Meet Jackie Aina, the Nigerian-American soldier who built a multimillion-dollar beauty empire by refusing to let the industry ignore dark skin
Billionaires Africa | 07.04.2026 19:20
In 2009, Jackie Aina was a military reservist living in Hawaii, unhappily married, bored, and watching other people post makeup videos on YouTube. She had dropped out of California State University San Bernardino after two years of pre-med study to join the Army Reserve. She was 21. She had, as she put it later, known things she liked but had not yet discovered that the things she liked could also make her money. She picked up a camera and started filming herself doing makeup.
