on of the viral beauty brand.  The opening paragraph of the book is a good indication of the kind of “warts and all” account that the reader is in for: “Emily Weiss was crying. The two of us were sitting in the middle of the restaurant at the Crosby Street Hotel in Lower Manhattan. Normally, when speaking to a reporter, Weiss would be chaperoned by a coterie of publicists. But this wasn’t a fawning magazine piece about her billion-dollar makeup company, Glossier, or its over-the-top stores that have been described as a ‘beauty Disneyworld’. This was about a book. More specifically, the book you’re reading now.” The book explores Weiss’s journey leading up to the launch of Glossier, from her short but memorable stint on the reality television show, The Hills, to working as an assistant at Condé Nast to launching the editorial site that would be the beginning of it all, Into The Gloss. Into The Gloss was launched in 2010 and would serve as the inspiration for the similar-sounding beauty brand that Weiss would launch just four years later. What’s been going on with Glossier? Weiss launched Glossier at a time of intense investor interest in direct-to-consumer e-commerce companies. With an in-built customer base made up of loyal Into The Gloss readers, and a product offering and communication style that felt refreshing and “real” to a younger demographic of online shoppers, Glossier was an almost instant success. In 2019, after raising an additional $100 million with a Series D round of funding led by venture capital company Sequoia Capital, the brand’s valuation was estimated to be worth $1.2 billion. As of July 2021, the company raised an additional $83 million with a Series E round of funding that brought its valuation up to $1.8 billion. But as high as Glossier was flying initially, the brand later took a bit of a hit, both in reputation and sales. According to Bloomberg Second Measure, a leading provider of transaction data analytics, Glossier’s US sales fell by 26 per cent year-over-year in 2021.  The brand also faced allegations of toxic internal work culture and backlash from consumers disappointed by the lack of an inclusive product shade range. Combined with product flops, such as the overhyped but underperforming launch of the (currently discontinued) Glossier Play line, the brand went from social media darling to social outcast. In May 2022, Weiss announced that she would be stepping down as Glossier’s CEO, handing the reins over to Kyle Leahy, who had been operating as the brand’s chief commercial officer since 2021.  In addition to Leahy’s appointment as CEO, Glossier has appointed several new faces to the now all-female C-suite, which includes Marie Suter as chief creative officer, Kleo Mack as chief marketing officer, Chitra Balireddi as chief commercial office, Seun Sodipo as chief financial officer, and Sarah Stuart as chief people officer.  What’s next in store for Glossier? Another major change for Glossier was its announcement in 2022 that it would start selling through Sephora. This marked a significant shift away from its previous DTC model, and was understood to be a way to reach more customers.  Glossier has since revealed that the brand is on track to make $100 million in sales in its first year at Sephora. (It launched in Sephora US and Canada in February, and in the UK in September.)  Overall, the brand’s retail sales, including DTC, Glossier stores, and Sephora, are up by 73 per cent year-over-year, marking a second consecutive year of growth, with no signs of slowing down anytime soon. According to Addison Cain, beauty strategy and innovation manager at Spate, a consumer behavior and trend analysis company, Glossier has seen a boom in business since launching at Sephora. Currently, the beauty company sees an average of 944.2 thousand searches per month on Google, up from 802.4 thousand clicks since Glossier landed on Sephora’s virtual and physical shelves. Searches for Glossier alongside Sephora, with inquiry terms like “Glossier at Sephora” or “Sephora Glossier You”, have gone up by 90.6 per cent year-over-year. The product that has seen the most growth, outside of Glossier’s You Eau De Parfum, the brand’s top-searched item which has an average monthly search of 95.5 thousand on Google alone, is Balm Dotcom. The low-maintenance lip product has seen an increase of over 120.8 per cent in search volume compared to the year prior.  In addition to the brand’s availability in Sephora stores in the US, UK, and Canada, Glossier has been stepping up its intercontinental delivery services.  In October 2023, Glossier launched international shipping to Europe, New Zealand, Australia, Mexico, India, and Brazil, with hints from Leahy that there will be further international expansion in 2023.  Meltzer believes that the brand is revving up for a potential acquisition. “If I had to guess, I think that everything they’re doing right now, whether it’s getting new customers through Sephora, having these stories in publications like Women’s Wear Daily, and having a new executive team is all to put themselves in as positive of a light as possible for potential future acquisition. I can’t imagine any other way for them to go. I would be shocked.”