Wet 'n Wild: Brand Origin Story!
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- Опубликовано: 7 сен 2024
- Hello everyone!
I am back again with another brand history. This time I'm tacking drugstore classic- Wet 'n Wild.
And it's a doozy.
Get your tin foil hats and join me on this weird journey of budget cosmetic history.
Let me know what other brands you'd like to see covered!
In my little break from uploading (thank you for all the X(Elle)-Mas support!), I've spent a lot of time researching.
Future research videos include Sigma and affiliate marketing, Versace Makeup, and CoverGirl (part 1, anyway).
XOXO
ELLE
email me: shadowsmoked@gmail.com
twitter/instagram: @shadowsmoked
buy me a coffee: www.ko-fi.com/elles
How are you not HUGE? This series is amazing.
Agreed.
I just found her from Smokey glow and was thinking the exact same thing this is fascinating to me
THIS!
Remember N.Y.C.? That rollerball lipgloss in strawberry banana was all I would wear in middle/high school. Oh yeah and the Maybelline mascara in Midnight blue or something......Ahhhh memories 😊
Yessssss the rollerball gloss! It didn’t last long on the lips but it tasted amazing and was so glossy so I just kept applying it multiple times a day!
As a history and makeup nerd who loves research but has to feed and care for two little kids, I can’t thank you enough for these videos! I’ve been interrupted three times just writing this comment 😭😩
I felt this! Hello to another mama 🙋🏼♀️
90s teenager here! The black lipstick was indeed from the Fantasy Makers collection and it was awful! I think I remember it being super greasy? Anyway, I opted to color in my lips with black eyeliner instead, so you know it had to be bad! Also, my first love gave me a BRIGHT green Fantasy Makers nail polish. It stained my nails yellow, but I loved it almost as much as I loved him.
I was born in 77, so 90s teenager, too! I remember that W 'n W also had a black lipstick in their permanent line circa '93 or '94 that was MUCH better than the Fantasy Makers one. It was hard to find, though. All of us goth girls made it our JOB to get that stuff and buy every tube the store had available and distribute it to our friends.
@@AislinSidhe oh, lucky! They must have never stocked them in the small isolated area I grew up in.
Omg I still had one of their black lipsticks in with my Halloween makeup...no idea how old it was so I chucked it a couple of years ago. I remember it always feeling so gross lol
my first nail polish i ever bought was a baby blue metallic wnw polish (my mom only wears red/pink nail polish so having a baby blue metallic was COOL to me lmao)
90s teen as well and wet n Wild was the 1st makeup brand I ever bought in junior high.
PLEASE do a video on hazel bishop 🙏 im going to school rn for a chemistry degree so one I can hopefully formulate makeup, she would be so interesting to hear about
Seconding this!!!!
yes for women in science!!! you go girl 🥰
Can you do a spin off series and talk about female pioneers in cosmetics like Hazel and Madame CJ Walker?
When I was a teen, the only black nail polish available to me was the 99cent Wet N Wild polish. Fond memories.
I love this series! I was an 80s teen and I loved seeing those products again! The makeup is so much better now. Kids don't know what garbage we tried to use decades years ago! LOL
Right?! Everything is better quality now!
What you don’t miss lighting your eyeliner on fire to get it to work? I was an mid 80’s baby, I used to watch my sister light her green eyeliner on fire.
@@ayjamay I remember doing that. They have it so easy these days. Lol.
@@gailbook70 Yup even by the time I was wearing eyeliner because that’s an advance skill that I couldn’t do as a child the formulas were so much better I didn’t have to light mine on fire. I did have one formula that I had to do that to and I ended up burning my eyelid. I couldn’t figure out how my sister did it.
@@ayjamay wait you don't still light your eyeliner? ❤😳
I can’t tell you how much I love this series!!!! Thanks so much for doing it. I look forward to these more than you know!💖💖
Glad you enjoy it!
Me too 😊💕✨😍
Same here, and I don't even wear make up. :)
Nyx!!! I feel like they’re the new affordable drugstore brand
I love this series! It's so fun to nerd out about makeup― it seems like there is NO content like this anywhere on youtube! I would love to see a video about defunct makeup brands. Thanks for the awesome content!
I'm working on one about Versace Makeup! That'll be one of the next ones. And a compilation of failed/former designer brands. If there are any brands you can think of let me know!
@@shadowsmoked88 Elle, I think that Calvin Klein beauty would be a good one to feature. CK has tried, & failed to sustain, a makeup line at least 3 times...I remember reading an article (Allure?) that mentioned they had a line in the late 70's/early 80's, then I remember their line in the early 2000's, & once again in the late aughties...
