Why trade marks are more important than ever for beauty brands

In the midst of a cost of living crisis with no end in sight, the beauty and personal care industries stand out as havens of increased consumer spending and business growth. Here, we explore why this makes investment in trade marks more important than ever.

In 2017, singer and actor Rihanna launched a brand that changed the world’s beauty industry for good.

Fenty Beauty, which first hit the shelves in the UK at Harvey Nichols, Knightsbridge, in September 2017, launched under the premise of ‘beauty for all’, offering more than 40 foundations in various formulas to cater for all skin tones.

The products, and the brand, were an instant success. They reportedly made more than $100m in just over a month and were declared by Time magazine as one of the 25 Inventions of the Year.

This success would also lead to the “Fenty Effect,” spurring other cosmetics and beauty brands to improve diversity and representation in both their products and their marketing campaigns.

Fenty Beauty continues to develop as a brand in its own right, expanding into haircare, skincare, and fragrances. It has made Rihanna a billionaire. It is also an example of how a strong trade mark can help to create a business venture that stands apart from the competition and provides a new platform for growth.

What is a trade mark?

A trade mark is anything that can distinguish the goods or services of one business from those of other businesses. A trade mark can be almost anything, from words and logos to more unusual things like sounds or the shape of goods or their packaging.

Trade mark registrations are a useful tool when it comes to protecting the integrity, reputation, and distinctiveness of a brand. In addition to providing exclusive rights for the use of brand names and logos, trade marks help customers to identify the origin – and, in some cases, the expected quality – of a product or service.

Our guide to UK trade marks provides more information on what can be protected and how to apply for a trade mark in the UK.

The power of a strong, recognisable trade mark when establishing brand presence and reputation should not be underestimated.

Despite being associated with one of the world’s most famous singers, the Fenty Beauty brand has become a distinct success that consumers associate more with its values of inclusion, diversity, and quality.

In fact, the choice to register her last name, rather than her first, as the trade mark for her line of cosmetics products was a deliberate one for Rihanna, as she explained to the New York Times in 2019:

“I used to be afraid to step into the whole celebrity makeup world. I saw brands like Hilary Duff and Hannah Montana have so much success, but it got to a place where they were so oversaturated in the market that it diluted their personal brands.

It made me think, ‘I’m not going to do this, because you lose your respect and credibility,’ and so every collaboration I did outside of music, I used Fenty so that you didn’t have to hear the word ‘Rihanna’ every time you saw something that I did. So Rihanna stayed the music, the person. But these other brands are called Fenty.”

Why are trade marks important in the beauty industry?

In the beauty industry, trade marks are crucial, with businesses using them to protect both the brand, and the individual products associated with that brand.

Take, for example, Maybelline’s Dream Matte Mousse. The mark DREAMMATTE is a registered trade mark and has become synonymous with beauty trends of the early 2010s. It is also arguably still one of Maybelline’s most well-known products.

Beauty and personal care are amongst the most active sectors for filing new trade mark applications. In 2024 alone, the UK Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) received 12,342 applications for trade marks in Class 3, which includes cosmetics and perfumery.

This number represents a 12.3% increase on the number of applications filed for the same class in 2023, demonstrating just how important registered trade marks are to brands.

Trade marks are also a valuable weapon in the fight against counterfeits. Counterfeit products are becoming increasingly problematic for brands, as they are designed to trick consumers into believing they are buying the genuine product. In fact, the product they buy is often of a significantly lower quality and may even be harmful.

For more information on dupes and counterfeits in the cosmetics industry, read our insight.

Having registered intellectual property rights such as trade marks, however, offers effective protection against counterfeits, as they provide opportunities for legal action when a trade mark is infringed. In the same manner, registered IP rights can also deter websites from hosting counterfeit products, lest they be liable as well.

Why should brands invest in trade marks?

Brands should not let initial – and relatively low – upfront trade mark filing costs dissuade them from investing in applying for a trade mark registration.

Indeed, such an investment could make all the difference to carving out a place in an industry that is going from strength to strength.

According to the latest British Beauty Council report on the ‘Value of beauty,’ the industry’s contribution to the UK’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew four times faster than that of the overall economy, reaching £30.4bn in 2024.

Consumer spending on beauty-related products and services is also increasing despite the cost of living crisis, rising by 8% in cash terms across the personal care industry to reach £32.4bn last year.

This year, the report predicts that the personal care industry will deliver a total GDP contribution of £31.5bn, supporting 681,000 jobs and making £9.4bn in total tax contributions.

Brands within beauty and personal care also continue to invest heavily in trade mark applications for products and sub-brands.

L’Oréal, for example, has more than 3,000 registered trade marks and continues to file hundreds of new applications each year.

Ultimately, trade marks can help to establish a brand and develop a new platform for growth, making them a vital part of a beauty business’s strategy at every stage of its development.

One has only to look at Rihanna and Fenty Beauty to see the power trade marks possess in distinguishing one brand from another.

In a busy marketplace, having the right trade mark strategy could make all the difference between a beauty business that glows, and one that fades away.