Fashion Fair Cosmetics, a division of Johnson Publishing Company, was started from scratch. With an idea and 20 bottles from a chemist, John H. Johnson, publisher of EBONY and JET magazines, created the largest Black-owned cosmetics company in the world.  

For many years, Black women's needs had been ignored by the major cosmetics industries.   Existing products were not marketed or sold to meet the particular needs of women of color. Many women with deeper skin tones had to choose from products that were clearly made with fair skin tones in mind.  

When Johnson noticed models in EBONY Fashion Fair, the company's traveling fashion show, mixing foundations trying to create the right blend to match their hues, he was driven to action.   First, Johnson approached existing cosmetics companies and urged them to create a line specifically to meet the needs of Black women.   When no one took up the challenge, Johnson and his wife, Eunice W. Johnson, decided to take the matter into their own hands. They went to a private lab that created permanent formulas out of the mixtures the models had been making.

After experimenting by using the makeup on the models in the fashion show, the Johnsons produced a mail-order package called the Capsule Collection in 1969.   The response was overwhelming. It was clear that there was a market for a Black cosmetics line.

Fashion Fair Cosmetics was born in 1973, named after the fashion show that inspired it. The line was marketed to high-line department stores and opened its first counter in Chicago at Marshall Fields on State Street.

Today, Fashion Fair is the world leader in the field of cosmetics for all women of color.   The products are sold in fine stores across the United States as well as in Canada, Africa, the Caribbean, England, France and other countries around the world.