You do such a fantastic job researching and I absolutely love learning the history of these companies. I graduated high school in 1997 and bought a lot of wet and wild lol. I remember buying Hard Candy nail polish at Sephora, maybe some glitter eyeliners, now it’s at Walmart! I am dying to hear the story there!
Working on Hard Candy! It's quite a story!
This serious is absolutely fantastic. I love the level of research that you put into this. I thought Wet n Wild was founded in the 90’s, so my mind was blown by the history. I had no idea that they had launched a sister brand for the Hispanic market. It feels so odd for white men to be marketing makeup to Black and Hispanic women. 🥴
I thought the same! And weird how they completely hide the history!
It’s so weird honestly. That one picture where the three white men are staring at the younger, attractive black woman putting on her make up was unsettling.
Does anyone remember Revlon's Street Wear collection from the 90's!!? Super fun grungy colored makeup
Burnt Sierra was my color
Yes! Urban Decay sued them, haha
Those photos from the 90s really threw me right back to the KMart makeup aisle in my childhood. I didn’t even know I had those memories 😂
Oh man! Feeling nostalgic seeing all that old white packaging.
omg i did a school project on hazel bishop in seventh grade!! i bought one of her lipsticks on ebay to display during my presentation lol
Growing up in the 90s I was allowed to wear nail polish long before I was allowed to wear makeup, and my first nail polishes were Black Radiance and Wet n Wild (I had no idea they were the same company!). Eventually I graduated to a Wet n Wild lipstick in the most impossibly bright fuschia which I loved like no other. It's so nostalgic to see the old packaging. This was so interesting - your in depth research makes these videos so much fun to watch!
Oh, those round nail polish bottles! I can remember the smell vividly. Pretty sure the window treatments in my childhood room still have smears of that metallic blue shade on them from a wet nail accident.
this was fascinating! wet n wild arrived in my country only two or so years ago, with select few products, and we still don't have the full line, so i'm always fascinated with the nostalgia regarding it haha
I have to say personally this is my FAVORITE hair wig on you I love the dark in front with the bangs it just looks so nice on you
Thank you! I think it's mine too!
This is fascinating! It's a bummer they've been so shady about animal testing. Wet N Wild has certainly had a weird journey to where it is now. I really love the idea of focusing on less conventional colors for really low prices! That basically describes my makeup style, haha.
My older sister gave me some of her nail polishes when I was young, so I have several variations of Wet N Wild bottles and logos in my nail polish collection. :) One of the bottles looks just like the ones on the screen at 17:29!
Slightly mortifying story: I found a lipstick that looked like the one at 17:36 on my mother-in-law's makeup shelf in *2019*. We went to Ulta together that week and I helped her refresh her collection. Eesh.
The amount of research you've done 🤯🤯🤯 also i wonder what do you think about the new ELF mint bit size palettes ?
They look pretty! I want to try them!
Love this series sooooo much! I'd love to hear histories of other drugstore brands, like Physician's Formula, Essence, Catrice, some of the smaller brands.
Do you have elf on your list to research? I’d love to know more about them too! Another great video, keep these coming, Elle! I love watching them.
I recently decluttered old nail polishes and I had some of those old old fantasy makers and they were still so good. I had the black lipstick too!
I love seeing sassy Elle about finding the animal testing article 😂
I remember those W&W lipsticks as well as the Fantasy Makers product line for Halloween :) Markwins is an interesting company. They’re brands are drug store and higher end, including Physicians Formula and Lorac.
I found your channel through your collab with Smokey Glow. Your extensive research is really impressive! Great job😀
Hiya Elle, great research from a brand that was (for a time) locally manufactured to where I live now (as did Stan). One part you didn’t go into is cosmetics manufactured in China are not animal tested unless there’s a complaint. Even cosmetics made in China & exported elsewhere. So the pics of showing it sold in China in ‘19 are unfounded. Furthermore, as of this year China is no longer requiring animal testing for imported brands - FINALLY! Jet 🧡🎸🎶⚡️🦇😻🐈⬛ PS as an aide, “The Journal News” is a newspaper circulated throughout Westchester County (where Stan lived, had manufacturing until he moved manufacturing to Nyack in Rockland County) not all of NYS.
Wet n’ Wild still feels new to the UK, a similar brand here is Barry M although their popularity is fading along with Miss Sporty, Bourjois, GOSH and Collection Cosmetics.
