playing Barney Rubble in The Flintstones movies) and graphic designer Kennya Deodato. The Baldwins of course, are one of the most famous acting families in Hollywood, with Hailey's uncle Alec being the most well-known.
After a few appearances in various projects alongside her family, Bieber started modelling in 2014, starring in high-profile campaigns for the likes of H&M, Guess and UGG. Coinciding with the rise in popularity of Instagram, Bieber was part of a new wave of models whose star power (and bankability) was intrinsically linked to their follower count, with other examples including her friend, Kendall Jenner, and Gigi Hadid.
Yet it was her relationship with the Canadian pop star Justin Bieber that truly propelled her into the A-list. The two first dated in 2015, before splitting, reconciling (and quickly becoming engaged and married) in 2018. Their romance has been particularly notable for the ire it inspires in certain corners of the internet – and specifically, Justin fandom – with online trolls accusing Hailey of plotting to steal the singer from his ex-girlfriend, Selena Gomez. All in all, she's undoubtedly proved the detractors wrong – not least because the couple are now parents to a nine-month-old boy, Jack Blues.
Much like when Kylie Jenner launched her lip kits back in 2015 (her brand Kylie Cosmetics is now also valued at $1 billion), Bieber clearly recognised that the key to a successful beauty brand would be to give the fans what they wanted – i.e. the products that would enable them to look like her. In January 2022, she kickstarted the 'glazed doughnut skin' trend, a few months ahead of Rhode's launch, which included not only the aforementioned peptide lip gloss but also the peptide glazing fluid and the barrier restore cream.
Since then, she has kickstarted a series of ingestible trends on social media tied to product launches, often featuring new flavours of her peptide lip treatment, including 'cinnamon cookie girl', 'brownie-glazed lips', and 'vanilla girl'. 'Strawberry girl', meanwhile, a trend that saw her applying blusher to her nose as well as her cheeks that she popularised in the summer of 2023, led to the launch of her 'blush stick'. Perhaps her most famous – and genius – launch has been her sell-out lip gloss phone cases, which capitalise on how your phone is in your selfie.
As well as being her brand's best ambassador, Bieber has also crucially listened when she's gotten things wrong. Case in point was her blush sticks, which some complained did not show up well on darker skin tones. Keen to be inclusive, Bieber invited black creatives to help her finesse the formulation in the lab, leading to a popular relaunch.
For Elf Beauty, too, there is much to gain. Not only is Rhode's growth impressive, but Bieber's star is still very much on the rise, especially after being a recent American Vogue cover star. Soon to be sold in Sephora in the UK, the market is only going to get bigger too.
'In an industry that's complicated and over-saturated, Rhode never steps out of its brand's core DNA, which are minimalist cool-girl essentials that are simple to understand and true to the founder, Hailey Bieber's, understated, polished aesthetic,' explains The Telegraph's beauty editor-at-large Annabel Jones. 'Whether it's the original peptide lip treatment, the pocket blush or the barrier butter, Bieber's fingerprints are all over it. Moreover, every single product formula works as well for boomers as it does for alphas and gen-Zers. No harsh active ingredients or overcomplicated messaging, Rhode taps into how real women want to look – fresh and vital. And how they actually get ready – quickly and without fuss.'
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