Claire’s for adults—how ear-piercing retailer Studs is attracting older Gen Zers and millennials

Brands on the Rise is a regular Ad Age feature spotlighting the marketing and business tactics of successful challenger brands. Read other installments here. For girls growing up in the late ‘90s and early aughts, sprinting through the mall in light-up sneakers for a Claire’s ear piercing was a right of passage. Millennials and older Gen Zers can probably still remember pressing their noses to the glass of a Claire’s store, where a nervous tween would inevitably sit perched on a tall chair waiting to feel the pinch of a piercing gun on her earlobe. But anyone old enough to remember that scene likely wouldn’t return to Claire’s for their second, third, or fourth piercings today. Instead, they might find themselves Googling “tattoo parlors near me,” and reluctantly handing a man who smells like cigarette smoke a wad of cash, hoping the piercing doesn’t get infected. That’s more or less the situation Studs Co-Founders Anna Harman and Lisa Bubbers found themselves in back in 2019. The experience inspired them to create Studs, the modern piercing studio and jewelry brand that caters to people ages 18 to 35. Studs has 22 U.S. stores including New York and California, and only pierces those 13 and older. Also read: 20 brands resonating with Gen Z right now The grown-up Claire’s experience is a growing business, too. Studs’ revenue jumped 35% in 2023 and is on track to grow at the same rate in 2024, said Harman, who is also the brand’s CEO. Below, more on Studs' origin story and the marketing strategies it uses to attract its hip target audience. Check out the latest Ad Age events and award programs How it started “In 2019 when I was 34, I was inspired by my friend with cool ear piercings to go get a second piercing and chose a premium piercing parlor,” Harman said. “The wait was going to be a few hours and my piercing was going to be too expensive, so I left.” While the piercing shop appeared clean and safe, Harman and Bubbers felt out of place in the environment and weren’t excited about the earring choices. So they researched what other options were available for the 18-to-35 set, looking for safe, needle-based piercing studios that were affordable and had an on-trend assortment of jewelry. Ultimately, they came up short—and by that November, the pair decided to build a business to fill the hole in the market. “Once we had our idea and vision, the first step was consumer research. We had held focus groups to learn more about what our customers wanted and needed out of their piercing and earring shopping experience,” Bubbers said. From there, Bubbers created the IP around Earscaping—the process of bejeweling an ear with multiple piercings—and Studs-specific piercings like the Studs Snakebite, which is two piercings stacked closely on top of each other. She then began building out the store and jewelry design, and a go-to-market strategy. Studs charges $35 for a single piercing, while the price for four piercings is $65, according to prices posted for its New York location in Flatiron. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Studs (@studs) In November 2019, Studs raised an initial $3 million seed round led by Birchbox Co-Founder Hayley Barna from First Round Capital with participation from Lerer Hippeau, as well as additional angel investors. Before Studs, the landscape for ear piercing with needles was fragmented, Harman said. Once a piercing healed, for instance, people typically went to mass retailers to shop for earrings rather than returning to the same piercing parlor to shop. “The behaviors were really disconnected,” she continued. Check out more beauty news here Tipping point Studs opened its first store in New York in November 2019, just months before the world shut down due to the pandemic. Like other retailers, the Studs team held its breath until the world started opening back up again. After six months in lockdown, Studs customers “came back in full force” to get ear piercings and shop for earrings when the stores reopened, Harman said. “The response to Studs post-COVID was a big indicator that our business was going to be successful,” Harman said. “The pandemic changed things, but our business emerged more resilient than ever, underscoring this industry as one that customers want, an experience that can be both planned and very much spontaneous. Since then, our growth has been exponential.” Marketing strategies The Studs marketing strategy hinges on two key concepts: Knowing what’s culturally relevant to the Studs audience and making the Studs retail store experience particularly “Instagrammable,” as Harman puts it. To combine those two strategies from the jump, Studs hosted a “buzzy Studio launch” when it opened its first Studs Studio in downtown Manhattan. “We wanted lines out the door and all appointments booked up,” Bubbers said. The result was a four-day press preview and “big launch party” for the store. The brand also bought wheatpasting all over New York promoting the opening. Kaia