Bubble is teaming up with Juice Press as it enters the lip care category
Gen Z-focused skin care brand Bubble is joining forces with Juice Press as it jumps into the lip care category for the first time.
For the last few months, Bubble and Juice Press have collaborated in the kitchen to develop a secret berry-flavored juice that complements Bubble’s new berry-flavored lip balm. To promote the two products, from Sept. 12 to Oct. 1, the first 50 people who order the drink at 35 select Juice Press locations will receive a free Bubble Tell All Juicy Secret Lip Balm. Juice Press is also debuting Bubble-branded drink sleeves in more than 60 Juice Press stores throughout the U.S.
Bubble’s sales have skyrocketed since the brand debuted in 2020. Its products — which include masks and moisturizers — are available in around 13,000 stores globally, including CVS, Ulta, Boots and Walmart locations. Bubble’s revenue is up 250% year over year, and the brand says it’s behind one in every four moisturizers sold at CVS. Meanwhile, Juice Press, founded in 2010, sells acai bowls, smoothies and juices at some 80 stores in New York and New Jersey, including more than 25 Equinox gyms. Juice Press also ships nationwide via its website.
Bubble has dabbled in partnerships before. In June, it teamed up with Disney and Pixar to launch an “Inside Out 2”-themed collection of cleansers, moisturizers and serums. In that case, Bubble printed images of the “Inside Out 2” characters on its packaging. But Bubble’s partnership with Juice Press is the first time Bubble has worked with another company to “make the connection between our products,” Bubble founder Shai Eisenman told Modern Retail. It’s also Bubble’s first time working with a food or beverage brand.
Bubble developed its lip balm first, then spoke with Juice Press about creating a corresponding drink. The two companies have similar audiences; Juice Press, like Bubble, is popular among wellness-minded consumers, posts regularly on social media and markets itself to young people, including college students. Juice Press also has a location roughly two minutes from Bubble’s office in New York City and is one of Eisenman’s go-to beverage destinations.
Juice Press has worked with personal care brands multiple times. In August 2023, it rolled out two smoothies, one vanilla and one cherry, purportedly inspired by Dove’s Exfoliating Body Scrubs. In May 2024, Juice Press collaborated with the hair growth brand Nutrafol on a Hair Health Hero smoothie with kale, passionfruit and pea sprout extract.
CPG collaborations have become popular in 2024, but the fact that Bubble’s lip balm and Juice Press’s drink are both berry is key, said Sarah Engel, president of the digital media company January Digital. “Gen Z, Gen Alpha, that audience is so aware, and they are really smart consumers,” she told Modern Retail. “They grew up understanding why brands are doing what they’re doing, and they expect a level of authenticity. To me, the biggest piece of this that brings authenticity is that the flavor tastes the same.”
The new lip balm is Bubble’s first flavored product, although, like others in the portfolio, it is fragrance-free. Bubble picked juicy berry as the winning flavor after testing out 20 different options with its 40,000-strong network of ambassadors — a group that had a waiting list of 41,000 people last year. Bubble tests all of its products with 50 to 100 people, and if an item doesn’t have a 90% acceptance rate, Bubble will go back and reformulate it.
Eisenman said it was important for Bubble to get the lip balm flavor right because lip balm (like eye cream) has been one of the brand’s most-requested products. Eisenman estimates that 10,000 users have commented on Bubble’s TikToks asking for lip balm, and Bubble has spent the last two and a half years perfecting the product before bringing it to market.
“Flavor is a very personal thing,” Eisenman said. “We’ve experimented with things that are more fun and on the younger side, and we’ve experimented with things that are more sophisticated. Our goal in the future is to be able to cater to every personal taste. But we’re super excited to launch with something that our community absolutely loved.”
Bubble’s final lip balm — now available at Ulta and Walmart — uses the ingredients chicory root extract, sunflower seed wax and moringa oil. It is shaped like a capsule rather than a tube or round tin — and also doubles as a keychain. Customers can personalize the product by adding charms to it, including one shaped like a star and another modeled off of Bubble’s best-selling Slam Dunk moisturizer. Each lip balm also comes with a “juicy secret” — a small piece of paper with an anonymous confession by Bubble community members. For instance, one says, “I had my first kiss. I regret it.”
Eisenman said that the company has more partnerships in the pipeline, although she declined to provide further details. “We have a lot of things that we’re going to be announcing together with our community, which is our biggest driver for everything we do,” she said.