The Chinese companies that sell makeup and other beauty products have to some extent the US Supreme Court to thank for their budding success in the Western world.
It was when the court considered stopping the Chinese platform Tiktok in the US and the app temporarily disappeared in the country that Chinese beauty products became noticed.
Approximately two million American Tiktok users jumped over to the Chinese app Xiaohongshu, also known as Rednote, and there Chinese beauty products waited to be discovered by them.
2.3 million views
"I realized that Rednote had many beauty secrets that the US was not aware of," says Hailey Laine, a Tiktok creator in Chicago to Bloomberg. She joined Xiaohongshu in January and now uses both apps - Rednote to find beauty inspiration and Tiktok to post about it.
In January, Laine shared a video of herself using a powder and light pink rouge to recreate the "glow" that is popular among Chinese beauty influencers. It resulted in 300,000 likes and 2.3 million views.
This type of exposure has been the key to success for Chinese so-called C-beauty brands. One of them is Judydoll, which started in China in 2017 and then expanded to markets across Asia in 2021.
Judydoll's total sales increased from $232 million, equivalent to 2.2 billion kronor, in 2023 to $345 million, 3.2 billion kronor in 2024.
Up 400 percent
Foreign retail sales increased by 400 percent in 2024, partly thanks to online sales directly to customers via, for example, Tiktok Shop, according to Stefan Huang, at Judydoll's parent company Joy Group Ltd.
He also says that social media has been important for "building the company's credibility".
Several of Judydoll's products have become bestsellers after videos with users praising them have received millions of views. An example is the company's Curling mascara. Instead of the usual mascara brush, the mascara is applied with a thin spiral-shaped steel tube, which users have praised and Judydoll has sold more than 8 million mascaras.
