Mass beauty creators help drugstore products regain momentum
Glossy profiled creators driving new attention to mass beauty brands at Walmart, Target, CVS and Ulta Beauty. Shelby Ann Bell's all-drugstore makeup routine has reached 11 million views, and she now has 2.3 million TikTok followers and 230,000 Instagram followers. Kristyn Hoffman built an audience around affordable skin care and now has 448,000 TikTok followers and 72,000 Instagram followers. Circana data released in May showed mass beauty sales rose 7% year over year in the first quarter of 2026 to $18.1 billion. Hard Candy's Dena Silver told Glossy the brand looks for creators who already talk about affordable beauty and fit the Walmart shopper.
THE BREAKDOWN
Mass beauty brands should not copy prestige creator casting. Agents with affordable beauty talent should pitch proof of category fit, retailer relevance and product performance rather than luxury aspiration. The strongest creators in this lane can command fees from brands that previously relied on low-cost gifting because they are moving measurable retail demand. Brand managers should vet whether a creator's feed already includes Walmart, Target or CVS products before paying for a mass campaign. Usage rights should include retailer PDPs and paid social separately because drugstore content often becomes conversion creative.
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