Fan Bingbing needs no introduction.

She was once one of China's top A-list stars.

But beyond being a star, Fan Bingbinghas another identity.

She is alsoacross-border e-commerce seller—founder of beauty brandFan Beauty Diary.

Many celebrities only pay lip service to cross-border business, but Fan Bingbing has truly committed to it.

In 2025, her brandFan Beauty Diaryachieved 1.8 billion yuan in omnichannel GMV, became a heavyweight brand in Southeast Asia's cross-border market, and made her a representative sample of celebrity brand overseas expansion.

In 2018, her cross-agency brand Fan Beauty Diary was born, with its first product a 2,399-yuan radio-frequency beauty device.

Although high-ticket beauty devices offer decent margins, low purchase frequency makes sustainable growth difficult. Fan quickly pivoted to skincare, which has lower barriers and stronger repurchase, with masks as the core breakthrough.

In 2019, the Sea Grape Hydrating Mask launched and sold over one million units in its first month.

That same year, Fan Bingbing sold 110,000 units of this mask in a livestream within minutes, generating over 10 million yuan in sales.

(Fan Bingbing's Sea Grape Hydrating Mask)

Thanks to this hitmask, the brand became a huge success.

In 2021, GMV was about 300 million yuan.

In 2022, it grew to 850 million yuan.

In 2023, it exceeded 1.1 billion yuan.

In 2024, annual sales reached 1.45 billion yuan.

In 2025, omnichannel sales further climbed to 1.8 billion.

Cumulative sales of the hero Sea Grape mask exceeded 100 million pieces; together with the Dragon Blood Repair Mask and VC Whitening Mask, it forms the sales foundation of Fan Beauty Diary.

This year, Fan Beauty Diary officially entered the base makeup category, launching the Holy Light Dream Red Carpet Cushion.

(Fan Beauty Diary cushion series)

The product took three years to develop, with thirty to forty sample rounds. Fan Bingbing, a regular on international red carpets, incorporated her years of hands-on experience with makeup longevity and finish into development.

The new product surpassed one million yuan in sales within just 4 hours of launch.

Within 7 days, sales exceeded 10 million yuan.

During Paris Fashion Week, she repeatedly shared this cushion on social media, posting vlogs and 10-hour wear tests to endorse the product through personal use.

The Southeast Asian cross-border market is Fan Beauty Diary's growth engine.

In 2024, the brand first entered Malaysia's two major local cross-border platforms, Lazada and Shopee, officially starting overseas expansion.

However, the overseas launch did not start smoothly, as initial sales of the hero mask were disappointing. Fan quickly adjusted, pairing online platforms with local KOL livestreams while expanding offline beauty retail channels.

In August 2025, Fan Beauty Diary entered 100 Watsons stores in Malaysia, with some selling out on the first day.

During that year's Double 11, the brand ranked TOP2 in skincare on Lazada Malaysia and TOP3 on Shopee.

In January 2026, the brand entered Singapore; in March, it landed in Thai beauty chain BEAUTRIUM, where Fan Bingbing appeared at the Bangkok store, collaborating with local artists and bloggers.

In May, she livestreamed on Shopee and Lazada, surpassing 2 million ringgit in sales in the first hour and nearly 2.5 million in two hours.

By mid-year, the brand's products were available in 67 BEAUTRIUM stores in Thailand.

Competition in Southeast Asia's beauty track is fierce, with many domestic brands pouring in. Relying solely on celebrity heat is hard to sustain.

Fan did not blindly expand all categories; instead, she first brought proven hit products like masks overseas and then gradually expanded into makeup.

Her team adapted promotion strategies to Southeast Asia's climate and aesthetics, first testing market response through online cross-border platforms and then entering offline stores. This "online first, offline deepen" approach is worth studying for many cross-border sellers.

Of course, this model also has shortcomings.

The brand is highly tied to the founder's personal IP, with traffic heavily dependent on Fan Bingbing's appearances. Its category mix is unbalanced, with sales long reliant on masks; whether new makeup and fragrance products can replicate the mask's hit status still needs time to prove.

Celebrity cross-border e-commerce failures are common.

Fan Beauty Diary's ability to reach 1.8 billion yuan in annual sales and successfully expand into Southeast Asia owes less to celebrity traffic itself than to continuous product refinement, supply chain building, and channel cultivation behind the traffic.

The lesson for all cross-border practitioners: traffic is only a short-term dividend; only by strengthening product quality, channels, and localized operations can one-time attention be converted into sustainable brand assets.

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Source: Cross-border Seller Hub