For all of you cosmetic-hoarding, YouTube-tutorial-watching, Sephora-browsing, powder-baking makeup users out there, you already know that finding the right shade of foundation is imperative to a put-together makeup look.

Back in February 2016 of my senior year, I remember my friends and I took a trip to Sephora and bought $200 worth of foundation, highlight palettes, brushes, and lip colors. One of my closest friends (who happens to be a few shades darker than me) and I expressed concerns about the lack of diversity in the makeup world for foundation that matches melanin-rich skin. Thus, we were introduced to Nars products.

We loved Nars not only because of its long-lasting wear and full-coverage, but also because it literally has good shades that fit our darker skin. Flash forward almost two years later, to when Rihanna came out with her Fenty line on September 8th, 2017.

Everyone was shook.

I’m not going to do a whole review of Rihanna’s products because you can easily scroll through Twitter or Youtube and find people who’ve been using the products. Instead, I’m going to focus on why this line is so revolutionary to the cosmetic and colored communities.

Everyone knows about undertones, right? You can have either a cool undertone (red, blue) or a warm undertone (yellow, pinkish, olive). I, personally, have a yellow undertone, which makes it hard to find products that match my shade. Most darker shades have cool undertones because most black women have cool undertones, so I’m usually out of luck. When I used to use a L'Oreal product that seemingly matched my shade, it would always be too red, rather than the yellow that I needed. And sure, Nars has my shade and undertone just right, but just how expensive it is makes me less inclined to buy their products.

Cue Rihanna’s Fenty Line.

This cosmetic line literally has forty amazing shades, all of which have different undertones varying from pink and red to green and blue. This is a long-awaited makeup line that’s made with darker skinned people in mind.

Sure, Bobbi Brown, MAC, Lancôme, and so many other cosmetic brands have darker shades, but it’s the undertones of the Fenty products that are so groundbreaking. Like I said before, I used to use a L'Oreal “Fit Me” foundation, but I always ended up looking sickly. My darker friend, who was introduced to Nars with me, used to use a certain foundation and claimed that it made her look “ashy” because it just wasn’t dark enough.

The point I’m trying to make is that these cosmetic companies need to realize that us, darker-skinned women cannot be forgotten. It’s not fair that there are at least twenty shades to fit lighter-skinned women and only five shades for darker-skinned women. Last time I checked, there was more variety in our skin tones than just light, medium-light, medium, medium-dark, and dark. There are in-betweens and there are undertones, all of which Rihanna’s Fenty Cosmetic line has fully grasped, and has slayed.

Now, because of Rihanna’s Fenty Cosmetic line, other cosmetic companies have begun to see the economic power melanin-rich women can have on their products. When social media was buzzing about Rihanna’s line, it appears as though these companies thought, “Wow, we can make some serious money off of these colored women." I know that sounds really horrible, but business is business, and companies need to find ways to make their products more appealing so they can get more money flowing in.

That entire week, cosmetic companies were posting pictures and bragging about their new shades that would “fit” darker skinned women. For example:

Becca Cosmetics

Estee Lauder

Marc Jacobs

Bare Minerals

Colourpop

Kylie Cosmetics

These were just a few of the products that tried to represent PoC in their social media throughout the week, but there were many more. I’m so disgusted by the fact that these companies want to make us believe that they’ve had our backs this entire time when, honestly, they haven’t.

A big shout out goes to Rihanna for having our best interests in mind. These other companies don’t care about us darker skinned women, and it’s evident every time I walk down aisles in Sephora or every time I swatch a shade that looks like my color, but just ends up making me look ashy or greasy.

After doing some research, I found another cosmetic line, called Iman Cosmetics, which only has shades for women of color. I have yet to watch a Youtube review or try it out for myself, but I can say we still need more. The few cosmetic lines that we have that fit our skin tones are not enough. People have different circumstances and preferences: maybe they don’t like a heavy feeling on their face, they sweat easily, have acne-prone skin, or their skin is dry and needs extra moisture from their foundation. The few selections that we have can’t possibly account for all the different skin types people have. We need more representation not only in media (that’s another article for another day), but also in our beauty products.

I can’t wait to see how far RiRi’s product is going to go. I know with the hype that’s been developing over this product, they can only go up from here. I’m also curious to see how other companies are going to start promoting their products to women of color. It’ll definitely be a struggle since they were so white-based, but I have some hope. Maybe this was a wakeup call for all other companies to think, “Hey, women of color matter too!”