Jeffree Star: An Example of the Post-Modern Fashion and Cosmetics Industry
As Covid-19 continues to ravage job sectors and industries worldwide, the concept of the corporate ladder going digital has never been more prolific, nor more viable. Indeed, while many new faces in industries such as fashion, cosmetics, media, and generalized entertainment have launched themselves from some of the deepest recesses of the internet, such an avenue was still never considered a lucrative option. Now more than ever, it’s becoming clear that self-made business opportunities hold dominance over the largely online shopping and retail markets. Individuals like Bezos and Musk may be nearing the trillion dollar mark, but already enterprises like theirs are joining the ranks of the old guard. The future lies in diverting from traditional methodologies of success, such avenues proving increasingly improbable for the average civilian. Whilst unregulated, many ordinary people across the globe have found fame and opportunity through digital conduits such as the YouTube channel, the self-realized website, and the self-produced online video production. Whereas such endeavors proving popular with audiences were categorized as ‘underground’ success stories, the failure of large conglomerates’ continuing promotional exclusivity in effect is producing an entirely new generation of talent.
Center-stage individuals such as Jeffree Star, recently characterized in a headline by Vox as a YouTuber made “too big to fail”. A native of Orange County, California, Star utilized the 2000s online platform MySpace to full effect, his self-made photo shoots and makeup tutorials garnering over 50,000 responses from website users. This lead to Star launching a short-lived music career where he popularized independent hits such as Lollipop Luxury, featuring an up and-coming Nicki Minaj. This increased his public image on platforms everywhere, and utilizing assets from these endeavors Star risked everything to launch a digital makeup line in 2014. Through continued self-promotion on his YouTube channel, Star eventually turned the line into retail giant Jeffree Star Cosmetics. As of 2018, he remains the fifth highest-paid YouTube star, often promoting new products and featuring shoots with talent in the likes of Danielle Bregoli and Kathy Griffin.
Stories like these confirm the obvious. The internet provided a hole in a void typically excluding many from achieving dreams in the entertainment sectors. For years, competitive businesses such as fashion, music, or entertainment seemed to thrive with whimsical glee at the virtual impossibilities facing qualified newcomers, lest nepotistic connections prevail. If the stories time tells hold any value, it’s that unnecessary exclusionary activity spells the road to ruin for the excluder. Now more than ever is the year of the underdog. In entertainment industries such as film or television, the ‘mainstream’ is scoffed at as artistically lacking drivel, something to be avoided at all costs. Entertainment giants are playing ill-advised games with key ambassadors, providing artistic mimicry to the perceived ‘common’ or ‘working class’ aesthetics. Enter much maligned proclivities such as the blaccent, the actorvist, and the ironically-termed celebrity YouTuber. That irony rests on the shoulders of people continuing to try to forge class warfare in a business built on imagination.
If the ‘ordinary man’ has become a trope wished to be seen from the horse’s mouth, naturally a cultural slide is inevitable. Modern-day commercials have radically changed their tunes from traditional, superhuman deifications. Contemporary examples of this change include Rhonda Rousey’s Perfect advertisement in response to Holly Holm, or Jaden Smith’s widely covered cross-dressing and gender-bending outfits. In a societal pocket where rules for beauty, glamor, and opportunity were unthinkable to break, the tables have turned overnight. The key to success now lies in the digitization of what we know, that is until such innovations prove too exclusionary unto themselves.