Since September 2023, the launch of TikTok Shop has seen exponential growth for up-and-coming and established brands to get their companies in front of consumers like never before.
The roll-out of TikTok Shop Live has also engaged consumers in a new way — the interactive ability for brands to connect with their consumers one-on-one has already been a tried and true method in the Chinese e-commerce market. Even Nicki Minaj got in on the action; the rapper hosted a two-hour livestream on Nov. 24, 2024, for her press-on nails brand Pink Friday Nails which quickly became the highest-viewed TikTok Shop Live ever, garnering more than 3.6 million views.
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Throughout 2024 and especially during the holiday season, TikTok Shop ramped up its sales and partnerships with major brands to make its social e-commerce channel one of the most influential platforms — reporting more than $100 million in sales for its Black Friday day sales.
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TikTok Shop also reported a 165 percent increase in shoppers year-over-year this past holiday season. Consumers use the platform to discover new products and find deals across the categories of fashion, beauty, sports, electronics, home goods and more. The social media platform reported 660,000 hours of TikTok Live sessions viewed, hosted by both brands and content creators for the Black Friday and Cyber Monday (BFCM) sales campaign period (Nov. 13 to Dec. 2).
The most notable categories for the 2024 holiday season were home, fashion and beauty — with top-sellers including Canvas Beauty, Tarte Cosmetics and Miniso. Stormi Steele, founder of Canvas Beauty and content creator, broke a record for the fastest million hit in TikTok Shop Live history by racking in $1 million in sales in two hours.
Despite all the wins that came from 2024 with its double-down efforts on social e-commerce, TikTok is facing some serious legal hurdles to ensure the continued user base of more than 170 million Americans.
President Biden signed a bipartisan law in April 2024 that would require the platform’s Chinese parent company ByteDance to sell the social media app or be forced to shutter its operations in the U.S. by Jan. 19. While many political experts see the move as a U.S. effort to be tough on China, President-elect Donald Trump asked the Supreme Court to delay its implementation of the upcoming law and reportedly met with TikTok’s chief executive officer Shou Chew last month. This is a notable change from 2020 when Trump issued a presidential executive order for ByteDance to divest from TikTok in the U.S. Meanwhile, the Justice Department has asked the Supreme Court to reject Trump’s plea.
After exhausting a slew of legal options, TikTok filed an emergency injunction on Dec. 16; the Supreme Court will hear closing arguments Friday to decide its fate. TikTok’s statement asked for the Supreme Court to “uphold Americans’ right to free speech” and “apply the most rigorous scrutiny to speech bans and conclude that it violates the First Amendment.”
TikTok went on to state that a ban on the social platform would result in “massive and unprecedented censorship” with “estimates show[ing] that small businesses on TikTok would lose more than $1 billion in revenue” and “creators would suffer almost $300 million in lost earnings in just one month unless the ban is halted.”
Project Liberty, founded by Frank McCourt, announced a formal offer on Thursday to acquire the TikTok U.S. called “The People’s Bid for TikTok.” Billionaire investor Kevin O’Leary was recently added to the project as a partner and advocate, although reports say the sale is unlikely as ByteDance has stated on multiple occasions that TikTok is not for sale. Unless the Supreme Court makes a decision that results in striking down the law or delays the law for the forced sale of the Chinese-owned social media platform, a TikTok shutdown in the U.S. is on its way.
Notably, social media content creators seem to already be preparing for the worst, by diversifying their video presence on other social media platforms and turning to Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.
Here, WWD sat down with major TikTok Shop brands BossUp Cosmetics, HeyDude and Comfrt to take a retrospective look at how the platform has shaped their business, their plans for 2025 and what the potential TikTok ban means for their business.
BossUp Cosmetics
Aliyah Arnold, founder of BossUp Cosmetics, started the beauty brand in 2018 when she was just 14 years old. The indie brand has gone on to accumulate more than 2 million followers on TikTok and quickly sells out.
Arnold said that using TikTok Shop has been a “game-changer” for her company. The direct access to an engaged audience is unmatched — unlike traditional e-commerce platforms, Arnold can engage with her customers in real time with livestreams and shoppable videos.
“Now customers can see a product, engage with me in real-time and purchase instantly without leaving the app,” Arnold told WWD. “This convenience has massively increased our conversion rates and introduced us to an audience we might not have reached otherwise.”
During the holidays, Arnold hosted a 12-hour holiday event with special giveaways and selling products normally priced ranging from $10 to $65 for just $1. Engaging with influencers or bilingual hosts to create “engaging and authentic content” with her products is the key to Arnold’s products going viral and spreading brand awareness to millions of TikTok users.
BFCM was Arnold’s biggest sales period, with the beauty brand creating discounted bundles, selling exclusive “Bossmas” collections, tapping into the latest TikTok trends and engaging in strategic livestreams to convert viewers into customers — making it a milestone for the brand.
