Summer Fridays is launching a bodycare category, with the debut of its Body Fragrance Mist and Body Butter Balm. The new products are the latest in a roadmap that influencers-turned-founders Marianna Hewitt and Lauren Ireland hope will help Summer Fridays last beyond the early buzz of its 2018 launch.
“We really think of ourselves as the next global legacy brand,” says Hewitt. “A few years in, we felt confident with the business that we were building, the brand, and the team that we have. Now, eight years in, the goal we had of being around for decades to come, we feel more certain about it.”
Can a new legacy beauty brand be created in 2026, when trends are fleeting and competition is fierce? Hewitt and Ireland — both of whom were influencers at the time they launched the brand — think so. Summer Fridays launched with the viral Jet Lag mask, a hero product that set the tone of the brand around hydrating skincare and a forever summer dewiness. The brand then released the also-viral Lip Butter Balm in 2020, and has steadily expanded its collection since, introducing some cosmetics that fit the brand’s ethos, like bronzer and blush balms and a lip liner. The new body butter and mist follow the Summer Fridays’s push into fragrance earlier this year, as well as past tests in the category like a belly oil and lotion.
“What I’ve learned about longevity is that it comes down to two things, whether someone reorders in year five and whether you’ve built a company capable of delivering that,” says Ireland. “Supply chain, partners, forecasting, a field team, real operators in the building; none of it is visible from the outside and all of it determines whether you’re still here. The other piece is being honest about who you’re for. Our sweet spot is the millennial and older Gen Z, and she’s told us clearly what she wants.”
Photo: Courtesy of Summer Fridays
The brand sells on TikTok Shop, Amazon, its own direct-to-consumer (DTC) site and in stores like Sephora, which was its retail launch partner. Rather than taking a social or DTC-first route, the brand debuted with the retailer after friend Jen Atkin, the founder of beauty brand Ouai, connected Hewitt and Ireland with Artemis Patrick, Sephora’s CEO of North America, who at the time, was the retailer’s chief merchandising officer. Patrick helped guide the brand through its early days, offering insight on the products, consumer profiles, and shopping habits that allowed it to stand out in a competitive beauty environment. The launch with Sephora was an intentional early decision to not get typecast as an influencer brand, the founders say.
“We knew going into it that people had a preconceived notion of what a creator brand might be, that maybe the formulas weren’t efficacious,” says Hewitt. “And to have a partner like Sephora really gave credibility to our products and our launches. We knew that we had this really great community online, but that Sephora’s audience was much larger than ours and that people at the time really did want to experience the product in-store.”