Very interesting! They've come so far. I remember when the Fergie line came out. Beautiful collection of shadow quints, but the pigmentation was terrible. I miss their Autumn collections.
Fergie was their first ever spokesmodel! It was a big deal for WnW for sure
I love these videos! I'm so glad I found your channel from the Smokey Glow collab you did!
Same and I'm so glad I did! I'm a research nut myself so I always find these super interesting.
Yay! Thank you!
@@shadowsmoked88 You're welcome 😊
OMG !! I struggled so hard to find info about this brand a couple months ago when I was on the hunt for the multi color confetti glitter from the 90s (only polish I was allowed as a kid)
Love these videos! I’m always googling “vintage” makeup and the originals I’m a 90s kid so it’s so fun to look back!
Ooh the part about their cruelty free status is fascinating
Probably one of the first nail polishes I ever owned was their blue polish. Such a fascinating deep-dive into their history, so glad I found you!
They are one of my favorite brands, but their quality was garbage in the 90s.
Ooh it would also be really interesting to see how makeup looks were influenced through the decades. Who did consumers look to? Royalty, film stars, makeup artists, books, magazines, tv ads, music videos, influencers? This would probably be a really long video haha.
I love this series and this was super interesting. I would be curious about a NYX brand video because I feel like they’re weren’t super mainstream like 10 years ago except did when the OG beauty youtubers used their jumbo pencil but now the brand is sold in target. Also your hair looks extra pretty in this vid!
I actually remember some of that old AF nail polish lol. I was a teen in the 90's
LOL. I 10000% had that "glitter overcoat" nail polish!
This has got to be, hands down, my favorite series on youtube.
I stopped everything that I was doing to watch it. Fantastic pictures! Oh the memories. Back then, we called it "the pharmacy." I started saying "drugstore" about a year a two ago.
I would like to know about NYX, Catrice, and Ofra.
The first time I remember seeing Wet N Wild, was in a Woolworth's store in the late 1970's. They sold these little bottles of jewel toned nail polish for- yep- a dollar! It was the first time we ever saw nail polishes in vivid purples (my favorite back then!) or turquoise green or canary yellow. I also remember Artmatic, it was another Woolworths type of brand. The larger drug stores back then carried things like Revlon and Maybelline, if you wanted to find Wet N Wild or Artmatic, those would have been at the deep discount stores, or what my late, great mother called "the five and dime" stores. I can remember getting in trouble for wearing a bright purple Wet N Wild nail polish to school when I was in the 6th grade, LOL- that would have been 1979ish.
This has to be my favorite series on RUclips right now. The amount of research that you obviously do is insane, but in the best possible way! Thank you for helping me get through the horror that's happening in the "real" world!
Thank you! The research is the best part!
What a throw back at 12:10. My grandma had that lipstick but in a lighter pinker shade. I remember always looking at it in the bathroom cabinet when I was little because my mom didn’t wear much make up ever but my grandma did.
Heya Elle!!!
OMC, we had those glitter nail polishes from Wet 'N' Wild from '95!!! Boy did that bring me back!!! Anywho, thank you for another well-researched, awesome video!!! It's so interesting to learn these histories!!!
🖤🖤🖤
~Casey
I actually have a lot of the Wet n Wild products from the mid-late 90s (I keep them in my "makeup archive" which are products I keep for the memories and swatching but don't use on my face). That's when I started buying makeup because my parents finally let me wear it. 😂 The mainline WnW products really were black lipstick, blues and greens, iridescent colors (they were the first duochromes I ever owned). In fact, where I was purchasing (the BX on the Air Base where I lived) didn't even have the Fantasy Makers line. This was really well done! Thank you for all of your hard work. I've often looked into this company but couldn't find much of a history. You did an amazing job and knocked it out of the park. 👏👏👏😃
Ok but can we talk about how even back in those days, even for cheap makeup it was actually still kinda expensive compared to a lot of other stuff like groceries, or even going to the movies?
Oh gosh, I don’t have time to watch this right now, but I will definitely watch it tomorrow. It looks amazing!!
I love seeing the old photos. I had some of those early 90s nail polishes and lipsticks 😊
I’m pretty sure Wet N Wild was the first makeup I ever bought. I remember seeing it in drugstores when I was a kid and I’m 44 now. This is such an interesting origin story, thanks for doing all the research!
So much work went into making this and it’s so interesting to hear about! Keep it going!
I swear I had some of those old lipsticks when I was a young girl from my mom...I'm 35 so late 80s and I swear it was from our dollar store. When it got popular again I was always thinking that wet &wild was in the dollar store!!!
