On the evening of 21 May, Barbadian singer Rihanna made her debut on an official Douyin (China’s TikTok) livestream for her brand Fenty Beauty. She also appeared on Douyin’s livestream hosted by two other beauty brand influencers. During the livestream, Rihanna enthusiastically promoted Fenty Beauty products, invited her co-hosts to try on her makeup, and showcased ‘Rihanna’ written in Chinese calligraphy. The Weibo hashtag #Rihanna is in livestreaming room to sell goods# (蕾哈娜直播带货) garnered 66.5 million views.
Fenty Beauty began in June 2013, when Rihanna was already established as a music mogul. With the corresponding influence, she took the initiative to develop a brand, and registered the surname Fenty as a trademark for various products. Fenty Beauty being one of them. The brand entered the Hong Kong and Macau markets in 2019, launching an overseas flagship store on Tmall, followed by another on Douyin. Last month, Fenty Beauty announced on its official Weibo (China’s Twitter equivalent) account that it had officially entered Sephora China, marking the brand’s first foray into China’s offline retail market.
Currently, Fenty Beauty’s Tmall overseas flagship store has 1.25 million fans. The top two popular items are the contour stick and the lip luminizer, with the lip luminizer selling 10K units in a single month, ranking in at number one on the hot list for lip luminizers. On Xiaohongshu (RED), there are over 30K notes about Fenty Beauty products.
Earlier on 21 May, Rihanna also appeared at Fenty Beauty’s ‘FENTY BEAUTY ALLEY’ flash mob space in Shanghai, where she served Shandong pancakes to her fans at a stall named ‘Queen’s Pancake BLING’. Chinese netizens have nicknamed Rihanna’s hit song ‘We Found Love’ as ‘Weifang’s Love’, due to the similarities in pronunciation. With Weifang being a city in Shandong Province which is famous for pancakes, Rihanna has naturally become the ‘Shandong Queen’. This playful interaction with Chinese culture underscores Fenty Beauty’s commitment to deepening its presence in the Chinese market.
Weibo users humorously commented on Rihanna’s busy schedule, noting, “From making pancakes during the day to hosting a livestream at night, each step was beyond our expectations. Maybe her next stop should be the Singer 2024 programme!” Rihanna has been on Weibo since 2013, and her account, managed by her team, currently boasts around 1.15 million followers.
