Rhode Beauty: How Hailey Bieber earned her $1bn payday
Hailey Bieber bet on the power of community, not marketing, to build Rhode. Its $1bn exit last week is proof it worked, writes Viviane Paxinos
When Elf Beauty acquired Hailey Bieber’s Rhode for $1bn last week, it wasn’t just another celebrity beauty deal. This acquisition represents a fundamental shift in how female entrepreneurs are building businesses, and it’s a blueprint that will reshape commerce for the next decade.
Rhode’s success lies in a simple but revolutionary principle that authentic community building is the foundation of sustainable business success. While traditional brands spend fortunes on paid advertising, Rhode generated an estimated $400m in earned media value through authentic community engagement.
Rhode’s real genius lies in marketing that doesn’t feel like marketing at all. When Hailey applies Rhode products during her morning routine, you’re not watching an ad – you’re watching your impossibly cool friend get ready.
Hailey Bieber gets 21st century marketing
Take their viral bath bomb campaign. Hailey sent giant bath bombs to influencers, each hiding a Rhode product inside. The reaction videos hit over 60,000 views, but here’s why it worked: nobody felt sold to. They were entertained. The recipients weren’t being handed a product to promote, they were being given an experience worth sharing. That’s the difference between interruption and invitation.
Views on a typical Rhode Instagram post range from 11,000 to 180,000, with product launches gaining massive organic reach. There’s also the infamous phone case with the Rhode logo, which Hailey Bieber turned into a must-have accessory overnight. Although it was originally a promotional item, Hailey released the case as a standalone product – only this time it contained a slot for a lip product to effortlessly fit into. A single Instagram post promoting it received over 460,000 likes.
Generating this kind of buzz through community engagement isn’t a coincidence – it’s strategy. Scroll through their content and you’ll notice something: they rarely post obvious testimonials. Instead, they amplify real moments, such as makeup artists casually mentioning Rhode in tutorials, everyday users showing genuine results, celebrities spotted wearing their lip treatments in paparazzi shots. Each share feels like discovering something rather than being marketed to.
I often say that community is like an iceberg, and what most brands see as “community building” is just the visible tip. Rhode’s success lay in the massive work beneath the surface: the authentic conversations, the genuine interest in individual customers, the invisible infrastructure that makes visible connections possible.
The difference is profound. Research consistently shows that consumers increase their spending when they feel genuinely connected to brands. Traditional marketing talks at consumers, but Rhode created spaces where consumers talked with each other. Every product launch became a community moment, every testimonial a peer recommendation. This approach generated exponentially more value than any advertising budget could achieve.
Not all celebrity brands are made equally
While Hailey’s 55m Instagram followers provided an initial platform, follower count alone doesn’t guarantee success. The beauty industry is littered with celebrity brands that had massive audiences but failed to convert attention into sustainable businesses.
The difference lies in execution. Having millions of followers is like having a megaphone that amplifies whatever message you’re sending. If that message is purely transactional or feels inauthentic, even the largest audience will tune out. Rhode succeeded because Hailey Bieber understood what I’ve learned through years of genuine community-building at Allbright: you can’t fake interest – people sense that immediately. Rather than posting overtly promotional content, she shares real-life moments like a selfie or a skincare routine that naturally feature Rhode products. This approach feels genuine and relatable, making her followers more likely to trust and try the products themselves.
This distinction is crucial for female entrepreneurs. Building an audience means people follow you, but building a community means people find each other through you. The latter creates exponentially more value and more sustainability.
At Allbright, we’ve long taught the difference between having an audience and building a community. Building community requires genuine curiosity about individuals, consistent meaningful touchpoints beyond scheduled events and empowering connections that eventually don’t need your facilitation. Rhode’s journey from zero to $1bn perfectly exemplifies this principle in action, turning a beauty startup into a cultural phenomenon.
The numbers tell the story: while established beauty brands spend approximately 9.55 per cent of revenue on marketing, Rhode achieved massive scale through community-driven growth that cost a fraction of traditional approaches.
A blueprint for female founders
Rhode’s acquisition signals that major corporations now recognise community-driven businesses as the future of commerce. Elf Beauty didn’t just buy a product line, they bought a blueprint for authentic engagement in an increasingly sceptical marketplace.
We’re witnessing this shift also at Allbright. In just the first five months of this year, we’ve received more requests from brands wanting to partner on community events than we had in all of the previous year. The demand for authentic community engagement has exploded as brands finally understand that genuine connection, not clever campaigns, drives sustainable growth.
For female entrepreneurs, this creates an unprecedented opportunity. The skills women naturally bring to business, including relationship building, authentic communication and collaborative leadership, are now the most valuable assets in commerce. Research from McKinsey shows that companies with diverse leadership teams are 21 per cent more profitable, and community-driven businesses amplify these advantages. The future belongs to founders who can build movements, not just businesses.
Rhode’s success offers a clear roadmap for female entrepreneurs. Stop trying to build the next great product and start building the next great community. Focus on creating spaces where your customers connect with each other, not just with you. Transform buyers into advocates who spread your message authentically within their networks.
The next generation of billion-dollar businesses won’t be built in boardrooms or through traditional marketing playbooks. They’ll be built in living rooms, coffee shops and comment sections where real women are connecting, sharing and lifting each other up. The future of commerce isn’t just female, it’s fundamentally human. And that’s a future I can’t wait to help build.
Viviane Paxinos is CEO of and everywoman