Black Women and the Relationship Between Beauty Standards
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THE BEAUTY GAP: BLACK WOMEN AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BEAUTY STANDARDS AND THEIR DECISION TO PURCHASE MAC COSMETICS by JALEESA JANELLE REED (Under the Direction of Katalin Medvedev) ABSTRACT This qualitative study examined the relationship between millennial Black women and MAC Cosmetics and compared their experiences and sentiments to the existing literature on millennials to investigate if there were discrepancies. Data was collected through semi-structured interviews with 12 participants. Three major themes emerged from the interview data: 1) Self-image management and presentation are important to millennial Black women who use MAC to create and reinforce an acceptable image for themselves as well as mainstream society. 2) Millennial Black women have an emotional relationship with MAC, which is created and influenced by specific aspects of the store environment and the customer service they experience at the MAC counter and 3) MAC employees’ ability to educate millennial Black women on new makeup techniques, while also providing them with professional expertise in regards to product choice, makes them feel empowered, which increases brand loyalty. INDEX WORDS: MAC Cosmetics, Black women, African American women, Millennials, Intersectionality, Queer Theory, Beauty THE BEAUTY GAP: BLACK WOMEN AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BEAUTY STANDARDS AND THEIR DECISION TO PURCHASE MAC COSMETICS by JALEESA REED BS, The University of Georgia, 2013 A Thesis Submitted to the Graduate Faculty of The University of Georgia in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree MASTER OF SCIENCE ATHENS, GEORGIA 2015 © 2015 Jaleesa Reed All Rights Reserved THE BEAUTY GAP: BLACK WOMEN AND THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN BEAUTY STANDARDS AND THEIR DECISION TO PURCHASE MAC COSMETICS by JALEESA REED Major Professor: Katalin Medvedev Committee: Denise C. Lewis Patricia Hunt-Hurst Electronic Version Approved: Suzanne Barbour Dean of the Graduate School The University of Georgia August 2015 DEDICATION Whether we worry or not, we will get there eventually because if it is meant for us, then it will come to fruition. Matthew 6:25-34 I dedicate this work to my younger sister, Marissa. In many ways, beauty is such a big part of our lives. From waiting on Mom to finish her never-ending makeup routine or trying to fulfill society’s expectation of what a mixed girl should look like. Inadvertently, you led me to this topic. I was hoping that, for our sake, there was more to beauty. I hope that you see how beauty is not the same for everyone and that you define your beauty, for yourself, always. iv ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I would like to acknowledge my amazing committee, who graciously gave me their time and energy over the course of two years and contributed many, necessary critiques and suggestions to my thesis. For me, this topic was an interesting thought, but you made it credible. Thank you Dr. Medvedev, Dr. Hunt-Hurst, and Dr. Lewis! I would like to thank my participants for sharing their experiences with me. I hope I caught the nuances in your relationship with MAC and your views on beauty. All of my interviews were fun and I appreciated being able to frame your cosmetic purchasing motivations in a different light. Also, the Institute for Women’s Studies at UGA has been influential in exposing me to works and authors that validated my thoughts but also my personal convictions. The classes were challenging and the readings were always mind-blowing but you gave me a feminist foundation to stand on and I love the view, from here. Finally, I would like to thank my family who always supports and loves me anyway, despite the fact that I “never come home” and even when it seems like I’m “always working” because I am trying to be a good daughter and get a good job so everyone can retire early ;). Last but not least, my second family, the Yarbrough-O’Neal- Darby-Johnson clan who gave me the chance to stop being a nomad and showed me what powerful forces of nature Black women can be. Thanks for answering my many questions and for everything else that you do. My acknowledgements would not be complete without a nod to Nayyirah Waheed¸ whose poetry kept me moving forward when I doubted myself… v i will crawl for white beauty. eat my arms. barter my legs (make my thighs into altars of grief). for skin that does not drink night. hair that is not angry. body that is not soil. i place curses on my flesh call them diets tell my ancestors they are ugly. howl at my nose until it bleeds. run my heart across my teeth, repeatedly. i am dying. to be beautiful. but beautiful. is something. i will never be. - by the time we are seven Waheed, N. (2013). “by the time we are seven.” Salt. vi TABLE OF CONTENTS Page ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ................................................................................................ v LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................................. ix LIST OF FIGURES ............................................................................................................ x CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................ 1 Justification ................................................................................................. 5 2 REVIEW OF LITERATURE ........................................................................... 7 The Idea of Beauty ...................................................................................... 7 Millennials ................................................................................................ 15 MAC: A brand for everyone? ................................................................... 23 3 METHODS ..................................................................................................... 40 Data Collection ......................................................................................... 41 Sampling and Sample ............................................................................... 41 Data Analysis ............................................................................................ 43 Assumptions and Limitations ................................................................... 45 4 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION ..................................................................... 47 Millennial Black Women as Consumers ................................................... 48 The MAC Environment ............................................................................ 63 5 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................... 77 Implications for Future Research .............................................................. 79 vii REFERENCES ................................................................................................................. 81 APPENDICES A CONSENT FORM .......................................................................................... 88 B INTERVIEW QUESTIONS ........................................................................... 91 C SAMPLE TRANSCRIPT: HARPER PERRY ................................................ 93 viii LIST OF TABLES Page Table 1: Participant details broken down by birth year and age ....................................... 41 ix LIST OF FIGURES Page Figure 1: Image adapted from a February 2015 Mintel report entitled Marketing to Millennials, showing that while millennials rely heavily on reviews, they are more reluctant to write them ...................................................................................... 18 Figure 2: A practical model of fashion brand management relating tangible and intangible brand components to consumer responses ............................................................ 26 Figure 3: A word cloud created by Dedoose showing the most prevalent codes in larger text…….. ............................................................................................................... 45 Figure 4: A typical MAC counter (left) and a Clinique counter (right) in a department store…. .................................................................................................................. 67 x CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION Social media allows cosmetic brands to engage with millennial consumers through popular mediums such as Facebook and Twitter. Social media combined with celebrity endorsements has allowed cosmetic brands to create a brand image that reaches consumers instantly through their mobile phones. Brands such as MAC Cosmetics have the highest followings on social media when compared to drugstore cosmetic brands like Maybelline, Revlon, and Covergirl due to MAC’s strong commitment to maintaining a social media presence (Mintel, July 2013). Specifically, MAC’s partnership with singer Rihanna exemplified how “leveraging the Twitter network of a celebrity” can generate greater interest than traditional marketing campaigns (Mintel, July 2013). When Rihanna used her 30 million Twitter followers to promote the release of her lipstick collection, RiRi for MAC sold out within two hours in stores and online (Mintel, July 2013). Besides promoting the release on Twitter, Rihanna also collaborated with MAC on her Diamonds World Tour by allowing fans to purchase the lipstick ahead of its release date at MAC pop-up stores inside the concert venue (Mintel, July 2013). During this time, MAC recorded heightened interest surrounding the release of Rihanna’s lipstick collaboration (Mintel, July 2013). Based