I love these deep dives into brand history. Do you purely use online documents or physical ones as well when researching?
Mostly online, but physical when possible!
I love these videos, but I would prefer if captions were enabled. I remember artmatic! I remember biking down to the Walgreens when I was 13 and using my babysitting money to pick up my first makeup, and I am pretty sure a bunch of it was artmatic.
They should be enabled!
I definitely had that “vintage polish” that was navy blue with the white cap when I was in middle school.
I still have old wet n wild nail polishes in some of those older bottles.
I'm watching all the episodes of this series now, as well as all your trademark videos. You can tell how hard you have worked on these videos and it shines through in your delivery. I can tell you have enjoyed the research, and I'm loving to watch!
I pulled up this video because I was remembering Wet n Wild being AWFUL in the 90s. Lol. Then I didn’t see it for a long time and assumed it was discontinued but I don’t know if it was. I was so confused because all of a sudden RUclipsrs were raving about them. I thought it was April Fools or something. 🤣 It took me a long time to even buy any of the stuff people raved about because I couldn’t get the crap they used to make out of my head. But I looked for info and only found the blurb on their site you showed! I can usually find info about anything online and I couldn’t with this. So weird.
I love these videos! This one was so interesting, especially because I so vividly remember wet n wild back in the day
Thank you for watching!
god i love this series! its super interesting to learn about drugstore brand history, since i have never really seen any history videos for drugstore brands, let alone wet n wild. i feel like i knew nothing about them, you could tell me wet n wild was founded in the 1800s and i would have been like yeah that sounds about right lol. great video!
Oh this is so interesting!!! I really love this format and seeing some of the old adds (particularly the ~Groovy~ cosmetically yours one, lol) I'd love to hear you talk about Hazel Bishop, just the little bit you mentioned made her sound so interesting!
I miss that eggplant frost nail polish! I'm also surprised how long they kept the packaging for some of their products, lipsticks and polishes you showed from the 90s still had those bottles at least as late as 2011 (I know I bought them in high school)
They really did not change the packing much at all!
Artmatic!! I Haven't thought about that brand in decades
also you look absolutely STUNNING today!!!!!!
Oh thank you!
I'm seriously trying to figure out how I can have her hair. At the very least I think I need to go back to bangs.
this is my favourite series on youtube, it combines my love of makeup and my love of useless knowledge and research, ill watch every single vid u do 🥰 i would be curious to see a history of mac, I feel like they're such a classic brand in the makeup sphere!
MAC is going to be a big project! I'm trying to get my hands on some early 80s sources!
Yay your back, hope you enjoyed your break from youtube! Another excellent video Elle, have you considered doing a deep dive on lime crime? Cant wait to see what you have in store for us in 2021
I don't think there's much to talk about with Lime Crime that hasn't already been covered, tbh!
I think it'd be cool if you looked into Essie! They really have an image as the drugstore polish and I wonder how they got so big and still stand out with the indie competition and other brands too!
I know Wet N Wild goes back to my childhood and I wish I had held onto something from that time.
As always, great job! Love these!
Oh this one is giving me flashbacks to my childhood already. IIRC I had a Wet 'n Wild purple lipstick. People were really averse to young me wearing black makeup.
Thanks you SO much for all of your hard work on this series, Elle! As a fellow research lover, it hits me in the feels so hard! I can't wait to see your Revlon (i.e., Charles Revson show-and-tell, because he was THE brand for so long!) episodes!
Love this series and this one especially! So many memories of Wet and Wild growing up, they helped me get into makeup. I worked for a small Ontario chain drugstore in 2001 where I managed the health/beauty/cosmetic section. Part of my responsibility was buying. I was only 18 so I knew what the kids from the high school up the street were into (not to mention what I wanted!), so I expanded our Wet and Wild inventory soooo much 😂 ALL the display units, lol. Sales increased though so they let me keep doing it!
Funny story though: one of their most basic black eyeliners was item number 666. My buying manager at head office, which was at our location and had to sign off on all ordering, forbade me to order that because she was super religious/superstitious. Like, if I selected it she would remove it from the form. So, I was always having to tell customers we were “sold out because it’s the most popular item” 🤦♀️🤣
Oh that's fascinating!! They had to know having an item numbered 666 would be controversial!
For sure! I’ve often wondered if they’ve changed it since then, because even though everything was just in chronological order, I did find it odd they wouldn’t just skip that one!
Love this video! it hit me in my sentimentalness. as 90's goth girl, i enjoyed the variety in dark colors. they also did some frosted pastels i enjoyed from time to time.
