How Glossier went from beauty blog to billion dollar brand

Glossier.

It's a brand that feels close, relatable, and small.

But it's not. Not anymore, at least.

While Glossier started as a humble beauty blog in 2010, it was valued at $1.2B in 2019.

So, how did this seemingly small brand grow so big?

Well, before there was Glossier, there was Into the Gloss, a beauty blog launched by Emily Weiss in 2010.

The blog—and later, Glossier—aimed to build an authentic beauty community, a space where beauty enthusiasts could chat about the best and worst products they'd tried.

It was like an online version of sharing the contents of your toiletry bag with friends on a weekend trip—honest, personal, and informative.

The real success of Into the Gloss came from a column called The Top Shelf. Here, beauty and fashion professionals shared their routines and products. It was an extension of the blog’s community vibe, focusing on real insights from real people, not brands.

This approach, along with the online community it fostered, established Into the Gloss as a champion of a no-frills, straight-talking beauty philosophy.

So when Weiss launched Glossier in 2014 with its 'skin first, makeup second' mantra, the brand quickly garnered the trust and loyalty of the large Into the Gloss readership.

And in the beauty industry, trust and loyalty are powerful assets.

Glossier leveraged this trust in their marketing, creating engaging content focused on being 'real.'

They took the community values of Into the Gloss and adapted them into Glossier’s content, like their 'Get Ready with Me' videos. These featured authentic reviews and routines from influencers. They simply showcased products without a hard sales pitch.

Take this video, for example. It's minimal and pared back, with no overt sales pitch. Instead, it just shows how Glossier blush works on the skin.

Glossier Vice President of Brand and Marketing, Kristin Kim, summed up their authentic vibe, saying, 'People want to see more behind the scenes, people want to see the product in real life and applied in real life.'

This strategy of embedding unbiased product information within engaging content helped Glossier build trust and grow their loyal following.

And their core value of authenticity is integrated across every part of the brand.

It's exactly what set Glossier apart within the beauty industry, and it's why the brand grew so rapidly.

They've always centred their efforts on simplifying beauty. The goal is to make their products effortlessly fit into consumers' lives.

This commitment to clear values has allowed Glossier to maintain a unified and consistent strategy throughout its growth.

And it's resulted in their huge business valuation and a following of 3.1 million on Instagram alone.

3 Strategies you can take from Glossier's playbook:

1. Make sure your brand values come through in everything you do. This will make your audience feel like they aren't just words on a page. They're something you embody.

2. Use authentic influencer marketing. Build trust by pushing out content that offers real product insights rather than a hard sell.

3. Create space for your community to engage with each other (and you!). Glossier did this with Into the Gloss, which laid the foundation for their strong customer base that's turned them into a billion dollar brand.

-Maggie, Copywriter