To give you a context of how prominent these two ladies are – As at January 2018, there was an estimated 23 million channels on YouTube (Tubics SEO) and about 1.9 billion monthly users as at 2019 (Oberlo),
But within the black beauty community these two ladies have emerged as the most subscribed and successful YouTube stars globally.
“Naija no Dey carry last”... lets meet Jackie Aina and Patricia Bright
Jackie Aina:
3.24 million subscribers, 301 million views
Based in Los Angeles, California Jackie Aina, has emerged one of the world’s most prominent black beauty You Tubers.
At the 49th NAACP Image Awards on January 15, 2018, Aina won the Award for “YouTuber of the Year”, She has also worked with many big name beauty brands including “Elf” “Sephora”, and very recently “Anastasia” which is presently number 1 make up brand at the largest Departmental stores in the US
She is controversial because she does not just talk about Makeup, she is very vocal about race and inclusion
If she feels a certain kind of way, she will say it, if she thinks someone is doing the most because she is black she will call you out- this has put at logger heads with many other Youtubers
She has called out many makeup brands for their lack of inclusion and diversity, for catering mostly to the white skin- she delivers her point of view in a conversational and comic sort of way
As of April 2016, Jackie was appointed a Change Ambassador through a YouTube and United Nations initiative aimed at empowering female creators.
Jackie Aina was born to an African-American mother and a Nigerian father of Yoruba descent.
Growing up her father rejected her appeal to go into fashion designing, he insisted she would study Pharmacy. two years into college, She had a brain wave, dropped out of school and joined the United States Army Reserve. While in the military base in Kuwait, she started doing fashion videos, eventually dabbling into makeup tutorials
She worked for Mac and Bobbie Brown Cosmetics, and was a freelance makeup artist for five years before going into YouTube full time.
When she started making YouTube videos, the comments from her black subscriber base inspired her to go into advocacy and campaigning for inclusion of women of color in the industry
She got comments like – “I never thought black skin was pretty” “never thought i could wear color”, “never thought i could wear green eye shadow“
Even Aina kept getting told at makeup counters that the trends she wanted to try wouldn’t work for her complexion”.This inspired her to make tutorials that prove that makeup can look good on any shade of black skin
Jackie Aina is still killing it in the YouTube game, recently she featured Naomi Campbell in her makeup tutorial
Tomorrow I will talk about Patricia Bright- she is the second biggest black beauty vlogger in the YouTube community, and she is also Nigerian.
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