Birthright or Self-Made Billionaire? Kylie Jenner’s Controversial Path to Success

Makeup mogul and Keeping Up With The Kardashians (KUWTK) reality TV star Kylie Jenner is undoubtedly successful. However, when Forbes declared her as “the world’s youngest self-made billionaire” in 2019 for her net worth of $1 billion, the internet made an effort to point out the laughable flaw of this title, particularly “self-made.”

Since the early age of 10, Kylie has starred in her family’s hit reality television series, KUWTK, along with her older sisters, Kim Kardashian, Khloe Kardashian, Kourtney Kardashian, and Kendall Jenner, and her parents. The world watched her adolescent life unravel on the series, from birthday parties to family gatherings. While Kylie started off earning $100,000 per episode from the first season, the show’s mass popularity and positive ratings have allowed this number to increase throughout the years. Now, her KUWTK salary per episode is around $4.5 million, split evenly with her existing family members on the show. As a result, fans can argue that Jenner was born on a golden spoon, considering her privileged household and more-than-steady foundation to jumpstart her career.

On the other hand, there is some truth to the self-made factor. As a teenager, Kylie’s obsession with makeup prompted her to become the beauty mogul and businesswoman that she is today. Specifically, Kylie turned her insecurities about her small lips into a business idea, lip kits, which later became the core product sold from her brand Kylie Cosmetics. Furthermore, by maximizing her large social media following from KUWTK, her first lip kit collection in 2015—a duo set of liquid lipsticks and three shades of liquid liner—sold out in less than a minute. Later on, with the help of her mother Kris Jenner, Kylie set up an e-commerce site for Kylie Cosmetics. Today, the brand is worth $800 million, according to Forbes.

Some of the students at AISG expressed their opinions on this controversial topic. “I think that if she wasn’t famous because of her family and if Kylie was a regular makeup artist with a business, she wouldn’t be able to have that amount of success,” said senior Vikisha G. “To some extent, her success is derived from her family’s fame.”

On the other hand, junior Sharon C., voiced an opposing view. “I think Kylie Jenner deserves being called a self-made billionaire because it’s not only about family—she also did all the marketing and ideas by herself.”

It can be argued that Kylie Jenner’s foundation of her family’s reality TV show garnered her a unique fanbase, which would later propel the success of Kylie Cosmetics. The increased exposure, money, family influence, and celebrity status were also a plus. However, the initial business idea of the lip kits and identifying that market gap was Kylie’s own doing. As a CEO, it inevitably took Kylie’s own time and willpower to create each collection and ensure the success of her brand.

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