Beauty YouTuber Jeffree Star, Internet Infamy, and a Multi-Million-Dollar Makeup Heist

You’ve heard of diamond heists. You’ve heard of financial institution heists and artwork heists. You’ve watched George Clooney, and Matt Damon and Sandy Bullock do them all in the Ocean’s franchise. But did you may also heist splendor? As the U.S. Prestige make-up industry gradually grows—aided and abetted by way of, or perhaps due to, the social channels devoted to spreading the good makeup word—so does the number of counterfeits and stolen goods. The F.B.I. Credits smooth get entry to customers thru the Internet. Follow any police blotter, and also, you’ll find masses of evidence of saving thievery, and the National Retail Federation reviews a soar in shipment robbery.

This week, the net splendor community became touched through one of these crimes, while YouTuber Jeffree Star claimed Tuesday that his $2.5 million in the hollow following a break-in at one among his make-up warehouses.
This particular heist got the TMZ remedy due to its sufferer’s prominence on YouTube. In a galaxy, ways, a long way away called “2006,” Star changed into a pop musician and the most-accompanied man or woman on Myspace. More recently, he’s grown to be acknowledged for his nicely-trafficked YouTube beauty channel.

Most lately, even though he’s become reviled for racist remarks, he revamped a decade in the past, which recirculated in the online beauty network final yr. (He apologized in a 15-minute video titled “RACISM.” It has over 4.6 million perspectives.) The feedback, and the blowback in opposition to them, sooner or later led to something called “Dramageddon,” which is a tale so niche and twisted, you must study or hear approximately it elsewhere. A caution: you may be 12 years old right now, but you’ll be 52 with a loan and an unshakable cigarette addiction with the aid of the end of it.

Anyway, Star said he was robbed. He became burgled. His items were given got. He introduced the breach in a video published to YouTube after fans noticed what appeared to be stolen Star-branded cosmetics for sale on Facebook. Ever the multi-platform maestro, he first teased the video on his very own Twitter account: Star believes it turned into an “inside job” and that a former warehouse worker had tipped off the perpetrators. Per the video, the “team” of thieves entered through the roof and stole $2.5 million worth of Star’s products—maximum notably, his unreleased Magic Star concealer. ”This is the biggest robbery I actually have ever skilled in my whole career,” he stated. “This is the biggest hit as a logo. I am nevertheless taken aback about the complete thing.” The video had well over 8 million views at the time of publication.