By now, you’ve likely seen the Tarte Dubai trip on your TikTok For You Page or Instagram reels. Whether it was an influencer filming a “get ready with me” video or showing their excursions in Dubai, it has gotten thousands of people talking about this luxury getaway. While it certainly succeeded Tarte’s mission in promoting their brand, the talk isn’t so positive and the backlash they are receiving is in the headlines.
Tarte Cosmetics sent out 50 beauty and makeup branded influencers, including plus ones, on a luxury all-inclusive trip to Dubai. On-the-rise influencer Alix Earle, and her best friend Xandra Phol, are some of the high-profiled people who were on this trip. They recorded their extravagant excursions and showcased their first-class seating on an Emirates flight to Dubai. But this wasn’t the first trip Tarte Cosmetics took influencers on, prior destinations include Hawaii and Bora Bora.
The controversy over this trip began when TikTok creators, like Jack McGuire, began to investigate the logistics behind the funding of this trip and how Tarte Cosmetics could possibly afford such a costly trip.
First, Mcguire investigated how much it would cost to fly first-class, with a plus one, to Dubai on an Emirates flight. He also researched the cost of stay at the Ritz-Carlton, where Tarte Cosmetics provided a room for their influencers.
“If you want to fly Emirates from New York City to Dubai, it’s going to cost around $22,000. Now, on top of that, all of them had a plus one, so that’s $44,000 just on the trip alone,” says McGuire (FoxNews).
Many influencers, like Lindsay Borow, felt that Tarte’s trip was tone-deaf. “Like, in this economy and everything, like this is just so unrelatable and if there’s one thing I feel like we’ve learned in influencer marketing this year, it’s like, you need to be a bit more relatable,” says Borrow (FoxNews). With the United States being on the verge of a recession, Tarte spending almost $200,000 on an influencer getaway was definitely not relatable.
Tarte Comestics founder and CEO, Maureen Kelly, spoke with Glossy and said that this was not the first time Tarte has sent away influencers on a getaway and that it certainly fit within their budget. She also noted that influencers were not paid to promote their products, and the reasoning for such luxury was because these influencers were giving up their time to go on a 14-hour plane ride, so they wanted to make the trip as smooth as possible for them.
Usually, influencer trips are not highly discussed. However, with the emergence of TikTok, Gen Z has prompted the conversation on the controversies surrounding this trip and made people more aware of these over-the-top trips.
However, in the end, Tarte still seems to be on the rise and even though this trip may be receiving critctism, it certainly succeeded in getting people to talk about Tarte Comestics and the influencers they brought on their trip.
Let us know your thoughts on the Tarte trip by tweeting us, @VALLEYmag, on Twitter!
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