Makeup brand criticized for creating deep black foundation shade following backlash

A makeup company with products available at Ulta Beauty released a deep black foundation shade after Black beauty gurus said its initial shade range wasn’t inclusive to darker complexions.

But now the brand, Youthforia, faces backlash after some Black beauty creators said the new dark shade was reminiscent of black face paint.

Golloria George, a Black beauty creator with over 1.4 million TikTok followers, first reviewed Youthforia’s Date Night Skin Tint Serum late last year after the brand released 15 shades. She complained that the original set of shades didn’t match her skin and wasn’t inclusive enough.

After a wave of backlash, the company released 10 more shades, including the darkest, “600.” George reviewed Youthforia’s new darkest shade Monday. In the video, she put jet-black face paint on one cheek and the Youthforia foundation on the other. They looked almost identical.

“When we say that we want you guys to make shades for us, we don’t mean to go to the lab and ask for minstrel show black,” George said in the video. “What we mean is to take the browns that you have made, create undertones and do what you need to do in the lab so it’s a darker shade of brown.” Her review has been liked over 1 million times on TikTok.

Last year, after the original complaints that its shades weren’t inclusive enough emerged, Youthforia CEO Fiona Co Chan apologized, saying, “When I first started Youthforia two years ago, all I wanted to do was create a safe space where individual beauty could be celebrated. And unfortunately with our latest launch, we just fell short of that mission.” Youthforia didn’t respond to a request for comment about the new “600” shade. Ulta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In an interview, George said the new black shade “feels like a slap in the face” and “sets the tone” for what’s acceptable in the industry.

“I feel like the beauty industry itself has taken a step backward,” she said. “We’ve seen so many complexion launches that would never work for a skin tone like mine.”

Black beauty creators have been criticizing makeup brands that they say don’t offer inclusive shade ranges for years. In 2017, Rihanna launched Fenty Beauty to fill the gap in foundation shades, leading to runaway success online and in stores. Yet makeup brands from Tarte Cosmetics to Youthforia have continued to face viral backlash for shade range controversies, typically over brands’ not offering darker shades.

But Youthforia’s attempt to make a product for darker skin tones seems to have missed the mark for many beauty aficionados.

Another Black beauty creator and cosmetic chemist, Javon Ford, made a video examining the pigments listed in the ingredients for each shade of Youthforia’s Date Night foundations. NBC News also reviewed the ingredients list for each shade to confirm Ford’s findings. While the 24 other shades each contained at least three pigments, the newly darkest shade, “600,” contained only one — the pigment “black iron oxide.”

“This foundation literally only has pure black pigment,” Ford said in the video. “Anyone who has ever taken an art class will tell you that black is a terrible pigment to mix with, because it just makes things gray and muddy.”

Ford said in an interview that in his experience working with contract manufacturers for cosmetic companies, most brands will use shade ranges from other brands like Fenty Beauty as a benchmark for developing new shades. Unlike shades of brown, Ford said, the Youthforia “600” shade contained only black and white, resulting in gray. It doesn’t match any human skin, Ford and George both said.

“What I feel like Youthforia did is ask their manufacturers to make the darkest shade possible,” Ford said. “But we all have different undertones.”

More than three other prominent Black creators with large social media followings agreed with Ford’s and George’s reviews in comments. Makeup gurus with darker complexions told NBC News last year that Youthforia’s darker shades looked gray on their skin and lacked the undertones that resemble human skin.

Even in videos Youthforia posted to its own social media channels, the “600” shade appeared too dark on models with darker complexions.

Black beauty creator Nyadollie Deng even said in a paid partnership video with the brand that the foundation “is just too dark” before she chose a different shade.

George told NBC News: “It shows they don’t really care to put in effort, they don’t really care to include darker complexions, and we are an afterthought to them. Humans have undertones.”

This article was originally published on NBCNews.com