Creators Are the New Storefronts: How the $480bn Creator Economy Is Rewriting Retail

In June 2024, Mitchell Halliday became the first UK seller to hit $1 million in sales on TikTok Shop in a single day. Six hundred thousand people watched him launch eight new products in a single livestream. His brand, Made by Mitchell, has since launched in Boots - proof that a TikTok-native business can break into mainstream retail.

Three thousand miles away, Hailey Bieber's skincare brand Rhode achieved $212 million in sales and sold to e.l.f. Beauty for $1 billion - in just three years (e.l.f. Beauty Press Release, May 2025). Within days of launching in Sephora, Rhode captured 2% of total skincare sales and ranked among the retailer's top ten brands.

These are not celebrity anomalies. They are the new retail playbook. And it is one that favours founders over conglomerates - though as Rhode's post-acquisition journey reveals, that advantage can be fragile.

The rise of creator-led brands

Rhode was the number one skincare brand by earned media value in 2024, with 367% year-over-year growth (Tribe Dynamics, 2024). But the truly disruptive number is this: the brand spent just 11% of revenue on marketing, compared to the 30-50% that traditional direct-to-consumer brands pour into paid social. Hailey Bieber is not just the face of Rhode - she is the demand engine.

According to Goldman Sachs, the creator economy will reach $480 billion by 2027, up from $250 billion in 2023. There are now 67 million creators globally, growing at approximately 10% annually toward 107 million by 2030. Creator-led brands now outperform legacy players in cultural relevance, speed and engagement because their audiences view them as human, transparent and inherently trustworthy.

The real tension emerges in what I call the heritage versus human dynamic. Corporations rely on history. Creators rely on relationship. Increasingly, consumers reward the latter.

The democratisation opportunity

The shift is not reserved for celebrities with millions of followers. A Pacsun creator with just 5,000 followers sparked 11,000 jean sales in 48 hours (eMarketer, 2025). TikTok Shop now drives 10% of Pacsun's e-commerce revenue, projected to reach 12% by 2026 - ahead of the industry average.

TikTok has become the UK's fourth-largest beauty retailer, with one beauty product sold every second on TikTok Shop UK (BeautyMatter, August 2025). The platform is not just a marketing channel - it is a shopfront. According to GlobalData, 83% of shoppers say they discovered a new product on TikTok Shop, and 70% discovered a new brand.

For entrepreneurs, this represents a fundamental levelling of the playing field. You no longer need the distribution infrastructure of a legacy brand to reach consumers at scale. You need authentic creator partnerships and content that converts.

The new storefront model

Creators are no longer just promoting products - they are facilitating transactions. Social is no longer top-of-funnel awareness. It is the shop floor.

Made by Mitchell demonstrates what this looks like in practice. The brand's cornerstone product, Blursh, functions as both blush and lipstick - a multi-use proposition that research from GfK shows consumers will pay premiums for. Every element is optimised for the platform: visually bold packaging, content tailored for TikTok's format, and a livestream strategy that creates urgency through exclusive drops.

The results speak for themselves. According to NielsenIQ, TikTok Shop has driven a 22% lift in social beauty sales overall. And 81.3% of TikTok Shop sales come from repeat customers (Influencer Marketing Hub, 2024) - evidence that the model builds loyalty, not just one-off purchases.

The cautionary tale: what Rhode reveals about founder magic

But Rhode's story also offers a cautionary lesson about what happens when creator-led brands get absorbed into corporate infrastructure. Following the $1 billion acquisition, e.l.f. Beauty's first earnings report revealed a more complicated picture. Rhode generated just $40 million in quarterly sales post-acquisition - a significant slowdown from its previous trajectory. Excluding Rhode, e.l.f.'s organic sales actually fell 3%. The company's shares plunged 29%.

The lesson for entrepreneurs is clear: creator-led brands derive their value from authentic founder connection. That connection is harder to maintain inside a public company with quarterly earnings pressure. Rhode's slow-and-steady, founder-led approach - the very thing that built its cult following - sits uncomfortably alongside the growth expectations of institutional investors.

This does not diminish the opportunity. It sharpens it. The brands that will win are those that protect founder authenticity as they scale - resisting the temptation to trade relationship for reach. Corporate acquirers may pay billion-dollar premiums for creator magic, but that magic is notoriously difficult to bottle.

How to compete smart

The playbook is clear, and it favours quality over scale. Selectivity beats volume - high-volume creator partnerships dilute authenticity, while creators partnering with fewer brands command higher trust and performance. Co-creation beats sponsorship - breakthrough performance comes from giving creators genuine product input, not treating them as distribution channels. Authenticity beats polish - user-generated content converts 4.5 times higher than branded content (Nosto, 2024).

Start building momentum through livestreaming, even at small scale. Mitchell Halliday built his audience before the record-breaking stream. The format builds brand affinity in real time and plays into impulse buying, which accounts for between 40 and 80% of all purchase types.

The timing advantage

Here is the paradox that creates opportunity: while 86% of consumers make purchases influenced by creators (Sprout Social, 2025), marketer investment does not match this. This creates a window of opportunity to gain outsized impact and category share while competitors hesitate.

Platform economics are irreversible. Algorithmic preference for creator content intensifies as short-form video dominates engagement. As the creator base expands, early relationship building compounds value while late entry faces inflated costs and diminished authenticity.

The future belongs to brands fostering genuine community connection - not those with the biggest megaphones, and not those who sell that connection to the highest bidder. For entrepreneurs willing to build authentically and protect what makes them special, the storefront has never been more accessible.

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About Pulse Advertising

Pulse Advertising makes brands the first choice through social media, enabling them to win on sales and market share. We combine human creativity with AI-powered technology to deliver end-to-end solutions — from standardised success measurement and integrated social commerce to content that converts — turning engagement into transparent results through a single, unified brand value score.

Founded in 2014 by Chris Kastenholz and Lara Daniel, Pulse Advertising has grown into a team of 125+ experts across 11 offices worldwide, working as one global unit to provide seamless, effective client support on both global and local levels.

Our clients include Apple, BlackRock, and Nestlé. An official partner of Meta, TikTok, and Google, our work is recognised worldwide for driving growth and impact, with accolades from Forbes 30 Under 30, the Influencer Marketing Awards, and TEDx.

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