When Jessica Alba first launched Honest Beauty back in 2015, there were a whopping 83 products to swipe, slather, and swatch. (We know because we tried them — and have even given a few Best of Beauty Awards.) But after three years of solid success (Alba was named a billion-dollar business mogul by Forbes), Alba and her team are nixing products left and right in an effort to cut the collection in half.
"We're streamlining everything so the line doesn't feel overwhelming," Alba tells me over breakfast during her recent trip to New York City. "And the stuff we never thought about, we can add later."
If scrapping 40-plus makeup, skin-care, and hair-care products from an entire clean beauty line — one free of parabens, synthetic fragrances, mineral oil, and other ickies — seems like a lot, well, it is. But Alba isn't too concerned.
She tells me that when Honest Beauty launched there were multiple shades (and textures) for almost every product, which, at the end of the day, felt like too many. "We just didn't need all of those options," says Alba. "We cast a wide net."
The new, streamlined version of Honest Beauty includes 45 products (35 color cosmetics for lips, cheeks, and eyes, plus 10 skin-care products), and features a few fan favorites, like Alba's beloved Magic Beauty Balm. "It's always in my bag," she says. She tells me she dabs the chamomile- and jojoba seed oil-enriched ointment all over to hydrate parched lips, soothe chapped cuticles, and even tame unruly flyaways.
Core Honest Beauty items, including the Best of Beauty-winning Everything Primer and Lip Crayons, are still very much a part of the line — with the same formulations. However, not everything made it into this new-and-improved collection. Certain colorways were, unfortunately, cut. "It's about creating products that have a purpose," says Alba.
There are some new shades, though. For example, the Lush Sheer Lip Crayon, a creamy lip chubby made with coconut oil and shea butter, now comes in two additional barely there shades (Sherbet and Bordeaux), while Fig and Blossom were added to the Lip Crayon Demi Matte range. Each will retail for $13.
Perhaps the most exciting addition to the line is a curated eye shadow palette designed by Alba's makeup artist and Honest Beauty creative color consultant Daniel Martin. "The palette was all Daniel," Alba says, as she walks me through the neutral hues. "He came in and developed it. I told him, 'You know I want something for everyone, every day.'" The result? A 10-shade palette filled with subtle browns, golds, and purples in matte and shimmer textures for $20.
Even Honest Beauty's packaging has evolved. The once blue, gray, and slightly dreary packaging is now brighter and more in tune with the kind of beauty minimalism Instagram eats up. Everything in the line — palettes, powders, and even facial wipes — comes in simple white tubes and compacts with peach-colored accents.
All of this to say that if you were to scroll through your feed and come across Honest Beauty, you probably wouldn't even recognize the brand as you gave it a double tap. It's that good.
The new-and-improved Honest Beauty line will be available on HonestBeauty.com July 15.
More new beauty lines to check out:
- All the Details on Linda Wells's 12-Product, 96-Shade Flesh Beauty Line
- Celebrity Facialist Georgia Louise Launches At-Home Galvanic Current Device
- Exclusive: Too Faced Super-Sized and Revamped Its Born This Way Concealer
Now, see how skin care has evolved in 100 years:
