What Is Skims? Inside Kim Kardashian's Billion-Dollar Business
No Matter How You Feel About the Famous Karjenner Clan, There's No Denying That Kim Kardashian Is a Major Mogul. out of All Her Endeavors, Skims Just Might Be...
No matter how you feel about the famous KarJenner clan, there's no denying that Kim Kardashian is a major mogul. Out of all her endeavors, SKIMS just might be Kardashian's biggest success. From luxe collabs to major partnerships that might have dedicated sports fans scratching their heads and muttering, "What is SKIMS?"
SKIMS is a vibe, a lifestyle, a state of mind. Okay, fine, it's a shapewear, swim, and loungewear brand that blends Kardashian's professed love of minimalism with major trends. While the KarJenners have been called out for popularizing unattainable beauty standards, Kim Kardashian's SKIMS is an inclusive brand that offers a range of sizing not frequently seen in celeb-founded fashion lines.
Its site keeps models of all body types front and center, allowing shoppers to view products on women and (as of October 2023) men who look like them. Even more impressively, and unlike other brands that promise to extend sizes over time, SKIMS has focused on inclusive sizing from the beginning, making it something like the Fenty Beauty of foundational garments. SKIMS is also known for its celebrity-studded campaigns. Everyone from Kim Cattrall to Megan Fox (alongside Kourtney Kardashian) has posed in SKIMS. Billie Eilish even wore the brand in the "Lost Cause" music video. Suffice it to say, SKIMS's founder isn't the only famous name associated with it.
From its earliest days to its latest superstar partnership, here's everything you need to know about SKIMS.
2019: SKIMS Gets a Pre-Launch Rebrand
When Kardashian first announced her clothing line in 2019, it wasn't the SKIMS we know today. In June of that year, the mogul announced she'd been developing a shapewear brand, "Kimono," for more than a decade. While the line was praised for its inclusive range of shades and sizes—nine versions of nude in sizes XXS through 4XL—the internet had some thoughts on its name.
Fans and detractors took issue with Kardashian naming her line of modern shapewear after a traditional Japanese garment. The Mayor of Kyoto even weighed in via an open letter addressed to Kardashian requesting that the mogul rename her brand. To her credit, Kardashian listened to the feedback. Roughly two weeks after her initial launch announcement, the reality star shared that Kimono would be no more.
On August 26, 2019, Kardashian thanked her followers for their opinions and officially debuted her shapewear company's rebrand. Just like that, SKIMS was born.
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2021: Fendi x SKIMS Breaks the Internet
SKIMS launches are known to sell out fast, but no one anticipated the SKIMS x Fendi capsule collection to fly off the shelves the way it did. "When we first launched Fendi, we were very worried about the much, much higher-priced product." Kardashian's business partner, SKIMS co-founder Jens Grede told The New York Times, "But it turned out that the highest-priced items sold out first.”
Not only did most of the 125 pieces, ranging in price from $100 to $4,200, sell out within the first 24 hours, but WWD reported that within the first minute of sales, the brands made a million dollars in profits.
The collaboration, launched on November 9, was such a success that the brands released a second drop the following month.
Robert Thorne covers electric vehicle innovations, autonomous driving systems, global mobility trends, and automotive engineering developments.
