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Skin, K-beauty, Korea trips and the beauty industry — ask and share
TikTok’s K-beauty formula: bring creators in at the idea stage
TikTok's global product marketing lead explained to Korean press why K-beauty works so well on the platform. Examples from TikTok Shop US Medicube (APR): No. 1 with $16.77M in sales over 30 days Dr. Melaxin (Brand501): N
0 0TikTok Shop beauty neared $1B a quarter, yet half of shops sold nothing
US TikTok Shop beauty sales are booming, but an analysis shows the winners are very few. The numbers Q2 2026 TikTok Shop beauty GMV: $980M, up 82% year on year The top 5 brands took more than half of tracked sales Medicu
0 0Where do overseas shoppers first discover K-beauty? TikTok vs Instagram
One question always comes up when setting an overseas marketing budget: "Where do people first hear about our brand?" Going by the mood in international beauty communities, each platform seems to play a slightly differen
0 0Entering Southeast Asia: halal certification first, or TikTok Shop first?
One dilemma comes up again and again among teams preparing for Southeast Asia: "Do we get certified first, or start selling first?" Commonly discussed points Indonesia and Malaysia: with large Muslim consumer bases, many
0 0Launching K-beauty in the US: which channel would you open first?
In every US-expansion conversation the first question ends up being "where do we sell first?" Each option has clear trade-offs. Commonly cited pros and cons Amazon: search demand already exists, but price competition and
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Which US channel would you open first?
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0 0Four structures you keep seeing in K-beauty short videos that travel well abroad
Scroll through K-beauty on TikTok or Instagram Reels and some formats repeat again and again. Here are the structures brand marketers often reference. None of them guarantees results, but they make good starting points f
0 0Fake K-beauty is surging, and Korea is launching a way to report it
If a bargain serum ever felt off, you are not alone. Counterfeit Korean-brand beauty is a growing problem, and Korea is responding. Key numbers from the August 2026 report: 97.7% of counterfeit Korean-brand goods seized
0 0Not Myeongdong or Hongdae: Tourists Are Heading to CU in Seongsu
CU, the Korean convenience-store chain, has recently become a new must-visit spot for overseas tourists. Located in Seongsu-dong, Seoul, the ‘CU Seongsu Dessert Park Store’ opened in February this year and quickly drew a
0 0'Tanmaxxing' is trending on TikTok. Dermatologists are not fans
While K-beauty feeds are full of SPF reapplication hacks, another corner of TikTok is doing the opposite. Tanmaxxing means deliberately maximising sun exposure to get as dark as possible. What the trend involves, per a J
0 0Slugging: who it helps, who should skip it
Slugging means finishing your night routine with a thin layer of an occlusive like petrolatum, so water has a harder time leaving the skin. It went viral on TikTok, but the idea is old: dermatologists have used occlusive
0 0Poll: which viral skincare trend do you think is most overrated?
TikTok and skincare forums have turned a lot of Korean-inspired habits into global trends. Some stuck, some faded, and some still spark arguments every week. A quick refresher on the contenders: Glass skin: the ultra-dew
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Which viral trend do you think is most overrated?
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0 0How does Spanish-language media cover K-beauty? Hype vs analysis
In recent months, business and beauty outlets in Argentina, Mexico, Chile and Spain have published plenty of pieces on the Korean cosmetics "boom". Read together, they show two very different tones: The "trend" tone Head
0 0Vitamin C and niacinamide "cancel each other out"? The myth that won't die
Few skincare rules get repeated as often as "never use vitamin C with niacinamide." It still shows up in comment sections and TikTok videos. Where the idea came from Older lab work looked at the two ingredients in pure,
0 0Olive Young opens its first US store in Pasadena: what it means for brands
CJ Olive Young opened its first brick-and-mortar US store in Pasadena, California, on May 29. Key facts 58 W Colorado Blvd, about 8,647 sq ft Roughly 400 brands and 5,000 SKUs across skincare, makeup, hair and wellness A
0 0Spicule serums: what the "microneedle in a bottle" trend actually is
Spicule products are one of the loudest K-beauty trends on TikTok right now. Beauty coverage often calls them "liquid microneedling," which is catchy but a bit misleading. What's inside Spicules are tiny, needle-shaped s
0 0Selling K-beauty on TikTok Shop vs Amazon: what teams are learning
Many Korean brands now run both. They behave very differently:
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Your best-performing US channel so far?
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0 3China fell from 19.6% to 14.4% of K-beauty exports. Time to pull back?
If there's one number export teams stared at in the H1 data, it's this: China's share dropped from 19.6% to 14.4%. Exports there fell 6.6% to $1.01B. China once took close to half of Korea's cosmetics exports, so opinion
0 0K-beauty exports hit a record — where is the growth coming from?
Korean cosmetics exports reached a record of roughly USD 10 billion in 2024, according to Korean government announcements. The mix has shifted a lot over the past few years. China is still a major market but no longer th
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Which market is your team focusing on next?
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