Industry Personal care Website www.urbandecay.com | Area served Worldwide Founded January 1996 | |
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Headquarters Newport Beach, California, United States Key people Wende Zomnir, Chief Creative Officer
Tim Warner, Chief Executive Officer Products Cosmetics and beauty products Parent organizations L'Oréal, L'OREAL USA, INC. Founders Sandy Lerner, Wende Zomnir, Patricia L. Holmes, David Soward, Pat Holmes Profiles | ||
Urban Decay, an American cosmetics brand headquartered in Newport Beach, California, is a subsidiary of French cosmetics company L'Oréal.
Contents
Products include lip, eye, and nail colors, as well as other face and body products. Its target market is younger women, although it is not limited to this range, and is also designed to appeal to customers who wish to purchase cruelty-free makeup. Its products are sold at large department stores in the United States such as Macy's, Sephora, Ulta, Nordstrom, and from the official website as well as in several other countries such as Mexico and Germany.
History
Pink, red, and beige tones dominated the beauty industry palette until the mid-1990s. In 1995, Sandy Lerner, a co-founder of Cisco Systems, and Pat Holmes were at Lerner's mansion outside London when Holmes mixed raspberry and black to form a new color, which they named Urban Decay. Then, they decided to form a cosmetics company. Launched in January 1996, it offered a line of ten lipsticks and 12 nail polishes. Their color palette was inspired by the urban landscape, with names such as Roach, Smog, Rust, Oil Slick, and Acid Rain.
In 2000, Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton (a diversified luxury goods group) purchased Urban Decay. In 2002, the Falic Group (owners of the Perry Ellis fragrance lines) purchased Urban Decay. In 2009, Castanea Partners (a private equity firm) acquired Urban Decay. On November 26, 2012, L'Oréal announced it would purchase Urban Decay Cosmetics. L'Oréal acquired the company in 2013. L'Oréal paid an estimated amount of $350 million for Urban Decay.
In Spring 2015, Urban Decay expanded its social media presence with a Tumblr site, The Violet Underground. It features collaborations with young artists such as Baron Von Fancy.
Animal testing
In 2009, Urban Decay received approval by the Coalition for Consumer Information on Cosmetics, and People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) awarded the company with the fifth annual Best Cruelty-Free Cosmetics Line award.
However, PETA removed Urban Decay from their list of cruelty-free companies following Urban Decay's announcement on June 6, 2012 that they would begin selling products in China, a country known to conduct animal testing on products before releasing them to the public. A month later, on July 6, 2012, Urban Decay announced that it would not sell its products in China.
As of 2014, Urban Decay does not employ animal testing in the creation of its products. PETA and The Leaping Bunny Program (CCIC) certify the brand as cruelty-free. Urban Decay offers 100% synthetic fiber makeup brushes made from taklon, an alternative to typical brushes constructed from animal hair.
Collections
The Naked Collection was released initially with the Naked Palette, a set of 12 full-size eyeshadows in neutral, matte, and metallic earth tones and an eyeshadow brush from the company's signature synthetic brushes.
The Naked Palette has an average 4.9 out of 5 star-rating, and 99 percent of users recommend it.
The collection later expanded to include other eyeshadow palettes like Naked 2, Naked2 Basics, Naked 3, Naked Smoky, and Naked Ultimate Basics.A sub-collection of the original Naked collection, Naked Complexion, includes other skin products like foundations, concealers, blushes, and makeup tools to accompany them.
Urban Decay also features collections from collaborations with celebrities like Gwen Stefani. The collaboration with Stefani is part of a larger female-empowerment initiative, The Ultraviolet Edge, that Urban Decay launched in order to reach a goal of donating $750,000 to organizations that benefit women in 2016.
The company also released two limited edition eyeshadow palettes inspired by the live action Disney films Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass.
In early 2017, Urban Decay announced its Vice liquid lipstick collection would be released.