Photo-Illustration: By The Cut; Photos: Getty Images, Tarte
Can a makeup product give you an upper blepharoplasty, nose job, lip flip, and jaw-lift? Tarte Cosmetics seems to think so (or is just trying to rage-bait people in order to get more attention for its latest product). The makeup brand, which is no stranger to controversy, has released the Snatch Stick. To promote the launch, Tarte has dispatched both plastic-surgery-related mailers and “ambulances” to influencers, and the brand is getting exactly what it’s after: buzz.
The product is essentially a crayonlike contour stick with a brush attached on the other end. It comes in five shades and is meant to be used all over the face to “get snatched in seconds for an instant face lift effect, no needles required,” according to the brand’s website.
The plastic-surgery-themed mailers that were gifted to creators were plastered with images of syringes, tweezers, and scissors. The box included two shades of the Snatch Stick as well as an image of the influencer — allegedly pulled from their social-media pages — with dashed lines along features like their foreheads, noses, and jawlines. The lines resembled the markings surgeons often draw on patients before plastic-surgery procedures. According to TikTok creator Maria Helen Rue, her package also came with a “prescription” for an upper blepharoplasty, rhinoplasty, jaw-lift, and Botox. She went on to say that it was as if Tarte were suggesting that while she needed to undergo those surgeries, she no longer had to thanks to the brand’s new product. “Am I the only one that finds this disturbing?” she asked.
There were those who felt like Rue and thought the plastic-surgery imagery was inappropriate for a makeup campaign. Raven, another creator, expressed her disbelief that the mailer survived the approval process, and she was dismayed to see plastic-surgery markings on herself — let alone on the particular photo the brand chose. When that picture was taken, “I had been trying to get myself out of a rut, and that was one of the days where I felt like I looked absolutely amazing,” she told The Cut. “So to see that they used that photo was just like, dude, come on. Really?” (A spokesperson for the brand wrote, “The markings were not personalized based on anyone’s face or individual features; they were intended to demonstrate how to use the product.”)
Meanwhile, there were plenty of people declaring loud and clear that they were not offended. Content creator Kelsey Martinez didn’t realize that the campaign could be insulting until she went online. “I actually thought it was giving the message that you don’t need surgery, you don’t need Botox, and you can play with makeup and create the same effect,” she told The Cut. “I thought it was a really funny, unique take on a contour stick.” Influencer Rachel Carlisle played into the theme, opening her video about the product by saying, “Nose job reveal” and taking off a surgical head wrap. And influencer Danielle Elliott declared in a video that she didn’t “think that there is anything wrong with this PR package. As a makeup artist, the only thing I saw when opening up this PR package was a brand showing you where your contour should be placed.”
The brand also sent ambulances that it turned into “glambulances” to influencers’ homes in Los Angeles and New York. The vehicles, designed to address “snatch emergencies,” featured decals of the product and an image of a woman in a surgical head wrap. Inside, creators were asked to lie down on gurneys as makeup artists dressed like medical professionals “snatched” the influencers’ features using the contour stick.
Reactions were mixed for the ambulance as well; the influencers who posted about their personal glambulance visits seemed more than happy to receive their “consultations.” “Snatch me up, girl,” said creator Natalie King in a TikTok about the experience. She was sent home with some “post-op care” (a makeup bag full of Tarte products) and ended the video by showing off her results. Influencer Naeche gushed in her TikTok that “this was the best doctor’s visit I’ve had in a while.” Martinez, who received a mailer but didn’t experience the glambulance, told The Cut, “I thought it was a cute way to go and visit.”
Others on the platform were not so pleased. Laura Capon, a beauty journalist, said that the glambulance was making little of the actual situations in which people need ambulances — not to mention the extreme cost and privilege of using one. “I’ve been in an ambulance with my mum when she’s having chemotherapy,” she said. “I have watched an ambulance when my dad’s been in it and not knowing if my dad was dead or alive.” (A Tarte spokesperson wrote, “The vehicles used were retired ambulances that were no longer in emergency service; no active ambulances or medical resources were taken out of service for the campaign.”)
Two days before the launch but after the product went viral, Tarte Cosmetics CEO Maureen Kelly doubled down on the campaign in an Instagram video, sharing that it was following her “playbook” for virality. Steps included creating a “scroll-stopping teaser” and a “crazy PR delivery.” She added that “our creative strategy is to own the ‘plastic surgeon in a stick’ positioning. Every concept turns the idea of skipping the needles into a viral moment that immediately communicates the product benefit in a very fun, shareable way.”
In a statement to The Cut, Tarte Cosmetics said that the campaign was not about encouraging plastic surgery. “The campaign’s references to cosmetic procedures were a playful way to highlight what contour can do with makeup in a completely temporary, non-invasive way,” the brand said. “They were never intended to suggest that anyone needs to change their appearance or pursue cosmetic procedures to feel beautiful. We believe makeup is about choice, creativity and self-expression, whether that means a full contour, a little concealer or no makeup at all.”
The brand also reported to Modern Retail that it sold 2.4 times the number of Snatch Sticks than expected, and 65 percent of the first round of inventory was gone in that first week. For 42 percent of those customers, it was the first Tarte product that they had ever bought. With those numbers, it doesn’t appear that Tarte’s marketing M.O. will be going under the knife anytime soon.
The Cut has reached out to Tarte Cosmetics for comment.
Stay in touch.
The latest in style, self, culture, and power in your inbox.
Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice