Hyram Yarbro

Hyram Yarbro (born April 20, 1996) is an American skin care influencer known for his videos on YouTube and TikTok. His videos consist primarily of product reviews, skin care advice, and reactions to celebrity skin care routine videos. In 2021, he launched his skin care product line, Selfless by Hyram, with Sephora.

Early life and education
Yarbo was born in Paulden, Arizona, and grew up on a cattle ranch. He is one of five children and was raised in a deeply Mormon household. As a teenager, he was kicked out of his family's home when he came out as gay. According to Yarbro, throughout his teen years and early twenties, he suffered from depression and eating disorders. During this period, he engaged in self-harm and attempted suicide.

In 2014, Yarbro moved from Arizona to Honolulu, Hawaii, to study at Brigham Young University–Hawaii. He later dropped out for financial reasons. According to Yarbro, while in college, he noticed premature aging of his skin and became passionate about skin care products. He went on to work as a make-up artist at Saks Fifth Avenue. Yarbro has described his motivation for starting his YouTube channel as the widespread practice of skin-care companies misinforming consumers about the facts of dermatology in order to gouge the prices of their products.

Career
Yarbro began his YouTube channel in 2017. In 2019, his number of subscribers increased from 50,000 to 500,000 in under two weeks, reaching a million before the end of the year. He joined TikTok in 2020 and experienced significant growth during the COVID-19 lockdown, going from 100,000 followers on TikTok in March to over 6 million by September. Between March and October 2020, Yarbro released videos about the L'Oréal sub-brand Cerave that were credited with contributing to increased popularity and sales of the brand. During this period, his videos contributed $3.2 million in media impact value for the brand and reportedly led to a 89% increase in its global sales in 2020. This led to Yarbro receiving a paid partnership from L'Oréal to create branded content on TikTok and YouTube. In October 2020, Yarbro signed with United Talent Agency. That December, he announced his first product collaboration, the Hyram x Kinship Sea the Good collection. A portion of the collection's profits were donated to Lonely Whale, a charity devoted to removing plastic from oceans. In 2022, he started a podcast called Justaposition, a play on the word juxtaposition, which is centered around exploring his and other influencers' mental health journeys. That year, he also began posting to Flip, a shopping-focused social media app with a similar interface to TikTok; although according to Glossy, he had only a small following on the app as of that August.

Selfless by Hyram
In June 2021, Yarbro launched his line of skin care products called Selfless by Hyram, consisting of five products priced between $20 and $30. The line was created in collaboration with Colette Laxton and Mark Curry, co-founders of skin care brand The Inkey List, and released exclusively to Sephora stores in 29 countries and online on June 24. Yarbro teamed up with non-profits Rainforest Trust, Youth, and Thirst for the release of the line to protect over 2,500 acres from deforestation, restoring over 370,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, and funding clean water projects in over 60 African communities in the first year after release. The line was released in the UK in March 2022.

Content
Yarbro is amongst a wave of social media influencers on platforms such as TikTok referred to as "skinfluencers" for their focus on skin care products. He has also been described as "at the forefront of the men's skin care movement" by GQ Australia. His content consists of reviews and recommendations of beauty products, skin care tutorials, and reaction videos in which he reacts to the skin care regimes of his fans and online influencers. On TikTok, Yarbro utilizes the duet feature to make such reaction videos. According to lifestyle magazine Elle, he also uses the feature to debunk skin care myths propagated by other users. He is known for recommending products which are at a lower price point, generally at a price under $50 and regularly under $10.

Yarbro's reviews have been described as taking an ingredients-first approach, and he has become known for his catchphrase "the ingredients don't lie" which has appeared in his merchandising. According to The Washington Post, Yarbro's brand focuses on promoting "clean beauty" consisting of products with safe, organic ingredients. According to The Independent, he disapproves of products containing fragrances and essential oils whilst praising brands that utilize sustainable practices to make their products. Yarbro states in his content that he is not a licensed dermatologist or aesthetician, instead calling himself a "skin care specialist", and has claimed that his content should not be taken as medical advice but as "shopping with a best friend".

Yarbro makes money from his content via affiliate links, YouTube ads, and brand sponsorships. He has stated that he refuses 90 to 95% of brand deals offered to him based on product ingredients, price, and a desire to retain the trust of his audience.

Criticism
Yarbro has been criticized for promoting a trend called "slugging" in which Vaseline is applied thickly to the face and left overnight which dermatologists say can worsen acne. Nylon included excessive slugging on their list of the 10 worst beauty trends on TikTok of 2021, naming Yarbro as one of the influencers that promoted the trend.