年销25亿的彩妆黑马AKF：起于流量 困于内斗

This article chronicles the full rise and fall of AKF, a once-burgeoning Chinese color cosmetics star that hit 2.5 billion yuan in annual sales. Key takeaways are as follows:

1. Development trajectory: Founded in 2018, AKF grew from zero to 2.5 billion yuan in annual revenue in just five years. It built its business rapidly through ultra-affordable pricing and aggressive Douyin (TikTok China) traffic operations, reaching the top ranks of Douyin's color cosmetics sales charts at its peak.

2. Current chaos: Internal infighting among AKF's founding team sparked a years-long trademark dispute that has dragged on for two years. Today, two different "official AKF" stores operate simultaneously on Chinese e-commerce platforms, selling nearly identical products while both claiming to be the legitimate brand, leaving ordinary consumers unable to tell them apart. A final court ruling has granted exclusive rights to the core AKF trademark to original operator Qingdao Ailefu, but the market confusion remains unresolved even after the legal battle ended.

3. Latest performance: AKF fell out of the top 10 ranking for the color cosmetics and fragrance category on Douyin during the 2024 618 shopping festival, and its annual GMV target has been cut in half from 2.5 billion yuan to 1.35 billion yuan, marking a sharp slowdown in growth.

The boom-to-bust case of AKF offers valuable lessons and warnings for color cosmetics brands. Key insights are as follows:

1. Actionable takeaways from its success: AKF successfully carved out market share by positioning itself as an ultra-cost-effective option for price-sensitive consumers, and rapidly expanded its product line by capitalizing on the post-pandemic trend of rising consumer focus on eye makeup. It secured quality credibility by partnering with top international OEMs including Cosmax, and used a structure of holding trademark rights in South Korea while completing product filing in China to keep costs low – retaining the "K-beauty appeal" while avoiding import tariffs. It also invested heavily in refined Douyin traffic operations, leveraging an in-house content team plus creator co-creation to scale sales rapidly.

2. Critical warnings for other brands: Poorly designed brand ownership structure created hidden risks, and the offshore-trademark-domestic-operation model AKF used is prone to ownership disputes. Shareholder infighting severely erodes consumer trust and derails brand growth. In addition, long-term neglect of in-house R&D leaves products without unique selling points, making it easy for competitors to poach market share with identical products from the same OEM at lower prices. Finally, a growth strategy that relies purely on low pricing plus paid traffic is extremely vulnerable to stalling once ad costs rise and competitors flood into the market.

The AKF case offers key opportunity alerts and risk warnings for color cosmetics sellers. Key insights are as follows:

1. Untapped market opportunities: There is still significant room for growth in the affordable color cosmetics segment. A strategy of ultra-cost-effective positioning paired with aggressive Douyin traffic scaling can deliver large-volume sales from scratch in a short time. Partnering with leading OEMs to build quality credibility also makes it much easier to win consumer trust.

2. Core risk warnings: Trademark ownership is the foundation of any brand. If you use the offshore-trademark-domestic-operation model, you must put clear compliance agreements in place in advance to avoid trademark disputes triggered by founding team infighting – which not only erodes brand trust, but can also lead to the entire brand changing hands unexpectedly.

3. Actionable takeaways: When a brand faces potential trademark risks, you can proactively launch new brands and build a multi-brand portfolio to hedge against risk. This strategy, which original AKF operator Shandong Feihua has already adopted, is a useful reference. Given rising Douyin traffic costs and cutthroat competition in the low-price segment, the traditional low-price-plus-paid-traffic playbook needs to be updated promptly to avoid being surrounded by competitors.

AKF's growth trajectory and downfall offer major business opportunities and development insights for color cosmetics manufacturers. Key takeaways are as follows:

1. Shifting product demand: Emerging affordable color cosmetics brands now place heavy weight on quality credibility, and partnering with a leading international OEM is a core way for these brands to quickly win consumer trust. Top manufacturers can lean into the "same production as luxury beauty brands" selling point to attract more emerging brand clients and expand their business footprint.

