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If you want to know something that really irritates me, it’s that Peloton, the at-home spin class company, got way more coverage for its market ups and downs after Mr. Big dropped dead on one of its bikes than Revlon did when it filed for bankruptcy protection a couple years ago. I saw this Revlon bankruptcy news maybe once on the news crawl, and never again. 

Revlon, the drugstore makeup brand from the 1930s is not sexy (anymore), and because it’s not in any way associated with youthful Silicon Valley start-up culture (ahem, Peloton), it does not capture our cultural obsession. I had to work harder than you would think to research the backstory of its bankruptcy…there are a few articles out there but they are generally very brief, repeat the basics and lack analysis.

Can you imagine if Tesla went bankrupt how many podcast hours would be dedicated to the news, meanwhile, I can assure you there are more Revlon lipsticks in households all over the world? One lipstick apparently sells every few minutes!

Before I jump into the bankruptcy, of course you’ll want to know about products because that’s what I do a lot of here in this newsletter. A warm welcome to my many news subscribers and paid subscribers! Thank you! You’re the best.

Revlon Colorstay Longwear Foundation is great dupe for Estée Lauder Double Wear Foundation but costs a fraction of the price: $13 versus $49 (USD. In Canada it’s about $20 versus $65). It oxidizes less than Double Wear and generally has a dewy appearance. It comes in 44 shades, Double Wear is 55 shades, so it’s not too bad in that regard either.

I’ve been wearing it about 5 years now and it was reformulated with hyaluronic acid about a year ago, due to a post-bankruptcy revamping of products that is seeing the addition of skincare ingredients that consumers supposedly expect. Personally I can’t tell any difference since the reformulation, but more on the new ingredient strategy further down.

The other Revlon must-have in my books is any of its red lipsticks. No one does red like Revlon, mark my words! If you don't like red (Fire & Ice is the best red), first of all, what’s wrong with you, it looks good on everyone, here are some other iconic shades dating from the 90s that are seeing a big resurgence. Whenever I mention even one them on YouTube, people start chiming in with these others in the comments:

Toast of New York (a brown-red)

Wine with Everything (a berry)

Coffee Bean (neutral/brown)

Rum Raisin (mauvish/coffee)

These lipsticks cost around $9, surely there is something from the list above that you’ll like. 

I mean, I cared because I’m a creature of habit and it’ll be sad if I have to switch drugstore brands at this ripe old age, but it’s also sad because Revlon has a rich makeup history – and amazing cosmetic formulations –  that could have been lost forever. 

Created in the early 1930s during the Depression by the Revson brothers, its first product was nail polish. After came the ingenious marketing idea to pair polish with a lipstick shade. Why sell one product when you can upsell a matching pair?

This was the first ad, circa 1952 for the Fire & Ice combo (you can still get the lipstick today at Ulta) and just feast your eyes on actress Dorian Leigh! She looks like Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor rolled into one hot tamale! You better show up at her door for a date with an armful of red roses and a Cadillac to squire her around.

Another high point for the brand was the 1990s because it was all about lipstick. We all owned something from Revlon, typically Toast of New York but Coffee Bean and Rum Raisin were big at that time too. And you had your red lippy girlies as well, who also wore Revlon. 

In June of 2022, Revlon filed for bankruptcy and really, no one blinked. It has cited Covid-related supply chain problems, but apparently its sales dropped 21% in 2020. It has been losing market share to the other newbie drugstore competition, which won’t come as a surprise to anyone who’s visited Target lately, there are so many more makeup brands then even a decade ago.

I did a bit more digging, and thanks to a rather obscure article titled “Revlon Emerges From Bankruptcy With Brand-Focused Strategy” by CE Noticias Financieras English I learned the following: It also owns these brands: Elizabeth Arden, American Crew, Almay, Mitchum, Cutex, Elizabeth Taylor and Juicy Couture.

Jeez Louise, if this isn’t a bunch of stodgy, older-lady brands (even Juicy Couture had its heyday when I was still in my 20s), I don’t know what is. Elizabeth Arden? Revlon bought that company for $870 million in 2016. That couldn’t have been a good acquisition.

The only Elizabeth Arden products I can name are Prevage the aging cream and…that’s it, actually. Oh, and Green Tea perfume. Not that every cosmetic company has to cater to young’uns, but maybe the acquisition of a fresh skincare brand or makeup targeting consumers in their 30s and not 70s might have been the smarter diversification play? But what do I know.

It filed for bankruptcy “saying its $3.5 billion debt load and pandemic-related disruptions had left it too cash-poor to make timely payments to vendors,” says this Reuters article. Revlon was a public company, and all shareholders would have been wiped out. At least that’s how I understand it.

Thanks for reading!

Warmly,

Helen

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