The Billion-Dollar Power Of Quiet Femininity: How Hailey Bieber Built Rhode

Hailey Bieber just pulled off what every skincare-obsessed girlie dreams of: she launched a brand in her wife era and flipped it for a billion dollars.

This week, E.l.f. Beauty announced it was acquiring Rhode—Bieber’s minimalistic, dewy-skin-for-days brand—in a deal valued up to $1 billion. Yes, you read that right. E.l.f., best known for selling affordable but tried-and-true cosmetics, went high-end for its biggest acquisition yet, betting big on Rhode’s clean girl glow and, more importantly, Bieber’s quietly powerful brand of femininity.

Let’s be clear: Rhode in no way rewrote skincare science. This brand is now worth a billion because Hailey turned skincare into a lifestyle—and it made that lifestyle look aspirational, serene, and soft. It’s wife-coded, in the best way.

Welcome to the Wife Era Economy

Hailey Bieber didn’t build Rhode by launching some heavy-handed feminist manifesto. She leaned into her femininity after marrying Justin Bieber by cultivating a brand built on effortless posh and polish, and letting that glow speak for itself. While the girlboss era of yesteryore was all about women emulating masculinity, Bieber’s approach shows there’s indeed power in grace, subtlety, and well-moisturized skin.

Her “clean girl” vibe—sometimes dismissed as boring, and then overdone—is printing money. Rhode only launched three years ago with ten products, and already pulled in $212 million in sales last year through e-commerce alone. It’s set to hit Sephora shelves later this year, but it’s been killing the game through word of mouth and influencer marketing by tapping into something women are clearly craving: calm and confident femininity.

Of course, Bieber’s rise hasn’t been without its critics. As the daughter of actor Stephen Baldwin and niece of Alec Baldwin, she’s often labeled a “nepo baby.” But rather than deflect, she leaned into it (literally!) by wearing a T-shirt with the term across her chest.

“I’m just going to call myself a nepo baby, because I am one, and I embrace that I am,” she said in a 2023 Bloomberg interview. “There is never any winning with the internet, and that’s what I’ve always—time and time again—realized.”

Still, she has put in the work. From early legal battles over her brand name to endless scrutiny from netizens with seemingly nothing better to do than trash talk celebs online, Bieber has pushed through with intention and is now more successful than ever before.

“I am a crazy perfectionist and I’ve had to accept the fact that there is no such thing as a perfect launch that doesn’t have its bumps or mishaps,” she said at the Forbes Under 30 Summit. “Mistakes are part of the process… you have to accept those mistakes and be able to learn from them so that you can actually improve your brand and help drive it forward.”

Pretty Privilege? More Like Pretty Strategy

You want to know why Rhode is doing so well? Think about why the Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show used to be such a smash hit. Rhode doesn’t just sell skincare, it sells the fantasy. Glossy, kissable lips, flawless, glowing skin, oversized comfy hoodies, and perfectly manicured nails gripping a $17 Peptide Lip Treatment. It’s quiet luxury meets a glazed finish, and Bieber’s image is the brand’s most valuable asset.

And the results really do speak for themselves. Asia Milia Ware, beauty editor over at The Cut, called the Peptide Lip Treatment in Strawberry Glaze “everything I’ve always wanted in a lip product: plumping, without a burning sensation; glossy, but not sticky; nourishing and long-lasting.” 

Meanwhile, Marie Claire’s beauty editor Mica Ricketts gushed even further: “While the Peptide Lip Treatments are good, these tinted versions are even better. In fact, I'd go as far as saying they are my favourite lip product of 2024—and potentially ever.”

Bieber will stay on as Rhode’s Chief Creative Officer where she oversees product innovation and creative direction, so she’ll keep on doing what she does best: making us all want to be her. 

It’s quiet luxury meets a glazed finish, and Bieber’s image is the brand’s most valuable asset.

And frankly, this couldn’t have come at a better time for E.l.f, the go-to darling for affordable but moderately mature cosmetics. The brand just announced it plans to raise prices by $1 across its entire lineup—a first for the brand with notoriously low prices, think the Costco hot dog of the cosmetics world—in response to inflation and the return of tariffs.

