Dolly Parton Talks Rhinestones, Lipstick Launch and Country Girls Who ‘Dream of Glamour’

Celebrity beauty has never been so bedazzled.

After launching fragrance in 2021, country music icon Dolly Parton is deepening her beauty entrepreneurial footprint with a makeup line and it’s everything you would expect.

The launch, beginning with Dolly Beauty’s Heaven’s Kiss lipstick collection available in four shades for sale on its website for $20 each, is in distinctly Dolly nomenclature and packaging, encompassed in sparkling rhinestones.

“I’ve always said I never leave a rhinestone unturned,” she told WWD in an exclusive interview from her hometown of Nashville. “I’ve wanted to be pretty my whole life like most girls, especially country girls that have a dream of glamour. I started creating my own little makeup things at home when I was just a kid, and I’ve been known for wearing makeup — usually too much — for years.”

The industry expects the line to be as resonant as the brand’s famed mastermind. Sources estimate the products to reach $20 million in retail sales for their first 12 months on the market.

Indeed, Parton’s appeal is universal, boasting 7 million followers on Instagram alone. Past and present collaborators range from Beyoncé on her most recent album, “Cowboy Carter,” to Parton’s sister, Rachel Parton George, with whom she coauthored a cookbook, due out in September. She thinks of her audience for makeup just as broadly.

“It’s important to create things that people that do wear makeup can enjoy,” Parton said. “You have to have a variety of colors.”

The four lipsticks share names like Jolene Red — “I like to name my products after songs,” she said. Then there’s Honey Plum, Rosebud and Birthday Suit, with the shades running the gamut from scarlet to neutral tones to a pale pink.

Her own experience as a consumer informed the genesis of the brand. “Every time I put on makeup, I’ll find certain things I want to put in the line. A great, thicker gloss, or a pearly gloss, or something that I’ve used and will find in an old drawer I remember loving,” Parton said. “Lord knows, nobody wears more makeup than me, so I know all the little things I want.”

That level of discernment made her an ideal collaborator, said Steve Mormoris, chief executive officer of Scent Beauty, Parton’s longtime licensee that launched her fragrance in 2021. “Dolly loves beauty inside and out. She loves beauty products, and she’s been very open and forthright that cosmetics is all a part of her repertoire of making herself feel and look beautiful,” Mormoris said.

“She’s embraced beauty in a big way, both unabashedly and proudly. We felt it was a natural fit for her to create a cosmetics line that reflected her spirit of imparting beauty to other consumers,” he continued.

The foray, years in the making, follows the successful launch of Parton’s fragrance business. “We’ve launched a successful fragrance line which was accessibly priced,” Mormoris said. “We have been working on [cosmetics] for two years, and working meticulously with Parton directly to capture all of those details, such as formula, pigment, load, ease of application, range and shade names, and packaging.”

She considered all of those factors, and wasn’t afraid to say when formulas weren’t up to spec. “I have to be involved in everything, and I sample and try things and say, ‘Oh, that’s not great, let’s go back and do this or that,’” Parton said. “Whether it being the packaging, where it says my name, I want them to think of me when they use it.”

Though Parton’s fragrances are sold in the mass market, Mormoris will decide the channel strategy for makeup following the direct-to-consumer launch. As reported, makeup remains challenged in the mass market, having declined 4 percent in the first half of the year, per Circana.

“We decided the best way to communicate the narrative of Parton’s love for beauty was through the website,” Mormoris said. “We will consider retail launches in the future, but right now, we want to build a strong business and consumer following through a website that effectively portrays Dolly’s world.”

The rest of the marketing rollout will follow suit, and the content pipeline is robust. “We have features on the website including the brand’s narrative, Dolly’s interacting with consumers and makeup artists, and showing Dolly in situ — her own studio, using the products, discussing what they mean to her, how she uses them and how she feels,” Mormoris said.

Dolly Beauty also has adjacent makeup categories across complexion, eye and lip in the pipeline, though Parton didn’t rule out other territories for expansion.

“I’ve always wanted my own wig line,” Parton mused. “But I always loved makeup, and when we did the fragrance, makeup seemed like the next step. Through the years, we’ll be doing different products with makeup, and eventually, we may do hair care or this or that. Anything that has to do with beauty — new dreams come every day.”