The rise and fall of Youthforia
How did this Asian American-owned cosmetic brand go from a viral sensation to closed for good in just four years?
Youthforia formally announced their closing on Aug. 4.
Photo illustration by Ryan Quan
Words by Ray Liu
Looks like cosmetic brand Youthforia did not age too well, as the 2021-founded beauty rookie couldn’t manage to recover from their jet-black foundation shade fiasco in 2024. The young Asian American-owned cosmetic brand is now closing for good, and this moment in the beauty industry is a critical reminder that consumers’ voices hold the most power.
As some of you take advantage of the brand’s clearance sale, let’s take a gander at the rise and fall of Youthforia and what we can learn from this makeup madness.
From viral sensation
The beauty world entered its new awakening in 2020, ushering the market to new heights, as more people than ever took interest in cosmetics as a form of self care. K-beauty broke into the U.S. market, challenging the sales of well-established American beauty brands. Competition was brewing in an already cutthroat industry, and in comes Youthforia in April 2021.
Youthforia brought innovation to beauty that many brands had yet to fathom at the time. Known for breaking norms in beauty, Youthforia made the bold claim that their products are so clean that anyone wearing their makeup can sleep in them. This claim was made possible by the brand’s rejection of fossil fuels and microplastics in their product formulations.
Their first social media-viral product, the BYO Blush, was the “world's first color-changing blush oil that reacts to your skin's pH,” as Youthforia claims on their online store. Playing off of the phrase, “bring your own,” the brand claimed the blush works on all skin types and tones while matching your skin’s natural pH level. It’s also a homophone to “bio,” indicating how the product is in conversation with the biological makeup of our skin.
@daceycash youthforia BYO blush 💥 #colorchangingmakeup #greenblush #blushoil ♬ original sound - dacey cash
The blush oil was also made for the attention span of the current social media landscape, namely TikTok. Filipina American TikTok beauty creator Dacey Cash tried the BYO Blush and demonstrated the color-changing properties of the pH-matching oil. She noted that while the product on the doe-foot applicator appeared to be greenish, it instantly turned pink once it made contact with her skin. Though there is no direct correlation between color science and how a product reacts to the pH and temperature of your skin, the creativity brought a level of shock value to a booming social media audience. This was Youthforia’s first taste of fame.
Riding on the high of their hero product, in 2022, Youthforia made a surprise appearance on the 14th season of the widely loved reality show, Shark Tank. There, Youthforia founder Fiona Co Chan, walked away with $400,000 from billionaire Mark Cuban, with him holding eight percent equity of the company.
In 2023, a year after Chan struck that deal with Cuban, Youthforia “experienced a sales growth of +200%, with its BYO Color Changing Blush accounting for a threefold increase in sales,” according to a 2024 article published by BeautyMatter. The quintessential contributors were Ulta Beauty and TikTok—Youthforia was everywhere, in stores and online. The bubble kept getting bigger for them. It was only a matter of time that the bubble would burst.
The fall of Youthforia
Nearly a decade ago, Black and dark-skinned makeup artists and the average Black and brown makeup consumer would have to blend multiple shades of foundation to get the perfect match for their skin tone. So when a brand provides a close or perfect shade match, it’s not just another avenue for revenue. It’s a sign of change toward a more inclusive beauty space. Beauty consumers in 2025 are at the forefront of an era in which every beauty brand is expected to provide a wide shade range of foundations. In October 2023, Youthforia boarded the express train to success, but they missed their stop and ended up at the end of their brand’s journey.
Youthforia’s first venture into foundation territory began with 15 shades of their Date Night Skin Tint Serum Foundation. While 15 shades was not lazy at all for a young brand developing foundations for the first time, their choice to ignore the needs of their customers with darker skin tones spoke volumes. Not only did their first range of shades prioritize pale- and fair-skinned customers, the gap between their medium shade, #345, and their darkest shade, #425, was jarring.
After their initial backlash, Youthforia went back to the drawing board. In March 2024, they returned with 10 more shades. This time, the backlash was worse. Their darkest shade, #600, is akin to black face paint, demonstrating the brand’s zero effort in paying attention to undertones and color theories for dark-skinned customers—all of which are basic expectations from a cosmetic brand.
@golloria the darkest shade of the youthforia date night foundation.
♬ original sound - golloria
The asinine response to their initial criticism was quickly picked up by a beauty creator known for her dark skin tone, Golloria George, in a video posted on her TikTok. In the video, she compares Youthforia’s darkest shade of the skin tint serum foundation to a jar of black face paint. The result: barely a difference. The video is currently sitting at 48.5-million views, with comments condemning Youthforia’s negligence. Within weeks, major retailers removed Youthforia off their shelves as an immediate attempt at damage control.
Cosmetic chemist and formulator Javon Ford’s TikTok video in support of George’s criticism of the jet-black foundation provided more context to the situation. Through his video, we learn about the ingredients and colors used in the foundation. Turns out, there was only one pure black pigment in the foundation: CI77499. As far as we know, Youthforia has not reached out to George or any Black product reviewers to figure out a solution to their foundation problem.
@javonford16 Stitch @golloria #cosmeticchemist #makeupforwoc #youthforia#greenscreen ♬ original sound - Javon Ford Beauty
On Sept. 24, five months after George posted her video, Chan took to Instagram to issue an acknowledgement of the fiasco and apologize for her oversight and negligence. She admitted to rushing the development process to make up for the initial backlash in the video. She added that the delay of the brand’s public apology was largely due to her pregnancy. But if that’s the case, someone else from Youthforia’s executive team could have stepped in to address the elephant in the room months prior, but that never happened.
A year later, Youthforia never seemed to recover from the loss of their customers’ confidence. A few weeks ago, the brand formally announced their closing, offering loyal customers a 50 percent off clearance sale. If there’s one takeaway from this short-lived journey of an Asian American-owned beauty brand, it is that brands must listen to their customers’ criticism and take immediate action to address any issues and rectify them. The issue was never that Youthforia was a young brand and didn’t know how to manage a large product launch. Their grave mistake was underestimating the power of their customers’ voices.
While Youthforia has fallen, let’s hope that future and current brands take deeper, more serious consideration when developing products for dark-skinned customers in the same way they have been with fair-skinned customers.
Published on September 3, 2025
Words by Ray Liu
Ray Liu is a New York-based entertainment and culture writer and K-beauty content creator. With a master’s degree in English, he finds purpose in analyzing fictional works with a cultural lens that centers marginalized communities. When he’s not writing, he’s making K-beauty content and reviews on YouTube (rayliur). Feel free to tweet him at @rayliur on Twitter.
Art by Ryan Quan
Ryan Quan is JoySauce's social media manager, associate editor, and all-around visual eye. This queer, half-Chinese, half-Filipino writer and graphic designer loves everything related to music, creative nonfiction, and art. Based in Brooklyn, he spends most of his time dancing to hyperpop and accidentally falling asleep on the subway. Follow him on Instagram at @ryanquans, and check out his work on his website.