And those tariffs aren’t just stressful background noise looming in the distance. Duties on imports from countries like China and South Korea have hit beauty brands hard, not just on finished products but also on the raw materials and packaging that make up the full supply chain. E.l.f. faces as much as $50 million in new costs due to tariffs.

But it’s not just big brands that could, theoretically, manufacture their products in America rather than rely on cheap Chinese labor in a more business-friendly American economy, tariffs disproportionately hurt small and mid-sized brands. Tariffs strain working capital and make it harder for companies to stay competitive—especially those without a billion-dollar backing. We need trade policies that encourage big brands to come back to the States, and those that don’t punish small entrepreneurs for playing in a global marketplace.

E.l.f.’s acquisition of Rhode is certainly a power move to hedge against these pressures. With Rhode’s prestige price point near $30 (pretty far off from $10 face primer and $3 eyeliner), E.l.f. is stepping into a more premium lane, likely to broaden its customer base and protect itself from margin squeezes. In hindsight, it’s no shock the big brand sought out another investment, as they acquired Naturium for $335 million in 2023—another skincare-forward pivot for the traditionally makeup-forward brand—but let’s be real… Naturium didn’t come with a Bieber.

The Billion-Dollar Bet on Femininity and Motherhood

This isn’t just another celeb brand cashing in. Rhode’s success, like Selena Gomez’s Rare Beauty and Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics before it, proves the market is thirsty for femininity done right. The brands raking in billion-dollar valuations aren’t the ones lecturing customers or chasing performative politics. They’re hyper-aesthetic, emotionally intelligent, and deeply connected to the women behind them. 

Investors can’t just bet on DEI checklists or activist slogans—that trend is passé and an increasingly toxic investment at this point. No, investors are now betting on beautiful branding, authentic storytelling, and the enduring pull of aspirational femininity. Bieber isn’t just the face of Rhode, she’s the reason it works.

And now, as Bieber publicly embraces motherhood, she’s bringing that same aspirational, intentional femininity into a new chapter. In a May 2024 Instagram post confirming her pregnancy, she wrote,“This next season is already the most meaningful of my life.”

Yes, the most meaningful, all while developing a now-billion-dollar brand. She has hinted at how motherhood is reshaping not just her schedule, but her entire philosophy around beauty.

In her tell-all cover story for Vogue Summer 2025, Bieber shared thoughts about this transformative journey of motherhood, sharing how it has changed her identity and perspective on life.

“You're not the same person that you were before. You change head to toe,” she said. Bieber initially found herself fixated on trying to return to her pre-pregnancy self, admitting, “There was a minute where I kept really hyper-fixating on getting back to what I was.” However, she realized she couldn’t ever go back, and that she had to accept how she needed to move forward and ask herself who she wants to be as a mom.

Embracing her new chapter, Bieber emphasized the importance of self-compassion during the fourth trimester and beyond, saying, “Every day I have to talk to myself, like, 'Hailey, you had a baby.' 'You grew a human. You birthed a human. It's okay. Give yourself grace. Give yourself time.'”

In true Bieber fashion, she’s even made pregnancy chic—favoring bump-hugging neutrals, minimalist makeup on top of her signature products, and a calm public presence. It’s another layer of the brand she’s building: feminine, maternal, and centered. And if the glow from her skincare was marketable before… the maternal glow? That might be priceless.

Closing Thoughts

Bieber’s billion-dollar exit isn’t just a PR win. This should serve as a cultural signal to us all that confirms: women don’t have to comply with performative toughness or reject softness to be taken seriously. You don’t need to lean in like a man to succeed.

Rhode is a win for beauty, femininity, and the growing cohort of women rewriting what power looks like. It’s soft. It’s pretty. It’s perfectly packaged, and it just made Bieber a billion-dollar beauty mogul. So wear your lip peptide. Romanticize your morning routine. Step fully into your wife era or mom era. The world is watching—and many are following—Bieber’s lead.