Fifty-five-year old Patrice Weiss and her mother once used Fashion Fair Cosmetics faithfully. “It was in the ‘80s,” Weiss remembers. “I used the moisturizer, the foundations,” she reminisced.
But in the ‘90s, Weiss stopped wearing the brand’s foundation, because she started to feel it was too heavy. “I found an old picture of myself holding [my youngest daughter],” Weiss explained to theGrio over the phone from her Jacksonville, Florida home. “You could see my face was light, and my neck was dark.”
Today, Weiss prefers Borghese Cosmetics, which she says she’s been using for the past 20 years. “It doesn’t look like I have make-up on,” she explains. “It’s just great.”
This mother-daughter pair was among the millions of black women who supported Fashion Fair for years, because it was the only line that catered to African-American women. Fashion Fair Cosmetics was created for the black woman who aspired to the in-your-face glamour of the ‘70s and ‘80s — but women no longer want to wear a mask of foundation complete with slashes of blush and flamboyant lips.
The ‘90s ushered in the “natural look,” and ladies of the new millennium prefer beauty products made of natural ingredients that are free of fragrances, parabens, and other harsh chemicals.
With Fashion Fair True Finish Refining Mineral Foundation, a new foundation formula from Fashion Fair, the beauty company hopes to get customers like Weiss back — while attracting her daughter’s generation. Acknowledging that the trend pendulum has swung in the opposite direction since Fashion Fair opened its first makeup counter in 1973, press materials stress that True Finish foundation has a lightweight formula, natural mineral ingredients, and anti-oxidant properties.
“Your skin shouldn’t feel as if it’s suffocating,” Clarisa Wilson, president of Fashion Fair Cosmetics, noted to theGrio about the nature of optimal coverage. She described True Finish as “being in harmony with the skin, not covering it up.”
Further reinforcing the brand’s commitment to a more natural beauty aesthetic, Fashion Fair opted not to use a celebrity spokesmodel to front the True Finish launch campaign. Wilson told us via phone from her Chicago office that the choice to cast unknown beauty Amanda Nassali Kiggundu instead shows, “The time is right for us to elevate black women, whether you’re famous or not.”
That said, timing could be a challenge for the success of the True Finish collection. Created when black women had few choices at the beauty counter, the Fashion Fair brand now faces competition from mass market and prestige beauty brands that specifically cater to customers of color. Iconic model Iman launched IMAN Cosmetics in 1994. Even drugstore brands such as L’Oreal Paris USA, Cover Girl, and Revlon have expanded their product offerings to service women with all shades of melanin — complete with campaigns fronted by A-list black spokesmodels.
Beyoncé, Queen Latifah and Halle Berry are drawing black women to use make-up brands that ignored customers like Weiss when she was their age.
In addition, Fashion Fair was borne out of the legendary Ebony Fashion Fair showcase, and marketed heavily through the traveling runway event. In 2009, Johnson Publishing Company, which wholly owns both the Ebony Fashion Fair and Fashion Fair Cosmetics brands, suspended the exhibition after 51 years.
Desiree Rogers, Johnson Publishing CEO, told the New York Observer she plans to revive the Ebony Fashion Fair in 2013 — but that won’t help Fashion Fair reconnect with the black female audience today.
Yet, Wilson believes timing — or rather history — is on the brand’s side. “We’ve been friends for almost 40 years,” she said referring to the relationship between Fashion Fair and its customers. “[Black women] are not an extension of our brand — they are our brand,” Wilson continued. “No one is going to beat us at being culturally relevant, because this is our life. African-American women and men.”
When creating products, Wilson believes, “We’re actually saying: ‘What do I need?’ We are our own focus group.”
For Wilson, the Fashion Fair “reboot” through True Finish Refining Mineral Foundation is about more than releasing a new collection of colors or products. Citing the empowering names of its color palette — with Precious Onyx, Honest Chocolate, and Tenacious Topaz among the list of 18 swatches — Wilson stresses: “Whether you use it or not, we want you to feel good about the brand. Everything should be inspirational, aspirational, always pushing [the customer] to be the best that she can be… a reminder that she is the best.”
Is this enough to inspire customers to try Fashion Fair Cosmetics — or come back to the brand — sticking with it for years to come? With a commitment to keeping black women top of mind as Fashion Fair founder Eunice W. Johnson intended, Wilson plans to re-conquer the market one face at a time.
The timing might just be right.
Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond is a fashion blogger and the author of ‘Powder Necklace.’ Follow Nana Ekua Brew-Hammond on Twitter at @nanaekua.