This year, Arnold said that BossUp Cosmetics goals are to expand its product line and increase its international sales into 2025 while maintaining its “direct, personal connection with our audience.”
As for the upcoming TikTok ban? She doesn’t foresee the social media platform going anywhere. “It’s such a massive platform that’s become a central part of how people connect, shop and share ideas,” said Arnold. “My family and I all depend on this business and TikTok has been a key part of our success. If it were to happen, it would impact not just the brand, but the livelihood of everyone who’s poured their heart into making BossUp Cosmetics what it is today. But for now, I’m confident TikTok is here to stay and I’m planning for the future with that belief.”
HeyDude
In 2008, Italian footwear experts Alessandro Rosano and Dario Kaute started the lightweight footwear brand HeyDude. The company sold to Crocs in 2021 for $2.5 billion, with the footwear brand collaborating with the likes of Warner Bros. and NASCAR and naming actress Sydney Sweeney its global ambassador in 2024.
Paul Nugent, chief marketing officer of HeyDude, said that while the company isn’t a small or even medium-sized business, the company has still seen “tremendous value” in using TikTok Shop. Nugent points out the young and women culture creating community on the social media platform that has made it a major strategic focus for the brand.
With more than 700,000 followers, HeyDude’s TikTok following surpasses its following on Instagram, making it a “unique opportunity” for the brand to reach a customer base where they are shopping. HeyDude’s posts featuring Sweeney and actor Chase Stokes are the biggest for the brand, with 3 million and 4 million views respectively. Nugent said that the footwear company also has been a top “Global Key Account” on TikTok during launch days during the third quarter of 2024.
Nugent said the company has re-imagined their social strategy by taking risks and connecting its consumer base, by engaging with TikTok Shop as part of its strategy to drive brand awareness of HeyDude with its core audience.
“Driving youth female culture and creating community is a strategic area of focus for us leading into 2025,” explained Nugent. “We know that female youth culture is a key driver of influence, brand connectivity, and a catalyst to build community. Continuing to leverage key digital channels and amplification tools — like TikTok — to bring in new, younger consumers and authentically connect with micro-communities will help us achieve that goal. Our social- and digital-first marketing strategy has allowed us to remain nimble and meet our consumers where they are shopping.”
Amid news of the TikTok ban, HeyDude has a strategy in place if the ban comes to fruition. And despite TikTok Shop being an opportunity for the brand to grow, Nugent noted that the platform is just one of many sales channels the company is strategically utilizing — he went on to emphasize that community is a core brand ethos they won’t lose, regardless of the Supreme Court’s decision with TikTok.
Comfrt
Comfrt is an apparel company founded in 2022 by Hudson Leogrande, as a way to support mental health through comfortable clothing. The brand is oversized and uses weighted material that is meant to help with stress and anxiety. Many of Comfrt’s creator videos have gone viral, with individual videos racking up views on TikTok of more than 33 million, nearly 30 million, 29 million and more.
The company launched Comfrt in the U.S. market in conjunction with its launch of TikTok Shop (the feature was in testing mode in November 2022), making it an integral part of its brand strategy. Leogrande said that the brand has leveraged TikTok’s features to help drive organic growth through user-generated content (UGC) and accelerated its growth through its paid strategy.
“We focus on generating TikTok-first content that embraces trends, storytelling and builds relationships with creators who are relatable and align with our brand values,” explained Leogrande. “The virality of the Comfrt brand has been a powerful driver of engagement and sales on TikTok and our success is largely down to our commitment to building the most powerful content creator program in the world.”
Notably, learning the TikTok algorithm has been an essential part of Comfrt’s success — with the brand leaning into the production of creator content and allowing the videos to gain organic traction. Comfrt’s average selling price (ASP) is $43; the brand heavily leans into having exclusive pricing on TikTok while featuring various promotions and flash sales.
Leogrande attributes the company’s success on TikTok Shop to the brand’s “high-quality products with a unique design” alongside its accessible price point making it attractive to the core TikTok audience. Moreover, the company’s usage of TikTok Live to launch new products and designs has made the live shopping channel account for 12 percent of Comfrt’s total gross merchandise value (GMV).
For this year’s BFCM, Comfrt has major sales performance in the apparel and fashion category, with more than 10 times the sales year-over-year from TikTok and saw a 40 percent increase of total GMV during November, with the brand reporting to be on track to hit $175 million. And for this year, the brand is looking to expand its product range including its Comfrt Kids line, Dreamer slightly weighted blanket and its pets’ collection, Paws.
While Leogrande notes the importance of TikTok in the U.S. market, he said that Comfrt has made provisions for “any macro changes in the market,” noting the brand’s ability to continue to grow given its “very loyal and engaged customer base with a high customer return rate.”