TikTok’s latest makeup hack is to not wear makeup — not in the traditional sense, at least. Over the past month, content creators far and wide have been singing the praises of the “Demi Method,” a makeup technique that will give you flawless, even-toned skin, without foundation or concealer.
Instead, the Demi Method revolves around brightening dark areas of the face, like the under-eyes, while darkening immediately adjacent areas that catch the light. The general idea: If you add color to areas that are light, the dark points won’t stand out as much (and vice versa).
Color theory determines how, exactly, you should go about brightening or darkening these areas. For example: If your under-eyes have a blue tinge, you’d apply orange — the opposite of blue on the color wheel — to neutralize that darkness.
Essentially, the Demi Method is a zhuzhed-up form of color correction, a technique that makeup artists have used for decades. Both rely on color theory to minimize discoloration: The redness of an inflamed pimple can be combated with a wash of its opposite shade, green; a purple-ish vein can be hidden using complementary yellow.
“[The Demi Method] is very closely related, if not exactly the same as, color correcting,” says Lindsay Kastuk, a makeup artist based in New York. “[Color correcting] is especially useful when you don’t want to wear multiple layers of product — it addresses parts of versus the entire face to create a ‘blank canvas.’” Alex Levy, a makeup artist who works with the likes of Hari Nef and Willie Norris, agrees that the Demi Method draws from tricks that most pros, and even makeup novices, are already familiar with. “It definitely touches on a lot of techniques that are incorporated in typical runway and ‘fashion’ makeup,” he says.
You might be wondering: If it looks and sounds like color correcting, why is it called the Demi Method? And why is it all over TikTok right now? After all, there are plenty of makeup brands, like Charlotte Tilbury and Fenty Beauty, that already offer color correcting sticks and compacts — the category isn’t anything novel.
Like most rebrands, the Demi Method is a sales vehicle. Take a closer look at most of the people promoting the technique and you’ll notice they’re affiliated with Seint, a makeup brand founded by Cara Brook in 2013. In fact, the term “Demi Method” appears to have been created by the brand, which registered a trademark for “Demi Colour” in 2021. Search “Demi Method Makeup” on TikTok, and you’ll notice something else: The women most aggressively pushing the technique, posting about it not once, but multiple times, demonstrate it with one particular product: Seint’s “Demi Correctors,” pigments in a variety of skin-brightening and darkening shades that can be purchased “à la carte'' and incorporated into a custom palette.
A quick scan of their profiles reveals that these Demi Method crusaders are members of Seint’s “Artist Program,” in which they earn commissions by selling Demi Correctors, along with the rest of the brand’s products. They can also recruit their own team of sellers to earn extra bonuses. Sound familiar? Seint appears to operate on a multilevel marketing model, the same strategy employed by Amway and LuLaRoe. It works like this: You buy a brand’s product, sell it, and then recruit other people to be your sellers. The more they sell, the more you make — at least in theory.
According to Robert FitzPatrick, author of Ponzinomics: The Untold Story of Multi-Level Marketing, MLMs are just an “endless chain” of sellers, who in turn can build their own respective “downlines” (and so on). “No other sales organization on earth would do such a thing,” Fitzpatrick says. If you have a contract to sell a product, why would you go and recruit other people to go sell the same product in your area? They would be your competitors.”
While MLMs are often conflated with pyramid schemes, the former isn’t technically illegal — only the latter is forbidden under most state laws. According to the Federal Trade Commission, pyramid schemes put little or no emphasis on actually selling product — and sometimes, product isn’t involved at all. Instead, pyramid schemes pay based on how many people you can recruit. On the other hand, MLMs don’t require you to recruit (though often, there are financial incentives to). Both models build a pyramid-shaped chain of command that translates into who is actually making money: only the tiny, tippy top. This means the vast majority of MLM sellers, who are considered independent contractors rather than employees, are destined to bust.
To be clear, what Seint is doing is legal, and the people promoting the Demi Method on TikTok could genuinely believe it’s a revolutionary technique. The catch is, most of them stand to profit from sales of Seint’s products. That’s what gives me pause: the brand appears to have created the Demi Method (or at least repackaged the principles of color theory) for the purpose of selling glorified color correctors.
Emily Lynn Paulson, the author of Hey, Hun: Sales, Sisterhood, Supremacy, and the Other Lies Behind Multilevel Marketing, points out the irony in the fact that the Demi Method, and by extension Seint, is gaining traction on TikTok. “MLMs aren't allowed to sell on TikTok,” she says, referencing a 2020 update to the platform’s community guidelines. “As long as the rep isn’t phrasing it in a way that isn't, ‘Here’s my MLM site, go buy for me now,’ or using that language, it seems to get skirted around.”
If you’re interested in giving the Demi Method a go, you don’t necessarily have to purchase from Seint — there are plenty of color correctors on the market that you can use to achieve the same “no makeup-makeup” effect. Makeup artist Dara Levitan, whose TikTok boasts over 8 million views, recommends Make Up For Ever’s HD Skin Sculpting palette as an alternative. Levy shouts out the complexion offerings from Kryolan, a brand beloved by professional makeup artists, and Kastuk points us in the direction of KimChi Chic’s Undercover Hoe palettes, which suit a wide range of skin tones. I’m partial to e.l.f. Cosmetics’ Camo Color Correctors, a $4 find that you can pick up at your local drugstore — no downlines required.
