Revolution Beauty names co-founder Tom Allsworth as CEO
This underlines a commitment to remain independent and to revitalise the brand through founder-led management and a leaner business structure to restore profitability and growth potential in a challenging market environment.
USA – Revolution Beauty has brought back its co-founder, Tom Allsworth, as its new CEO.
Tom Allsworth’s return marks a key leadership shift as he steps into the CEO role to lead the brand’s turnaround.
Fellow co-founder Adam Minto is also returning, albeit in a consultancy role, to assist with the reset.
Concurrently, the company has ended its formal sale process to refocus on growth and recovery.
The beauty group, which has experienced a challenging period marked by accounting issues and plummeting sales, decided to abandon plans to sell the company after failing to receive any suitable acquisition offers since launching a sales process earlier in the year.
Instead, the company is embarking on a fresh fundraising effort to raise around £15 million(USD 20.34 million) in equity aimed at repaying debt and supporting a strategic reset.
This leadership reinstatement follows a period where the company reported a 25.5% drop in sales year-on-year, with revenues falling to approximately £142.6 million (USD 192.68 million) and a pre-tax loss of £16.8 million (USD 22.7 million), compared to profits the year before.
The chairman, Iain McDonald, remarked that the company had “lost its way” but expressed confidence that returning the founders who initially scaled the brand provides a clear path back to growth and long-term value creation.
The new strategy under Allsworth’s leadership aims to revive Revolution Beauty by rebalancing the business model, focusing on fast, trend-driven innovation combined with a product-led approach, while streamlining operations and reducing costs.
This includes planned job cuts to free up around £7.5 million(USD 10.13 million) in staff expenses by 2027.
Meanwhile, Revolution Beauty recently rejected a takeover bid from the UK-based private equity firm True, a move that sets the stage for the cosmetics company to pursue a capital raise from its existing shareholders.
The company initiated a formal sale process in May 2025 and, by June, had attracted interest from multiple parties.
However, True was the only group to submit a formal offer.
Sources familiar with the situation indicated that True’s bid was considered to undervalue Revolution Beauty, which is listed on the London Stock Exchange and sells its beauty and haircare products through major retailers like Boots and Superdrug.
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