Gerber—the daughter of Cindy Crawford and Instagram model who is popular with older Gen Z and younger millennial audiences, the age group Studs focuses on—stopped by and even got a Studs signature Snakebite piercing. The party was also co-hosted with trendy downtown DTC accessories brand Susan Alexandra. “The launch marketing strategy was a hyper-local NYC strategy targeting the Gen Z and millennial female customer here in NYC,” Bubbers added. Also read: Inside Susan Alexandra’s brand collabs Since then, Studs has evolved its marketing strategy beyond launch parties and onto digital and social media platforms. “We invest in ‘ear-ducation’ … to inspire and educate our potential ear piercing and earring shopping customers on Instagram and TikTok,” Bubbers said. @studs Recently pierced? 👂🪡 Here are our top three aftercare tips for a happy healing process for your new ear piercings ✨ Check out our complete, in-depth guide to ear piercing aftercare on our (Ear)ducation Hub on our site! #piercing #earpiercing #piercingaftercare #earpiercingaftercare #earrings #earstyling #studspiercing ♬ Storytelling - Adriel Thus far, the brand has collaborated with anonymous gossip blogger DeuxMoi, dating and confidence influencer Serena Kerrigan, and Shake Shack for social media posts and more. “Studs uniquely understands the risk and reward associated with joining the cultural zeitgeist conversation and being a part of the noise at large,” Bubbers said. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Studs (@studs) The numbers indicate that these social media efforts are paying off: Studs has 332,000 Instagram followers and 82,000 TikTok followers. While Bubbers and Harman are now slightly older than Studs’s target audience, they figure out what’s culturally relevant by doing consumer research and hiring younger people. “You need to sort of figure out the intersection of what your own goals are as a brand, and what is happening in culture for your customer,” Bubbers said. It can be a bit of an uphill battle to create culture, like Studs did with its launch party—or “make your own noise,” Bubbers said. Instead, she recommends reacting to what is happening in culture and adding to that conversation, especially for small or emerging brands. Studs conducts consumer research to see who their core audience is following and engaging with on Instagram and TikTok, as well as through customer surveys about how they spend their time and money. The Studs marketing arm spends about 30% of its time creating organic content on social media and partnering with content creators. Another roughly 30% of the team’s time goes to email, SMS and retention marketing, while the next roughly 30% goes to offline brand marketing, such as the brand’s mobile “Studs on Wheels” pop-up. The remaining 10% of the team’s time is directed toward advertising and performance marketing, according to Bubbers. Bubbers says that less than 5% of Studs’s revenue goes toward marketing. Studs spent roughly $2 million in U.S. measured media in 2023, according to Vivvix, including paid social data from Pathmatics. What the experts say “They’re targeting piercing consumers who might not want to go to the typical mall-based piercing place … but also are not the typical tattoo or piercing parlor customers,” said Sky Canaves, senior analyst, retail and e-commerce at Insider Intelligence, in an interview. “Within that gap, that’s largely adult Gen Z and younger millennial consumers,” she said, adding that Studs’s marketing is honed in on understanding that target customer. Essentially, Canaves said, Studs found the gap in the market between Claire’s and hardcore tattoo and piercing aficionados—then doubled down on courting those consumers by not only setting up permanent locations in trendy urban areas, but also by following that customer to events they love (think: Bravocon) with the Studs on Wheels pop-up. View this post on Instagram A post shared by Studs (@studs) “Studs is setting themselves apart by targeting the slightly older adults, the 18-and-over consumer,” Canaves said. According to Harman, people often assume that Studs is directly competing with incumbents in this space such as Claire’s. “In fact, we consider ourselves a complement to their businesses, offering a more ‘grown-up’ experience for those looking for a piercing and who are no longer in their tweens to graduate into,” she said. What’s next Looking ahead, Studs plans to rapidly scale its retail locations, including opening one in New York City’s trendy downtown Meatpacking District. Studios in Atlanta and San Diego are in the works, too, according to Harman. This month, Studs is revealing a limited-time luxury pop-up of sorts. Dubbed “Fancy Studs,” the pop-up will feature “a curated selection of fine piercing assortments, in a highly designed space,” Harman said. Subscribe to Ad Age Sign up now for the latest industry news and analysis Click here

Claire’s for adults—how ear-piercing retailer Studs is attracting older Gen Zers and millennials

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