The 22-year-old influencer Emily Lulamay had a confession: her love for Sol de Janeiro was getting out of hand. In a playful video broadcast to her 1.9 million TikTok followers, she mimes chugging its fragrance mists from the bottle. “That’s buss,” she said in another video sampling its Cheirosa 39 mist, using a Gen-Z term meaning very good or delicious.
Originally founded in 2015, Sol de Janeiro has the kind of rabid fan base that any beauty executive covets. They’re also loyal.
“We have an amazing, crazy, obsessive consumer,” Heela Yang, the line’s founder and chief executive, told The Business of Beauty. “Any mist that we launch, they want.”
Walk down any college, high school or elementary school hallway in America, and you’ll likely pass through perfumed clouds of Sol de Janiero’s Cheirosa 68, 71 or 40 on your way. Launched in 2017, the $39 perfume mists soared in popularity in 2020 when younger shoppers discovered them during the pandemic. In 2024, mists alone generated $573 million in sales for the brand between Sephora, Ulta Beauty and Amazon, according to YipitData, propelling Sol de Janeiro’s total US sales over the $1 billion mark; the brand says globally, sales reached $2 billion last year.
The perfume mists’ wild popularity helped the brand become world-famous, and no doubt factored into L’Occitane’s decision to purchase the label for $450 million in 2021. While Yang is grateful for the boost it gave her business, she’s now hoping the brand can become better known for what she considers its core focus: body care, coupled with scent.
On Dec. 16, Sol de Janeiro will launch the Rosa Charmosa Dew Cream, $48, a body cream infused with “crystal peptides” and Brazilian botanicals. The launch is still youthful, but Yang is hoping to reach the label’s original customers, who are more likely to be in their 30s or older.
“The mist category just overtook the brand,” said Yang. “Our strategy is to take back the narrative, and go back to our roots.” She said this year’s sales represented a “plateau” after many years of double- or triple-digit growth. Per YipitData, its sales across US retailers are down 14 percent so far this year.
Getting customers to see your brand in a new light is never easy, but the company has done it before. When the brand launched in 2015, it quickly became synonymous with its signature Bum Bum Cream, a whipped body butter with a rich pistachio and salted caramel scent, and skin-firming claims. Yang said she was delighted customers knew her product, but also “horrified” to be called the “bum bum brand.” It reoriented customers’ focus by running campaigns that focussed on the brand rather than just its hero product.
“In order for us to last, we need to be considered in a serious way,” said Yang.
The Mist Opportunity
When a brand creates a category, like fragrance mists, it has a first-mover advantage. But in a trend-driven industry, that doesn’t last for long.
Some of Sol de Janeiro’s cooling is normalisation, Yang said, and some of it is a comedown from the highs of mist mania. It’s also increased competition — brands as diverse as Phlur to Kylie Cosmetics, Rare Beauty and Adidas have all launched body mists.
But the competition is also with retailers. When a brand is no longer exclusive to a retailer, it loses prime placement in its original home. That’s what happened when Sol de Janeiro launched with Ulta Beauty in 2024, after working with Sephora for eight years.
Likewise, if a certain product is outperforming, a retailer might understandably encourage other brands to launch similar items to lift its overall business.
“We need to get the word ‘defend’ out of our vocabulary, because we have to move forward,” she said. “Once you start defending, you just spend your life defending.”
Slowing down, she added, will help So de Janeiro sharpen its focus.
A Return to Form
The success of the mists took the company by surprise. It had offered them since 2017, but weren’t of much interest to the brand’s original demographic of women over 30.
It’s these older customers who Yang is keen to reconnect with.
The brand’s body care offering has long been formulated with popular skincare ingredients, Yang pointed out, citing the existence of seven different kinds of hyaluronic acid in its Body Badalada Vitamin-Infused Lotion. They just hadn’t been marketed as having them.
“We just didn’t talk about [the skincare ingredients]. We sort of take it for granted that people should know,” she said. The brand will start adding skincare claims to its packaging, and heroing these elements in marketing. It will also be experimenting with YouTube advertising’ marketing campaigns will feature both the scent and skincare profile of its creams, lotions and gels.
Switching gears is a risk. Fragrance mists comprise roughly 60 percent of the brand’s total sales, and it owns 71 percent of the total category, per YipitData.
But it is necessary for the company’s longevity.
“We were the ‘bum bum’ brand, and then we took it back. Now we’re the mist brand, and now we’re going to take it back again,” said Yang. “Hopefully, we’ll do a good job, and we’ll start to be considered as iconic, and here to stay.”
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