2. New business opportunities: Most emerging color cosmetics brands prioritize traffic acquisition over R&D in their early stages, and only add in-house R&D capacity later on. A growing number of brands are now building joint R&D labs with their manufacturers. Leading factories can proactively open up joint R&D cooperation to lock in more brand clients and unlock new revenue streams.

3. Insights for digital e-commerce: Brands generally have strong incentives to control costs, and many use the offshore-trademark-domestic-production filing model to cut tariffs. Manufacturers can add supporting services for compliance and product filing to help brands lower costs and boost their own competitiveness. They can also help brands develop differentiated products to build unique selling points, which increases their own value as a partner.

AKF's growth and subsequent crisis reveal new industry trends and new business opportunities for beauty service providers. Key insights are as follows:

1. New industry trends: The early emerging color cosmetics playbook of ultra-affordable pricing plus Douyin traffic scaling has hit a growth ceiling. Rising traffic costs and intensifying competition in the low-price segment have exposed a wide range of problems at many fast-growing brands, which are now in need of external professional support to solve these issues.

2. Core client pain points: Most rapidly scaled emerging brands have non-compliant trademark ownership structures, especially those using the offshore-trademark-domestic-operation model, which is highly prone to ownership disputes. Additionally, most of these brands prioritize traffic over R&D, leaving them without differentiated core competitiveness, and their traffic operation efficiency continues to drop as ad costs rise.

3. New service opportunities: Service providers can develop targeted trademark compliance consulting services to help emerging brands sort out ownership rights and完善 contract terms in advance to avoid infighting and ownership risks. They can also connect brands with R&D resources to help them build out R&D systems and develop differentiated products. They can also optimize traffic operation strategies to help brands improve ROI and sustain growth amid rising ad costs.

AKF's trademark dispute offers important insights for e-commerce platforms' operations management and merchant sourcing strategies. Key takeaways are as follows:

1. Core existing problems: Trademark ownership disputes can lead to multiple "official" stores for the same brand operating simultaneously on a platform, confusing consumers. This not only harms the brand, but also erodes consumer trust in the platform and damages the platform's reputation.

2. Optimization for operations management: Platforms need to improve their brand onboarding review mechanisms, strengthen checks on trademark ownership and authorization documents, and clarify the validity and ownership of trademark rights to prevent brands with hidden ownership risks from entering the platform. When a brand does face a trademark dispute, platforms should promptly publicly disclose the final court ruling to help consumers identify legitimate channels, reduce consumer confusion, and minimize negative impacts on the platform.

3. Insights for merchant sourcing: Affordable color cosmetics still enjoy huge consumer demand and remain an important category growth driver for platforms. Platforms can proactively source high-cost-performance emerging color cosmetics brands with strong R&D capacity and clear trademark ownership, while screening for trademark ownership risks during the onboarding stage to reduce the chance of operational chaos down the line.

The AKF case is a typical sample for studying the development of China's emerging color cosmetics industry, with the following core research value:

1. New problems in the industry's old development model: Early cross-border emerging color cosmetics brands widely adopted the model of trademark ownership held by an offshore entity with operations handled by a domestic entity. This model reduced compliance and approval costs for foreign-affiliated brands and helped them launch quickly in the early stage of the industry, but it carries clear structural flaws. When founding teams split rights across different entities, infighting and trademark disputes are highly likely, and can deliver a devastating blow to the brand. This shows that the old model is no longer suited to the industry's current development needs.

2. Flaws in the traffic-driven brand business model: AKF represents a common category of emerging brands that prioritize traffic and marketing over R&D. These brands scale quickly through low pricing plus paid traffic, but without long-term R&D investment, their products lack unique, irreplaceable advantages, making them easy for competitors to copy and displace. They also rely excessively on traffic platforms, so growth stalls immediately once traffic costs rise, making it extremely difficult to build sustainable long-term brand moats.

3. Implications for future industry development: For emerging brands to achieve long-term growth, they must complete compliance planning in advance, prioritize R&D investment to build differentiated competitiveness, and proactively build multi-brand portfolios to hedge against potential risks when risks emerge. All these lessons are worthy of in-depth research.