Forthcoming Body Coverage Brand Deeper Recognizes That Black Girls Self-Tan, Too

In summer 2022, the apparently novel idea that Black girls self-tan went viral. Byrdie covered the trend, a Teen Vogue writer put products to the test, and people flocked to TikTok to share their experiences and takes. The #blackgirltan and #blackgirlstan hashtags have drawn over 18 million views on the platform, respectively.

Cousins Chioma Ndubuisi and Chineme Elobuike were influenced by the discourse, although they didn’t know about each others’ interest in it at the time. “I lived in New York and Chioma lived in DC, so I remember buying self-tanner and coming to visit her and I realized she bought it as well,” says Elobuike. “We both were like, ‘Wow, that’s interesting that we both bought this to use it for the same reason.’”

The reason was to even out their skin tone. Black women often use self-tanner for that purpose in addition to enhancing their skin’s glow. But Ndubuisi and Elobuike weren’t satisfied with the self-tanners they purchased. “It wasn’t going as deep, and it wasn’t working as well as we anticipated,” says Elobuike. “So, we said, ‘Let’s put this into our own hands and create something that reimagines what this experience looks like for us.’”

Deeper, a new brand set for release later this year, is that reimagining. Ndubuisi and Elobuike describe it as a body coverage brand that’s good for skin and all of its quirks. Those quirks include stretch marks, hyperpigmentation and childhood scars that never seem to go away.

“We’re focused on not exacerbating existing skin conditions and not promising false hope in terms of these things will resolve once you use this product because we know the depth of these skin conditions will take a very long time to heal and, in most cases, will often not go away,” says Ndubuisi, who shares she’s had a burn on her back since the second grade. “We see Deeper as a catalyst for living life unfazed.”

Deeper’s debut product is Overlay, a self-tanning mousse product slated to retail for $34. An application mitt will also be available for a bundle purchase of $55. Overlay comes in one buildable shade, and among its ingredients are guava extract, hyaluronic acid, vanilla and banana flower and green tea. More products promising a range of coverage, from light to medium, are in the plans. Body cover sticks are in the product pipeline.

Ndubuisi and Elobuike believe the body coverage category is due for modernization for younger generations. “When we think about leaders in the body coverage area like Westmore Beauty or Dermablend, those are founded in 1917 and 1981,” says Elobuike. “It’s an over 100-year-plus industry where we haven’t seen anybody come in and make anything new for gen Z or millennials exclusively.”

Ndubuisi and Elobuike are gen Zers, and Deeper is targeting the diverse members of the generation. Ndubuisi mentions that, in the United States, 52% of gen z and 44% of millennials are BIPOC and another 75% of people with skin of color experience a pigmentary condition some time in their lives.

Deeper has been on a roll with initiatives to draw consumers prior to its launch. It introduced a quiz last year asking people for information on their body coverage preferences, products they’d be inclined to buy and what would impact their purchasing behavior. From there, Ndubuisi and Elobuike created a beta test group on the platform Geneva that they later moved to Instagram. The curated group currently contains about 100 people.

The pair also released a trivia game called Can We Tan at the music festival Broccoli City Festival in Washington, D.C., last year and during the trade show Project Beauty Expo. This month, its release went wide to the public. The true or false game poises a series of questions such as does self-tanner only work on light and fair skin tones, and does self-tanner help to camouflage the appearance of hyperpigmentation, stretch marks and strawberry legs? It’s garnered roughly 400 plays and has been a catalyst for growing Deeper’s waiting list.

Accessibility is a big focus for Deeper. In the past, its target audience may have had to go out of their way to find body coverage products suiting them or could only find them in the back of stores. Deeper will kick off in direct-to-consumer distribution and on Amazon, but Ndubuisi and Elobuike are driven to place its products on retail shelves in the future.

Deeper hopes to raise $1 million in the second quarter to assist with scaling its distribution and expanding its merchandise collection. Ndubuisi and Elobuike have racked up $40,000 so far from pitch competitions to support the brand’s launch.

After conquering the American market, they have ambitions to spread Deeper globally. Elobuike says, “80% of the world is skin of color, so we know a lot of major markets could really benefit from this product because we really have a new approach to pigmentary disorders and conditions.”