Selfless by Hyram and Item Beauty by Addison Rae are departing Sephora.
Selfless by Hyram, the brand created by skincare influencer Hyram Yarbro in partnership with The Inkey List, landed at the beauty specialty retailer in the summer of 2021 with five products priced from $20 to $30, including a cleanser, moisturizer and serums. At the time, Sephora bet big on the brand, putting it in nearly 700 stores across 29 countries and its website.
Around the same time Sephora introduced Selfless by Hyram, the retailer also launched Item Beauty by Addison Rae, a brand from TikToker Addison Rae Easterling and Ipsy owner Beauty For All Industries’ incubator Madeby Collective that had started a year before, with 11 makeup and skincare products priced from $14 to $20, including Lip Quip Clean Moisturizing Lip Gloss. Sephora is now dropping Item Beauty, according to reporting by the publication Business Insider. Madeby Collective and Sephora didn’t respond to requests from Beauty Independent for comment.
In a statement, Yarbro complimented Sephora for having a “wonderful relationship” with Selfless by Hyram and successfully launching the brand. He explained that “changes in direction and retail adjustments” led to the brand winding down at the retailer. Selfless by Hyram remains available at Cult Beauty, where it entered last year, but the e-tailer is selling it at a heavy discount.
“We’re so excited to expand into new retailers that allow the product line to be more accessible to consumers, give new shoppers the opportunity to discover what the range has to offer, and increase the global social impact of protecting forests from deforestation and connecting communities with clean drinking water,” stated Yarbro. “We’re grateful for the opportunity to have partnered with Sephora, and we can’t wait to reveal where Selfless by Hyram is expanding to next! We are only growing Selfless by Hyram, and I am so excited to share what is all to come.”
Along with the closure of Morphe’s 18-unit store network, Selfless by Hyram’s and Item Beauty’s departures from Sephora demonstrate that many influencers are having a tough go of it in the beauty industry today as consumers move on from their brands and turn to products aligned with long-term authority. Morphe parent company Forma Brands developed brands associated with the influencers and celebrities Jaclyn Hill, Ariana Grande, and Charli and Dixie D’Amelio. At one point, it had ties to Jeffree Star, Emma Chamberlain and James Charles as well.
Yarbro, a former Saks Fifth Avenue makeup artist, rose to social media fame by sharing skincare tips and his favorite products, criticizing brands such as Drunk Elephant, being candid in product reviews, and assessing celebrities’ skincare routines. When Selfless by Hyram launched, he pulled back on harsher elements of his content and stopped scouring celebrity skincare routines, although he has returned to reacting to celebrity skincare routines. Yarbro’s brand universe extends beyond Selfless by Hyram to Selfless Coffee.
The content shifts and fluctuating beauty landscape have diminished Yarbro’s and his brand’s social media power. Influencer marketing platform CreatorIQ figures Selfless by Hyram’s community size, posting activity and earned media value, an estimated value of social engagement with digital earned media, have been declining since the second half of last year. Item Beauty has fared better. CreatorIQ data shows its EMV dipped slightly, but its community size and posting activity have jumped.
Yarbro has 6.1 million TikTok followers, 4.56 million YouTube subscribers and 982,000 Instagram followers. Easterling has 88.9 million TikTok followers, 4.43 YouTube subscribers and 39.3 million Instagram followers. Their brands have significantly smaller social media presences, and those presences have been shrinking. Currently, Selfless by Hyram has 169,000 Instagram followers, and Item Beauty has 334,000 Instagram followers.
Ann Oh, the content creator known as Minsooky who tweeted on Dec. 3 about Selfless by Hyram no longer being sold by Sephora, says Selfless by Hyram’s exit from Sephora could signal that “the influencer bubble is bursting. This is a total guess, but perhaps people don’t care as much about who heads a beauty brand as much as its quality.”
“People are more conscious than ever about where they spend their money.”
Oh hasn’t been a fan of Selfless by Hyram’s marketing, which she describes as focused on social impact. Selfless by Hyram supports the organizations Rainforest Trust and Thirst Project. Oh says, “What about the actual products? How do they work? What’s to like about them?…If consumers don’t like the products, it’s not going to matter how much they benefit the environment. People want products that work for them, bottom line.”
In a video on Selfless by Hyram posted seven months ago, Robert Stead, a YouTuber whose channel is called Mad About Skin, agrees that the brand’s social impact positioning has been an issue. He suggests it should commit a specific percentage of its profits to its chosen causes. However, he doesn’t identify the social impact issue as the main problem with the brand. Rather, he argues Selfless by Hyram’s prices have been its main problem. “If they would have brought that price point down down a little bit, it would’ve been much more accessible, more people would have tried it,” he says in the video.
Stead’s video was posted after Selfless by Hyram slashed prices on its own website. At the moment, shoppers can purchase the brand’s products on the site for $11.20 to $21. Stead speculates that the discounts represent Selfless by Hyram “testing the waters” with lower prices that it could transition to. The brand didn’t elaborate on price reductions or specify new retailers it plans to expand to.
Alicia Lartey, an aesthetician and product developer, doesn’t believe Selfless by Hyram has a future. “There are so many skincare brands on the market with far better formulations at a far better price. You can even get the same sort of ingredients for cheaper from Inkey List themselves,” she says, adding, “As the influencer industry becomes bigger, I suspect that people have a deeper insight into how much money can be made and how easy it is to flog products with a large audience. People are more conscious than ever about where they spend their money, and I do think some brands come across as disingenuous ventures for profit.”
Stead is comparatively optimistic that Selfless by Hyram will stick around. He commends the brand on formulas applicable to a broad range of skin types and for bringing sustainability to the fore. “I hope this brand does have a future. You know, I’m all about choice in the skincare world and I think, whilst there has been some slip-ups, it’s definitely nice to see brands look at sustainability in a meaningful way,” he says. “If they change their approach—just declare what percentage went to charity and all that good stuff—I think they’ll be leading the industry in terms of donations and supporting social causes, which I wish more brands would do. There are definitely some positives to take out of this, and I will keep an eye out on future launches.”
