Global Muslim Success Stories
Chances are you’ve heard of these businesses or personalities even if you are not avid followers of their brand. These brands were not overnight success stories but rather the culmination of years of hard work to become household names. Bookmark these stories to inspire you:
July 29, 2020
Huda Kattan sits at the top of a beauty empire with over 40 million followers on Instagram and the CEO of one of the world’s fastest growing beauty brands. And yet, she had humble beginnings. In 2010 while working as a make-up artist for Revlon, Huda started a blog, Huda Beauty, on Wordpress. Her makeup tutorials and tips went viral. Identifying a gap in the market, she launched her own line of eyelashes in 2013 which retailed at Sephora and sold out on the first day. Retail sales hit $1.5 million in the first year and jumped to $10 million the next. The product also caught the attention of Kim Kardashian West. She quickly expanded her beauty line to include eyeshadow palettes, liquid lipsticks, foundations, concealers, and liquid eyeshadows. By the end of 2018, Forbes valued Huda Beauty at over a billion dollars and her beauty line currently retails at over 900 stores across the US.
In 2015, Hanan Challouki and Taha Riani started Mvslim, an online space that reflected the diverse voices of Muslims worldwide. Tired of the stereotypes they saw about Muslims in the media and identifying a lack of a creative outlet for Muslims worldwide, the two students (at the time) at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, decided to start Mvslim. And the success of the platform was almost instant - one of their first articles about the first Hijab wearing police officer, Kadra Mohamed, was shared more than 475,000 times. The article even caught the attention of the White House and Mohamed was invited by President Obama to the White House iftar. In its first year, the website had just over 30 contributors and by the next year, that number had jumped to over 300. The website now commands over 10 million unique visitors monthly.
From a street food cart to a nationwide franchise and the #3 most reviewed eatery on Yelp, The Halal Guys success story spans 30 years. In 1990, Mohamed Abouelenein, Ahmed Etsaka, and Abdelbaset Elsayed decided to switch from a hot dog cart to one selling a hearty meal of chicken, gyro meat, rice, pita bread and their secret sauce. It soon became a hit with NYC’s cab drivers and word of the mouthwatering meal spread with huge lines snaking around the block as patrons sometimes waited an hour for their meal. In June 2014, the owners finally gave into demands for franchising and hired Fransmart, a franchise development company and within a year of launching their franchise, The Halal Guys currently has locations in California, Texas, New Jersey, Illinois, New York, and Washington DC.
When it launched in 2013, crowdfunding website LaunchGood was struggling to find its first users. In its second year, the website targeted at the Muslim community and launched a range of projects that raised over $1.5 million. Founded by Chris Abdur-Rahman Blauvelt, the platform fundraises for nationally known projects including the Jewish burials of the victims of the Pittsburgh synagogue shooting and for the rebuilding of African American churches destroyed by arson. Today the website has over 500,000 users and has raised over $95 million for over 9,500 campaigns.
