Founders and Formulas: What Rhode Skin and Reale Actives Can Teach Us About Brand Strategy
Founder-led beauty brands can attract attention before a product reaches the shelf, but attention is only the first test. Rhode Skin (Rhode) by Hailey Bieber and Reale Actives by Alix Earle show that strong brands need more than visibility. They need founder fit, a strong understanding of their audience, and a brand strategy that makes the promise feel believable.
What makes a founder-led brand feel legitimate?
“Another celebrity beauty brand” has become shorthand for a crowded shelf and a tired idea. Consumers are skeptical, and they can usually sense the difference between a founder with a reason to exist and a famous person with a formulation.
The more interesting question isn’t why celebrities keep launching beauty brands, but why audiences still make room for some of them. Rhode and Reale Actives offer two different perspectives.
Before Rhode became the subject of a billion-dollar deal, it was already a feeling: glazed skin, the ease of a five-minute face, plump lips, your go-to product always within reach, and the impression that Hailey Bieber had turned looking effortless into something tangible. The brand worked because it built on what people already associated with her. Rhode didn’t have to convince audiences to believe something new; it translated an existing perception into a product experience people could buy, use, and recognize as unmistakably hers.
Reale Actives began from a different place. Before it sold out on launch day, it was already a story. Alix Earle had built a following by showing something beauty culture often tries to smooth over: cystic acne, prescription treatments, frustration, vulnerability, and the public work of becoming comfortable in her own skin. That openness gave the brand credibility, but it also raised the standard of scrutiny. Acne care is personal, emotional, and often medical. So while Earle’s story created trust, it also raised fair questions about the role prescriptions or medical-grade treatments played, and what her over-the-counter products can realistically do for someone without the same access or resources.
Rhode invites people into a look. Reale Actives asks them to trust a solution. Those are different kinds of promises, and they require different kinds of strategy.
Yet both require trust. In the beauty world, and in the business world more broadly, consumers are increasingly skeptical of hype and are centering brand trust, alongside quality and value, in their purchasing decisions. In other words, visibility may create the first look, but it doesn’t earn the second one.
What can leaders take away from Rhode and Reale Actives?
Not every organization has a celebrity founder as the cornerstone of their brand, but every organization has a brand.
Clients, customers, employees, funders, partners, and communities all carry associations about who you are, what you stand for, how you behave, and what they can expect from you. Some of those associations may come from your history. Some may come from your leaders. Others may come from a single experience that stayed with them.
Together, those associations become your story and brand.
Brand strategy helps leaders decide which associations to strengthen, which ones to clarify, and which ones may need to change.
1) Be clear about what you want to be known for.
A brand is easier to understand when people can answer three questions without working too hard:
- Who is this for?
- What does it stand for?
- What can I expect from it?
The questions may sound simple, but this is often where organizations get stuck. In an effort to give every strength, audience, ambition, and proof point equal weight, brands often become harder to understand and easier to forget.
For leaders, this means making deliberate choices about what the organization wants to be known for and reinforcing those choices again and again until they become instantly recognizable.
2) Match the proof to the weight of the promise.
The more personal, emotional, or ambitious the promise, the more closely people look for proof. For organizations, this means understanding the gap between what you want people to believe and what they will need to see before they believe it.
3) Treat consistency as proof.
Proof isn’t always an impressive statistic or a glowing recommendation. Often, trust is built through what people see repeatedly: decisions that reflect stated values, leaders who behave consistently, employee and client experiences that align with the organization’s purpose, and ways of working that help the organization deliver again and again.
4) Make your story known through the right channels, moments, and messengers.
A clear brand still needs to be shared. For organizations, this means being intentional about how the story is told, where it shows up, and who helps carry it forward. This includes using language your audiences understand, highlighting proof points that matter to them, and creating repeated opportunities for people to encounter and remember the story.
How can MacPhie help?
MacPhie helps organizations understand their target audiences, clarify what they want to be known for, and determine how their brand should show up through positioning, culture, communications, and experience.
To learn more about how MacPhie can support your brand strategy, click here.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is brand strategy?
Brand strategy defines how an organization wants to live in the minds of the people who matter most, and how that meaning should be reinforced over time.
What can leaders learn from beauty brands?
Audience perception is shaped by the alignment between story, promise, product, proof, and experience.
Why should senior leaders care about brand strategy?
Because brand shapes how people understand, trust, and choose to support an organization.
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