Huda Kattan

She launched her first product with a $6K loan and now her brand is valued at $1.2B.

After graduating from the University of Michigan-Dearborn, Huda Kattan landed a steady corporate job.

She hated every second of it.

So she quit.

She moved to Los Angeles to study makeup, started freelancing, and eventually landed celebrity clients like Eva Longoria and Nicole Richie.

But success didn’t come fast.

When money got tight, she moved back to Dubai and took a job at Revlon.

Still, she couldn’t shake the idea of building something of her own.

That’s when she launched a beauty blog on WordPress: Huda Beauty.

She wrote product reviews, shared tips, and taught makeup techniques.

In 2013, with a $6,000 loan from her sister Mona, she launched her first product: a line of false eyelashes.

She pitched them to Sephora in Dubai.

When Kim Kardashian wore a pair, they sold out immediately.

That was the beginning of Huda Beauty as a product brand.

Over the next few years, she expanded the line to include liquid matte lipsticks, highlighters, eyeshadow palettes, and her now-iconic #FauxFilter foundation.

By 2017, Huda Beauty was generating $200M a year in sales.

That same year, private equity firm TSG Consumer Partners acquired a minority stake, valuing the company at $1.2B.

But Huda wasn’t done building.

She launched Wishful, a skincare brand rooted in her own struggles with acne and hyperpigmentation.

And co-founded Kayali, a fragrance line inspired by Middle Eastern scent layering rituals.

Of course, she still kept growing the core brand.

Huda Beauty now sells more than 140 products and brings in an estimated $600–700M annually.

Meanwhile, her online reach exploded:
- 57M followers on Instagram
- 4M YouTube subscribers
- 10.7M TikTok followers

But Huda didn’t just use that platform to sell.

She donated $500,000 to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund during the George Floyd protests.

She contributed to COVID relief efforts in India.

She gave $1M to humanitarian organizations working in Gaza.

And in 2025, she bought back TSG’s stake and took full ownership of Huda Beauty.