Aaliyah Arnold, founder and CEO of BossUp Cosmetics, hopes she will see her brand of lipsticks and eyeshadows on the shelves of Sephora and Ulta Beauty. BossUp is the 20 year-old’s second company, and right now it is riding high thanks to its color-changing lip oil—which claims to look different on every person depending on their pH—that has gone viral on TikTok, helping it sell over 500,000 units.
BossUp, an indie brand especially popular with women of color, currently offers over 100 products including blushes, body lotions, and masks. The Houston startup employs about 10 people; all are Arnold’s family members, including her mom, who handles the company’s finances. BossUp makes many of its products, including the body scrubs, lip masks, and body lotions, as well as all the lip oils and lip glosses. For eye shadows and blushes, it relies on an overseas lab. Arnold used to make the lip oil herself but delegated this duty so she could focus on running BossUp. “A lot of people think I have a manager to handle this, to do that. I don't. I do everything—the email marketing, the product photography, the packaging. Everything I do myself,” she said.
Her efforts come as BossUp fights for a share of a global cosmetics market that is expected to grow by nearly 43% to $446 billion by 2030 from $312.33 billion in 2024, according to Grand View Research.
Lip oil, a combination of lip gloss and lip balm, has surged in popularity because the product aims to keep lips hydrated and smooth. Lip oils represent a small slice of the cosmetics market.
This year through August, sales of high-end lip oils in the U.S. grew 59% to $115.5 million compared to 2023, according to Circana. That’s up from less than $18 million in 2021. Elf Cosmetics in August said that robust demand for its Glow Reviver Lip Oil, which costs $8, helped boost revenue by 50%, Bloomberg reported.
Some of the best-selling lip oils include Dior Lip Glow Oil ($40), Summer Fridays Dream Lip Oil for Moisturizing Sheer Coverage ($26), and Gisou Honey Infused Hydrating Lip Oil ($28), according to Sephora. (Neither Dior, Summer Fridays, nor Gisou is independent. LVMH owns Dior, TPG has a controlling stake in Summer Fridays, and Gisou is backed by Eurazeo.)
Bossup’s lip oil offers an additional hook. While it moisturizes, the lip oil reacts to a person’s pH, changing a custom shade of pink. “It’s different on everyone,” Arnold said.
BossUp remains a small player in the cosmetics world with $6 million in revenue. It is considered an “indie brand” and stands out in part because it is led by an Afro-Latina founder. (Arnold is Black and Mexican, or “Blaxican,” as she describes herself.)
The startup tries to keep its products as affordable as possible, said Arnold, who noted that she often gets messages from customers saying they don’t have enough money to buy items. Her color-changing lip oil costs $12.99, while glosses range from $9.99 to $10.99 and blushes sell for $10.99. “In my opinion, makeup is not a need. But I don't think that should be a reason why you can't treat yourself!” said Arnold.
Following a trail blazed by Rihanna
For years, major makeup brands largely catered to lighter skin tones. That began to change in 2017 when Fenty Beauty, the brand backed by Rihanna, launched with 40 foundation shades. Since then, new brands have emerged, like Huda Beauty, that are more inclusive. Arnold agrees that major beauty brands still largely ignore Afro-Latinas, whose presence is often overlooked within the Latino diaspora.
The Afro-Latina segment is becoming more visible, though, with the emergence of several growing brands, including Luna Magic Beauty, led by Los Angeles–based sisters Mabel and Shaira Frías. Arnold thinks beauty brands are finally making a place for people of color. “I think we still have a long way to go, and I think social media is playing a huge part in making our voices heard,” she said.
Arnold introduced BossUp’s color-changing lip oil as part of a Valentine's Day collection of glosses in February 2023. She then offered the lip oil separately and it sold out within minutes. But real success didn’t come until BossUp launched the lip oil on TikTok Shop last summer.
TikTok typically limits small corporate sellers to 200 products a day, so they won’t oversell. The limit helped BossUp because Arnold could publicize that the lip oil was selling out by 8 a.m. She would advise potential customers to buy in the early morning and “get one quick before they sell out again,” according to an October 2023 TikTok that has received about 9 million views.
The lip oil remains BossUp’s top-selling product, followed by Boss Balm, her black color-changing lip and cheek balm, which has sold more than 50,000 units and costs $8.99. TikTok does get a slice, “not a big percent,” of BossUp’s orders, she said. (BossUp products are only sold on TikTok Shop and the company’s website.)
TikTok Shop does not disclose specific product or category sales data, nor does it provide comparison information. BossUp’s color changing lip oil remains “highly popular,” according to a person familiar with the situation at TikTok Shop.
BossUp has also used Alibaba to source products that she needs to buy in bulk, including 500,000 lip oil tubes from a Chinese manufacturer. “All of my packaging, my lip oil tubes and everything like that, I do purchase it through Alibaba.com,” she said.
Social media has played a significant role in the startup’s success. Arnold said she “records everything,” which allows her to share many of her accomplishments—and her mistakes—with BossUp’s 2.3 million TikTok and 387,000 Instagram followers, as well as 958,000 subscribers on YouTube.
Arnold’s social media feeds offer not just makeup videos, but windows into her personal life—and the sweet smell of success. There are videos of when Arnold bought her first house at age 19, moved into a new warehouse, and a tearjerker where Arnold gave her grandfather a pickup. “I just learned that people want to see me, and they want to see how I run this business. And they want to see how I run it with my family,” Arnold said.
Making Gloss
Arnold has always loved makeup, she tells Fortune, but her first business was selling slime on Etsy. She was just 11 and quit that venture when it reached about 400 sales. “I grew out of it,” Arnold said simply.
She credits that first company with teaching her how to sell online and promote a product. After a bullying incident at school, Arnold’s parents decided to homeschool her. Arnold, who comes from a family of entrepreneurs, used the time to create her second company. She was just 14 and her mother wouldn’t let her wear makeup, but Arnold was allowed to put on lip gloss. She looked up on Google how to make gloss and then learned how to create her own website. Arnold launched BossUp on Instagram. It took two months before she had her first sale.
Every weekend, Arnold said she visits beauty retailers like Sephora, which sells more than 300 brands, and Ulta, which offers over 600. Arnold said that once BossUp’s products are in these stores that’s when she will know “I've made it.” BossUp, she said, still has much growing to do before it can reach this milestone. Arnold said she would consider venture capital backing that would allow her to reach this goal, but it would “depend on the number.”
When asked who she looks up to in the beauty world, the BossUp CEO was very quick to answer. “It 1000% has to be Selena Gomez,” said Arnold. Gomez’s net worth hit $1.3 billion in September and much of that comes from her cosmetic brand, Rare Beauty, which she launched in 2019, according to Bloomberg.
Initially Arnold was a fan of Gomez’s music but now she admires the celebrity’s branding and marketing prowess. “She's definitely someone I'd look up to,” Arnold said.
The 20-year-old CEO, who launched BossUp in her grandmother’s living room, isn’t shy about her plans. “I'm a big dreamer and I know that my brand is going to go big. I want to be a billion-dollar business one day,” said Arnold, her voice rising with enthusiasm.
“I would wake up every day looking forward to making lip gloss, because I just thought it was such a cool thing,” she told Fortune.
