Photo: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images for Drunk Elephant
For several years now, Drunk Elephant has enjoyed a booming market of Gen-Alpha kids stocking up on the brand’s $72 moisturizers and $90 serums. But now, after leaning into playful branding that popped on the TikTok feeds of skin-care-obsessed kids, it sounds like Drunk Elephant is turning over a new leaf and trying to win the adults back.
According to Business of Fashion, Drunk Elephant is rebranding to focus on its 21-and-over customers. Barbara Calcagni, president of global brands for Shiseido, Drunk Elephant, Nars, and Dr. Dennis Gross, described their new campaign as more “grown up,” with a subtly anti-teen tagline: “Skin so good it should come with a warning. Please enjoy responsibly.” The campaign is apparently meant to steer focus away from the colorful packaging and back to the clinically backed formulas Drunk Elephant was originally known for. In a press release that imagined its clients “heading into the office, enjoying a night out or having a cozy self-care evening at home,” the brand emphasized “long-term skin health” and “consumers who are deeply invested in their skin.”
Meanwhile, the company’s Instagram page has been wiped; as of the writing of this piece, it only has five new posts that seem to signal a rebrand, featuring of-age models and a cleaner, more sophisticated aesthetic language.
Drunk Elephant may not have been explicitly marketed toward children, but when anti-aging products suddenly became a standard in 13-year-olds’ medicine cabinets, it certainly didn’t shy away — in December 2023, the brand’s founding partner and chief creative officer, Tiffany Masterson, said in an Instagram post (that no longer exists) that yes, kids and tweens could use Drunk Elephant products — just not the acids and retinols. But products like the Beste No. 9 Jelly Cleanser, Lala Retro Whipped Cream, and Virgin Marula Oil? Fair game, according to her.
Alas, Drunk Elephant learned the hard way that the younger generations are fickle — its parent company Shiseido revealed that its first-quarter earnings in 2025 were almost 65 percent lower than the year before. Will they win back their adult loyalists with this pivot? It’s hard to say, but moving away from being so kid-friendly seems promising. I look forward to seeing fewer children’s fingers near the Sephora testers.
This post has been updated.
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