Rihanna named as the Wealthiest Female Musician in the World
Robyn Fenty, known popularly as Rihanna, has been named on Forbes as the wealthiest female musician in the world and the second richest female entertainer, following Oprah Winfrey.
As wildly guessed, her fortune wasn’t made from entertainment but from her cosmetic line, Fenty Beauty. Rihanna launched Fenty Beauty in 2017, she sought to create a cosmetics company that made “women everywhere (feel) included.” The bulk of her fortune (an estimated $1.4 billion) comes from her 50% stake in Fenty Beauty, the beauty line which has helped her enter the world’s billionaire rank.
The rest of her fortune lies in her stake in her lingerie company, Savage x Fenty, worth an estimated $270 million, and her earnings from her career as a chart-topping musician and actress. As estimated by Forbes, Rihanna is now worth $1.7 billion.
Rihanna launched Fenty Beauty in 2017, which is a 50-50 joint venture with French luxury goods conglomerate LVMH (run by Bernard Arnault, the world’s second-richest person). In its first year, Fenty Beauty achieved sales of $550m, far more than other celebrity-endorsed makeup ranges. Forbes magazine estimates that the company is now worth “a conservative $2.8bn”.
The singer, who has described makeup as her “weapon of choice for self-expression” while growing up, said she was driven to create her own range because established brands did not provide a full choice of products for all varieties of skin types and tones. The brand boasted foundation in 40 different shades when it first launched to “make skin look like skin” and has since expanded to 50.
Rihanna also capitalized on her social media presence of 101 million followers on Instagram and 102.5 million on Twitter, to build the beauty brand. Nonetheless, Rihanna is not the first celebrity to make a fortune from cosmetics. Kylie Jenner, the youngest member of the Kardashian reality-TV family, became the world’s youngest billionaire in 2019 at the age of 21 thanks to the success of Kylie Cosmetics, the makeup company she runs largely from her iPhone. Her sister, Kim Kardashian West, also owns a cosmetic line, KKW Beauty.
