For those of us who aren’t part of the beauty YouTube community, the names James Charles and Tati Westbrook meant nothing until this weekend, when they were everywhere.
Instagram? Check. Twitter? Check. Mainstream media? Check.
Tati Westbrook and James Charles were inescapable.
Tati Westbrook discusses why she ended her friendship with James Charles. Post continues below video.
A quick recap: On Friday, Tati published a 43-minute video that has attracted almost 30 million views in the days since.
In the down-the-barrel video, titled “Bye Sister”, Tati Westbrook unleashes on James Charles and explains all the reasons she has ended her friendship with her fellow YouTuber. She starts with the fact Charles publicly endorsed a vitamin company, Sleep Vitamins by SugarBearHair, which is a direct competitor of her own beauty brand, Halo Beauty.
(You can get the full run-down on James Charles here, by the way).
The Quicky deep dives on why we hate follow people on social media. Post continues after audio.
People who previously did not care about makeup, YouTube and especially ‘beauty YouTube’ were suddenly 100 per cent invested in this drama and figuring out who Tati Westbrook was and why she would turn on James Charles after years of mentoring and friendship. We didn’t know why we cared, but we did, so much.
Tati’s video has led James to lose two million followers – across YouTube and Instagram – in a matter of days, whereas Tati has gained triple that in YouTube subscribers, pushing her count to nearly nine million.
Who is Tati Westbrook?
Tati grew up in Seattle Washington and worked as an image consultant – someone who aims to improve the image of a client personally or professionally through appearance, behaviour and communication – and a makeup artist in Los Angeles before beginning her YouTube channel GlamLifeGuru in 2010.
