Mac Cosmetics, with an MIV of $928.5 million, ranked second. The brand has been on a winning streak with its appointments, from naming Nicola Formichetti as global creative director in May to signing ambassadors including Ella, the South Korean American singer and member of girl band Meovv, alongside Doja Cat and Chappell Roan. Mac also launched a lip product, the Lipglass Air, with a campaign featuring Lisa Rinna and her daughter, Amelia Gray Hamlin.
“Huda Beauty and Mac Cosmetics drive scale by moving beyond product-led calendars to content shaped by creators, culture and real-time community signals,” says Maggie Hickey, executive VP of marketing at Dash Social. “Together, these rankings point to a broader shift in beauty: success is rooted in entertaining, shareworthy content that invites participation and deepens relationships, allowing brand growth to compound over time instead of peaking around a single campaign or launch moment.”
Brands have been leaning into this with new cultural partnerships. Beauty’s growing intersection with sport, in particular, has been underscored this year with tie-ups including Clinique’s partnership with the Red Roses — making it England Rugby’s first-ever official beauty partner — and in June, Charlotte Tilbury became the official beauty partner for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders.
Taking up space in sports has become an important focus for L’Oréal Group and its skincare brands. L’Oréal Paris recently named soccer player Declan Rice an ambassador for its L’Oréal Men Expert and L’Oréal Paris Elvive lines. In May, La Roche-Posay tapped tennis stars Madison Keys, Frances Tiafoe and Taylor Fritz for its Anthelios UV Pro Sport SPF 50 campaign. The brand scored second place in Launchmetrics’s skincare ranking, with an MIV of $286.6 million (L’Oréal Paris came top in this category with an MIV of $351.3 million).
“If America is the entertainment capital of the world and beauty is becoming more entertaining, then the beauty industry is becoming even more embedded in American culture,” says Natasha Hulme, chief creative strategy officer at global communications agency Seen Group. “I believe the next phase will see beauty overlapping more directly with entertainment and cultural expression, and the US will be a driving force of this shift. We’re already watching some of the most visible public figures in the US choose beauty as their business focus, which tells you exactly where the cultural energy is going.”
American influencers cut through
Many of the top beauty influencers hail from the US, a market that’s grown in importance this year during China’s downturn.
