The Glossy 50 honors the year’s biggest changemakers across fashion and beauty. More from the series →
Five years ago, Starface launched with a mission to disrupt the skin-care category. It’s since grown to a nearly $90 million business.
Starface entered the market with a single product: Hydro Star pimple patches. The stickers, which come in the form of a bright yellow star, are packed with hydrocolloids, designed to reduce the appearance of inflammation and shrink red spots.
Launching right before the pandemic worked to the brand’s advantage. Being at home, consumers shamelessly wore the patches for hours, including on social media. They were then emboldened to wear them outside, too, catapulting the product to a status symbol.
In the years since then, the brand has strategically shown up in culturally relevant spaces to connect with its always-online audience. For example, in 2022, it became the first pimple patch brand to walk a runway, at Puppets and Puppets’ New York Fashion Week show. This year, it returned to NYFW, on Luar’s runway, and made its Paris Fashion Week debut with Kiko Kostadinov. In addition, the brand’s products have been worn by Justin and Hailey Beiber, Willow Smith, Addison Rae, and Millie Bobby Brown.
Now, Starface is in expansion mode under the leadership of Kara Brothers, the brand’s president since January 2022.
“This year, we sold over a billion Hydro Stars,” Brothers told Glossy. “It means we’ve helped redefine how people are engaging with their skin. [Calling attention to pimples] used to be something people shied away from.”
In November, Starface launched on Ulta.com and plans to expand in-store in the first quarter of 2025. Starface has experienced over 50% year-over-year sales growth across its retail channels this year. The brand is available at CVS, Amazon, Target and Walmart. In 2021, it expanded to the U.K. and Canada.
In November, Starface hosted a sale on Depop featuring Star Face merch created by local artists. Each artist crafted exclusive items, including custom holders for Starface’s signature Star Balm. Starface sold 90% of the products in the first few hours.
“Remaining accessible and being where our customers are and where pimples are has always helped our growth,” said Brothers.
Starface has also been expanding its product assortment. In August, it launched its first non-pimple patch product: a lip balm. To promote the launch, the team teased the product on its social channels and gifted it to A-listers, including North West and Pink Pantheress. After North West organically posted about it on TikTok, the lip balm sold out “almost immediately,” Brothers said.
Moving forward, expanding into more categories while staying true to the brand’s values is top of mind.
“One of the blessings and challenges of growing so fast is that we have more and more people along for the ride,” Brothers said. “But we’ve found that remaining focused on being ourselves while growing up resonates because we’re all kids at heart.”
