Now, Bubble gets tagged on TikTok greater than 4,000 times per day and has an extended waitlist for its ambassador program, Eisenman said. Lots of those ambassadors are young enough to want permission from their parents to hitch the Bubble program, adding an additional approval step to the Bubble team’s plate.

Because of this, Bubble has grown its social media staffers from a team of about 4 people to roughly 20 people. 

Eisenman said the marketing channels the brand spends probably the most money and time on vary from month to month and product to product. “If we’re currently in regular months that don’t have any launches, sometimes it’s on paid ads, sometimes it’s on influencers,” she said. “Sometimes it’s more on the retail side, ensuring that we have now an attractive experience in store. We’re currently evolving and focusing loads on the education team and field team, which is clearly a major marketing investment as well.” 

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What the experts say

Targeting Gen Z shoppers within the reasonably priced skincare aisle has put Bubble on the map. Plus, 2020 in some ways was a very great time to launch a skincare brand and start on TikTok, based on experts within the space.

The Cetaphils and CeraVes of the world, which operate in the identical space and price range as Bubble, were ripe for disruption in 2020. Unlike Bubble, with its brilliant colours and fun, daring fonts, these brands should not “particularly revolutionary or cool or trendy,” Sky Canaves, senior analyst, retail & e-commerce at Insider Intelligence, said of Bubble’s older competitors. She added that the cooler, trendier brands within the skincare space typically are inclined to exceed Bubble’s price point.

The $20 and below price range appeals to Gen Z “especially the younger Gen Z teen segments,” she added. While lots of them would like to spend a whole lot of dollars on high-end beauty and skincare products they can not quite afford that yet, Canaves noted—in order that they’re in search of the very best value for his or her babysitting money.

“Affordability can also be really vital to that consumer demographic,” Emma Chozick, head of community and curation at brand discovery platform Thingtesting, said of Gen Z in an interview. “Especially because it’s a younger demographic, they don’t seem to be buying like Lancer skincare, they don’t seem to be going to love Nordstrom and buying Caudalie.” 

More brand news: CeraVe continues to soar in skincare

“That is a part of what’s given rise to the massive dupe trend on TikTok, for instance, and likewise ties into the de-influencing trend where creators review and discuss products that beauty shoppers really should not be spending their money on,” Canaves said.

Chozick also noted that Gen Z likes shopping in-store. “They like accessibility. They like ease of purchase,” Chozick said.

Canaves seemed particularly impressed with Bubble. “They’re selling out a few of their top products, and their products are going viral,” she said, adding that “they reportedly have a really strong product pipeline going into next 12 months.”

Plus, it just happens to be a fantastic time to be a skincare brand. “Skincare is a subcategory of cosmetics and wonder, which is a subcategory of health and private care, and in 2023 it’ll be the fastest-growing of all the retail categories and subcategories that we track,” Canaves said.

Through the height of the pandemic, Canaves continued, “interest in skincare and caring for yourself” increased. “That is really reached younger consumers through the impact of social channels. They’re just loads higher educated and more sophisticated of their knowledge of products and the ingredients that go into them. … There’s consumer demand.”

While Bubble might need the upper hand on TikTok, it has an extended option to go by way of beating out legacy brands resembling CeraVe in market share. Canaves cited a recent WWD report which noted that unnamed “industry sources” expect Bubble’s sales to achieve $85 million in 2023, “with those sales predominantly within the U.S.,” per Canaves.

For comparison, while L’Oréal, CeraVe’s parent company, doesn’t break out the brand’s sales, “it did note that it reached the $1 billion mark back in 2021, and sales have continued to grow at a rapid pace since then, so global annual sales needs to be greater than $1.5 billion by now. The U.S. is the brand’s biggest market, accounting for 60% of its sales, per the most recent earnings call. We forecast U.S. retail sales for skincare to achieve $21.59 billion this 12 months,” Canaves continued.