Fan Bingbing earns nearly $200M a year from beauty business

Chinese actress Fan Bingbing. Photo from Fan's Instagram

According to Finance Sina, at 44 years old, Fan is now more widely recognized as a businesswoman and fashion blogger than an actress in China. A report from a beauty business website noted that in 2024, Fan Beauty Diary ranked 35th on the list of the 100 hottest Chinese beauty brands.

While Fan Beauty Diary’s revenue is significantly lower than the top brand Proya, which earned 8.6 billion yuan last year, analysts view this as an impressive accomplishment for a brand founded just seven years ago. Fan Beauty Diary is emerging as a "strong contender" in the competitive beauty industry.

The brand has experienced steady growth, with a milestone achieved in June when it sold 100,000 boxes of whitening face masks in just 10 seconds during a livestream. Each box was priced at 198 yuan. In addition to face masks, the brand offers lipsticks, shampoos, skincare creams, with prices ranging from 99 yuan to 684 yuan. Fan promotes her products through advertising, livestreaming, and collaborations with popular Chinese livestreaming influencers during major shopping festivals. The brand’s Douyin account has amassed 11.4 million followers.

Alongside her business ventures, Fan continues to participate in international events, appear in magazine shoots, and star in films produced in Hollywood, South Korea, and Malaysia.

Once one of the most prominent Chinese stars, Fan was named one of Time magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2017. However, her career suffered a major setback in 2018 when she was fined US$128 million for tax evasion, which led to a lengthy public hiatus.