Makeup YouTuber Nikkie Tutorials explained why she took a deal for only $50k for her Too Faced collaboration after Jeffree Star said she took 'dirt'
- The new Shane Dawson docuseries about his makeup collaboration with Jeffree Star touched on a YouTube controversy involving Nikkie Tutorials and the brand Too Faced, including new details about a contentious contract.
- Back in 2016, one of the most popular beauty YouTubers, Nikkie de Jager (better known as Nikkie Tutorials), announced she would be debuting an eyeshadow and face powder palette with the brand Too Faced, along with a bundle of other products.
- The collaboration was called "The Too Faced Power of Makeup by Nikkie Tutorials Collaboration," and hinged on de Jager's wildly popular series of makeovers that show, aptly, the power of makeup.
- In 2017, Star accused Too Faced CEO Jeremy Johnson of underpaying de Jager, after the two makeup moguls and brand competitors started feuding publicly about who originated which makeup concepts.
- In Dawson's latest video, Star again dredged up the accusation, confirming earlier speculation that de Jager recieved a flat fee of $50,000 for the palette, which Star said made over $10 million.
- On Twitter, de Jager then responded with a brief explanation of why she signed the low-balling contract, calling herself "naive" at the time, and said the biggest loss via the product was not the money, but her reputation, given the quality of the product.
- Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.
Jeffree Star has revived an extinct beauty drama about Nikkie Tutorials' collaboration with the brand Too Faced, revealing new details and prompting a response from the YouTuber herself in the process.
Nikkie de Jager, better known as her channel name Nikkie Tutorials, was one of the first beauty YouTubers to cross over into collaborative marketing and product creation with Estée Lauder's Too Faced brand in 2016, when she announced her wildly popular "Power of Makeup" YouTube series would become a palette and product bundle.
The palette included eyeshadow shades, two blush colors, a bronzer, and a highlighter, and it sold for $56. Drama first cropped up when fans who purchased the palette claimed it was poorer quality than what de Jager's own swatches and reveal suggested.
Then, in 2017, as Star embarked on a public feud with Too Faced CEO Jeremy Johnson. Johnson suggested that other brands were ripping off a "unicorn makeup" trend he started, and Star responded to say that the "unicorn" trend started before Too Faced capitalized on it. Star also revealed that Johnson had underpaid de Jager.
At the time, speculation ran wild from anonymous sources that said de Jager only made between $40,000 and $60,000 on the product, which had sold at least 150,000 units – netting over $8 million.
Star revived the old drama in his latest video with Shane Dawson, causing de Jager to respond again to his accusations on Twitter
In "The Secrets of the Beauty World," Star tells Dawson that a fair split of earnings from their makeup collaboration would be giving Dawson 30 percent, due to the size of his audience and how it would impact sales. Star predicts that Dawson could make $5 million from the collaboration.
He goes on to explain that other makeup brands have been less than fair with YouTubers who create and market makeup collaborations. Star's example is Nikkie Tutorials, who he says made a $50,000 flat fee from her Too Faced palette and bundled products, called the "The Too Faced Power of Makeup by Nikkie Tutorials Collaboration."
"I've seen YouTubers and other influencers take dirt because they didn't know," Star said, noting that everything he revealed in Dawson's video was already on the record – when the controversy first emerged, anonymous sources confirmed to drama YouTuber Sanders Kennedy that de Jager only made between $40,000 and $60,000.
"When she told me, I was so horrified," Star continued on to say in the video. "And when I kind of let that secret out it turned really ugly."
Dawson's video already has almost 12 million views and is the top trending video on the platform. De Jager responded to the rehashing of her Too Faced collaboration on Twitter on Saturday, calling herself "naive" for signing the contract – and suggesting that the real drama at play involved Too Faced changing the quality of the product without her knowledge.
"I signed my contract with TF back then because I was naive & didn't know better," de Jager wrote on Twitter. "At the end of the day, I signed it, it's my own fault – but what I'll never forgive is that 'allegedly' they changed the palette's quality behind my back. 1000's of negative reviews & I was clueless."
She went on to say, "I had to see all these negative reviews, while the palettes I had were outstanding. 'they lying in their videos to get views' is what I was told. I don't care about the money.. but I had to fight YEARS to prove my authenticity and gain your trust again."
Neither Too Faced, its parent company Estée Lauder, or de Jager immediately responded to Insider's request for comment.
SEE ALSO: Here's how much Logan Paul, PewDiePie, and 8 other top YouTubers make per minute of video
DON'T MISS: Inside YouTuber Jeffree Star's incredible rise from teen MySpace star to a makeup mogul raking in millions
Join the conversation about this story »
NOW WATCH: Why Venice floods every year