How a former Vogue fashion assistant built Glossier from a small blog to a $1.2 billion beauty business
Weiss moved to New York at 18 to study at New York University, majoring in studio art. It was at this point that she made her first foray into the fashion and beauty realm by taking up a three-day-a-week internship at Teen Vogue during her studies.
After graduating in 2007, Weiss worked briefly for W magazine before moving to Vogue, where she worked as a fashion assistant.
Source: Fashionista
While working as a fashion assistant, Weiss set up her beauty blog, Into The Gloss, spotting a gap in the market for beauty product coverage.
"I was surrounded by so much magic … All these models and makeup [artists]," she said in an interview with Fashionista in 2015.
"That was the inspiration for Into the Gloss, wanting to know more about these women who were so cool and interesting for all these different reasons."
Weiss would candidly interview celebrities such as Kim Kardashian and Karlie Kloss about their beauty regimens.
Source: Business Insider
The blog quickly gained a following among beauty enthusiasts who commented on posts to share their experiences with various products and make suggestions to other readers.
Source: Business Insider
Weiss decided to leave her job to focus on the blog full-time. She asked Nick Axelrod, a friend who had also worked in publishing, to become the editorial director.
Source: Business of Fashion
Weiss re-launched the website and upped the number of posts; overnight traffic to the site tripled.
Source: Business of Fashion
Product feedback on the blog laid the foundation for what was to come. Weiss was now armed with a wealth of information to create products that were directly tied to what readers wanted.
In 2013, the company raised $2 million in venture capital funding. At the time, Weiss said the funding would be put toward eight to 10 new hires across editorial, tech, and design.
A year later, Glossier was born.
Weiss teased the new brand on Instagram about four weeks before launch. Within the first week of selling the new products, she had more than 18,000 followers.
Source: The Wall Street Journal
Instagram influencers and celebrities spread the message, posting photos of themselves in Glossier swag. Glossier launched with four products: a facial mist, moisturizer, skin tint, and balm. These products were intended to give off a "no-makeup" look.
Source: Karlie Kloss Instagram
A month after launching, Glossier raised an additional $8.4 million in venture capital funding.
A key part of Glossier's success has been Weiss' commitment to its brand identity.
"Brand is really, really important. It's kind of everything," she told Business Insider in 2016.
Glossier has always been known for its signature pink hue, playful marketing voice, and images of diverse women with minimal makeup.
But the most defining part of its business model is its customer feedback system.
The product team depends on the user community and feedback to innovate and iterate.
Between 2016 and 2018, the company raised $76 million in two rounds of funding and opened two stores: a showroom in New York (which transitioned into a permanent flagship store) and a store in Los Angeles.
The company told Business Insider that it surpassed $100 million in annual revenue in 2018, doubling its 2017 numbers. It also acquired a million new customers that year.
In 2018, the brand sold one Boy Brow every 32 seconds, it said.
In March 2019, Glossier launched a new color makeup brand, Glossier Play, which was two years in the making.
Two weeks later, the company was valued at $1.2 billion after receiving $100 million in funding.
Source: Markets Insider
It plans to open five pop-up locations in 2019, beginning with Miami in the spring.
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