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It’s my pleasure to talk to you about what content creators get up to in any given week. But this week, I’m not just talking about any content creator. I’m talking about a woman who does so much more than create content, even if that is technically what she does. But that’s also technically what I do, and it just seems wrong to compare the two of us.
You see, this woman isn’t just a content creator—she’s a culture creator. When she drops content, the world moves accordingly. Everybody understands that things were one way, but they’re a different way now. Sort of like this newsletter, but on a much grander scale.
I’m not referring to this newsletter’s favorite bid at cultural relevance/target of benign mockery, Taylor Swift. She’s great too (just not at dancing), but she hasn’t recently launched a second brand.
No, dear reader. I’m referring, of course, to Beyoncé.
Yes, like a comet blazing once more across the firmament, the iconic artist is back in the spotlight again. Not just for Cowboy Carter, her deep dive into country music and Americana, but for the launch of CÉCRED, a science-backed brand catering to textured hair whose name I initially found pretty confusing.
It’s not just another Celebrity Beauty Brand: it’s Beyoncé’s Celebrity Beauty Brand. We are contractually obligated to stan.
Yet while CÉCRED has already made a splash in haircare—we’ll have a full report soon—this splash looked a little familiar. Not just because there are so many other Celebrity Beauty Brands (let’s call them CBBs, both for catchiness and to spare me the effort to type that out each time), but because of Beyoncé’s previous CBB, Ivy Park.
That’s right—remember Ivy Park? I almost didn’t. And that, dear reader, is where our trip down memory lane begins.
The Top Brand of All Time (of the Week)
Though Ivy Park launched in March 2016, the athleisure brand didn’t really kick into high gear until several years later. I can dimly recall, when I was younger and my eyes still gleamed with innocence, writing about Ivy Park’s celeb-heavy product drops, which captured the internet’s attention in January 2020. (No wonder it’s hard to remember now.) These coordinated sends to A-listers like Michael B. Jordan, Reese Witherspoon, and Cardi B brought some of the world’s biggest names under Beyoncé’s banner, cementing impactful—but highly timebound—EMV generation for Ivy Park.
There were other Ivy Park drops in November 2020, February 2021, and August 2021. See if you can find those months on this graph of the brand’s EMV from its launch date to the present:
EMV growth for Ivy Park from 2016-2024
Alright, no major points for finding those product sends. You also get no major points for noticing that after 2022 or so, besides for a few minor aftershocks following that initial earthquake, Ivy Park has largely been lying low. The numbers from 2020 bear this out in relatively dramatic fashion:
Ivy Park EMV and EMV YoY Change by Year
You don’t cé. And what does that look like in graph form?
EMV for Ivy Park from 2020 - 2023
This is pretty much the opposite of the sort of graph I usually like to show in these newsletters. We love a 1.0k% YoY EMV growth, like Ivy Park saw from 2019 to 2020, but to have your EMV decline 72% over the following three years? That’s distressing, man. I for one am distressed.
Correspondingly, Ivy Park’s ranking amongst our top Apparel brands by EMV has plummeted year in, year out:
Total Engagement and Total Engagement YoY Change for March 2023 to February 2024
Look, there’s nothing wrong with being the internet’s 238th-most popular Apparel brand. But maybe if you’re founded by Beyoncé, there’s something a little unexpected about it.
And I know what you’re thinking: Alex, first of all, you are excommunicated from the Beyhive for this one. Second, what about 2024? Has CÉCRED’s launch led to a mini- or even a maxi-revival for Ivy Park?
Well, hypothetical reader, first of all I don’t know why you’re talking in italics. But second, no.
In January and February 2024, Ivy Park pulled in $604.9k EMV, which proved an 87% YoY decline relative to January and February 2023. What’s more (or rather, what’s less), Ivy Park ranked at No. 493 in Apparel across those two months. Congratulations to our No. 492 Apparel brand, Daisy London—you beat Beyoncé!
So what’s the deal with Ivy Park’s rather lackluster numbers? And what does this mean for CÉCRED? Here’s what I think is going on, and will continue to go on:
Ivy Park Was Built for the Old Social Media
Back in Ivy Park’s halcyon days of 2020, the rules for influencer marketing were different. It was enough to rely on star power to carry brands, especially when that star power consisted of Beyoncé and her best friends. Launching broad-scale product sends to A-listers several times per year was enough to ensure growth, and to create viral moments that sparked anticipation from consumers.
Things are a little different now. Consumers crave authenticity, a lack of ostentation, and constant engagement—more TikTok, less fashion catalog. That was never the vibe or aesthetic that Ivy Park was going for, and perhaps to the brand’s credit, it doesn’t seem like Ivy Park ever really tried to shift strategies.
In a sense, Ivy Park was one of the last pre-COVID brands to make it big, if only for a little while, with the old mode of business. Nowadays, successful celebrity brands like Rare Beauty, RHODE Skin, and Fenty Beauty put their founders and their founders’ famous friends less front-and-center. While these founders are still highly involved, and certainly far from invisible, content about these brands tends to focus on products, creators’ routines, and elements closer to the lives of consumers.
CÉCRED Might Be Built for the New
It’s too early to say this definitively, but at least from what I can see, CÉCRED has read the cues and is catering to 2024’s social media landscape. Science-backed haircare is all the rage, and so long as the brand puts some of that Lemonade money toward product quality, there’s no reason to believe that Beyoncé won’t be able to provide the best.
Plus, compared to Ivy Park, CÉCRED is already making more of an effort to work with creators, rather than mainstream celebrities. In February 2024, the month of its launch, CÉCRED’s top EMV-drivers came from the world of beauty and haircare tutorials, or social media more broadly: Desi Perkins, Alisha Marie, Shayla Mitchell, and Bretman Rock all ranked among the brand’s top earners. In contrast, Ivy Park’s top earners from January 2020 to February 2024 included:
- Tina Knowles (Beyoncé’s mother)
- Megan Thee Stallion (I don’t need to tell you who Megan Thee Stallion is)
- Irina Shayk (model)
- Gabrielle Union (ageless wonder)
So suffice it to say, CÉCRED is pulling from a different well. Time will tell whether CÉCRED sticks to this strategy, but the early returns are promising.
It All Comes Down to Investment
How will Beyoncé position herself relative to CÉCRED? Is she another Hailey Bieber, Selena Gomez, or Rihanna? In other words, a figure from the world of entertainment who remakes herself into the face of a brand by putting in countless hours of work, forsaking other pursuits (where’s the new music, RiRi?), and, most importantly, knowing when to step back?
Think about it: Rare Beauty, RHODE Skin, and Fenty Beauty are all so much more than their famous founders. Obviously those founders sit at the heart of each brand, but each has differentiated itself via its product line and creator outreach strategies—something that Ivy Park, intentionally or not, never did.
Now, with CÉCRED, Beyoncé has a chance to rewrite history, which she’s done once or twice before. Are you prepared to bet against her?
For the record, Bey, I am not. Now that I’ve reaffirmed my allegiance, please be the first brand to send me some free product. Prove that you’ve learned your lesson from Ivy Park!
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