I enjoy these brand origin stories so much! I especially love seeing the images you’re able to find. Keep em coming Elle!
Thank you! Will do!
I was 13 in 1985, and this brand, and Love My Nails/ Love My Lips were the only brands I had because they were so cheap. Back then, L’Oreal and Revlon were considered drugstore “high end” brands. Cover Girl & Maybelline were “mid range”. 😃
This was absolutely fascinating! Man I wish you had a whole Netflix documentary series exploring the history of makeup and makeup brands!!!
What an amazing video! You are so talented! I’m going to be looking forward to more of these!
Thank you so much! Let me know if there are any specific brands you're interested in!
I’m so glad you’re back!! I can’t wait for more videos like this one. I love learning the origin story about all brands!!
this is such a cool idea, I can't wait to see the other companies you cover
I remember being in high school in the 90s and like wet n wild was the cheap shit you didn’t get caught dead buying and now to see it being this lauded brand that all the beauty influencers rave about is still so weird lol
So fascinating!! I would love to hear about Hazel bishop, she sounds incredible!
The original company, Pavion was on Nyak On The Hudson NY , Eventually they were bought by Markwins in California and manufactured in china, The lipsticks had black cases with silver stripes and some eyeshadow singles
So much for WnW “always” being cruelty free. I’d also heard that Black Radiance and Black Opal were not “black owned brands” despite the marketing. Your research confirmed it.
I’m love this series! Makeup history is fascinating 😊
I absolutely love this series, Elle ! Can't wait to listen to this one. Amazing work as always. ✨
Glad you enjoy it!
Had to click that notification bell!!!! I don't want to miss any of your origin story videos!!!
Another incredible video!! These are my favorite thing to watch, not just on your channel, but out of every channel I'm subscribed to
Wow, thank you!
As a kid in the late 90s 00s wetnwild and NYC were the only brands that I would spend my allowance on. I could get a lot of fun stuff for $5. My mom as a teen in the late 70s said she did the same with wetnwild.
I so LOVE these behind the curtain brand videos! 😍😍😍
Yay! Thank you!
I saw those early WnW polishes at the Dollar Tree in 2010! I have Eggplant Frost and Darkest Green. It’s a great green: 100% dark green pigment shimmer, not black.
Markwin also did (does) off label stuff like (an old one I saw at Ross) Lina Gale. Maybe a holiday release?
Wet n Wild was an 80s alterna girl’s best friend. It was cheap and it came in black-both nail polish and lipstick-even though it dried to a weird cellophane texture and peeled off again, and stained cuticles and nails (because I didn’t really mess with base coats or anything like that). I would say that I can’t believe it’s still around, but a company with such a simple mission and decent commodity products with good distribution will probably always have steady business.
Just a moment of extra super nerdyness here-I really wonder what the story is with Wet n Wild’s 1984 restructuring (any time documents are destroyed, there is a story-you’re right to be curious about this). I would look into the history of 1980s federal regulations, because the Reagan administration’s policy of deregulation had huge implications for the way that business was conducted from small family businesses to huge corporations, and I suspect that Wet n Wild might have been backwardly integrated-ingredients/manufacturing/distribution/ownership/etc. merged somehow-after federal regulations changed. Lots of antitrust regulations that were put in place after the Great Depression to prevent one single company from dominating the market were being dismantled, and a company with a savvy owner would be ready to take advantage of that. Hmm 🤔
I love this series you are a thorough researcher and a great storyteller, thank you!
Thank you so much!
I'd love it if you did the Revlon video soon - it would be especially timely now that they are going through restructuring and bankruptcy!
The way i screamed when this showed up in my feed. i LOVE these videos
I just watched this vid for the first time and let me tell you Elle.....you are AMAZING !!! All the research that must have went into doing this!!!
So So interesting. You really do come up with unique ideas on the topic of Makeup:). Just want you to know that your APPRECIATED Hon!! Big Hugs 🤗
Thank you!! I really appreciate this!
I also still have one of those OG lipstick bullets, dang.
Can you do a video on J.Cat makeup ? Love those videos you do. :) From Ida in Norway
I will add to my list! Thank you!
This is so fascinating, and this is such a great series!
Yes Elle! Not sure if I'm going to like or dislike WNW by the end of this but IM READY!!!
I love this series!!!! I'm in my 40's and totally remember using Artmatic lipsticks and that the very first nail polish I ever bought with my own money was a Wet N Wild blue with silver glitter. I saw so many products in this video that I remembered. Fun walk down memory lane!