The billionaire influencers were dubbed ‘America’s First Family’ and broke the internet – but now the world is starting to leave them behind, writes Laura Craik.
If ever there was a month to feel as though we’ve reached “peak stuff”, it’s January. Whether peak cheese, peak booze or peak partner, it’s why most of us are currently swearing off something, in a valiant if clichéd bid to cleanse body and soul from the toxicity that we believe has been holding us back.
While Sancerre and sausages might traditionally revolt us at this time of year, there’s one product that has so far remained impervious to the vagaries of human desire. Like electricity or paracetamol, the Kardashians are a hyped-up human example of inelastic demand; a family whose followers, dominance and net worth only seem to grow, no matter what they shill, or the cost of what they’re shilling.
Until now. Whisper it – or shout it if you hate them – but there’s a growing sentiment across the pond that we might actually, finally have reached Peak Kardashian. 2025 might be a promising year for “bombshell beauty”, Christian Lacroix, microdosing and Chappell Roan, but mounting evidence suggests that it will not be a stellar one for Kim, Kylie, Kourtney, Kendall, Khloé or Kris.
Writing in her influential fashion newsletter Line Sheet, a division of the US digital media platform Puck, journalist Lauren Sherman noted how a nameless but perfectly placed fashion entrepreneur had shared the bold prediction that “we are at the end of the Kardashian era. We have moved to an era of raw authenticity meets podcasters and YouTube. The Kardashians are neither raw nor have a POV [point of view] that people care about.” It’s but the latest death knell that many say has been sounding since the tail end of 2023, when Anna Wintour, the influential editor-in-chief of American Vogue, was said to have snubbed Kim at a couple of fashion shows. And then there are the failing family businesses – more of which later.
Unless you are a rabid fan of Keeping Up With The Kardashians, or a woman whose breasts have never looked better than when encased in a nipple push-up bra by Skims, the waning of the Kardashians’ star isn’t likely to have you reaching for the tiny violin. But whatever your views on the Kardashians, the fact remains that they are a cultural force; a family who’ve collectively shifted the dial on a slew of issues, some of them (America’s trans debate) more important than others (contouring).
Not for nothing did Cosmopolitan magazine call them “America’s First Family” in 2015. To their millions of fans (Kim has 358 million Instagram followers; Kylie has 395m; Khloé has 305m; Kendall has 290m; Kourtney has 220m, while self-styled momager Kris trails the pack with a mere 51.6m), they genuinely are. In the US, where an increasing number of Americans have lost all faith in politicians whatever their allegiance, the Kardashians actually stand for something. A loving (if volatile) family with loyalty at its core, in their own strange way, they’re both redoubtable and reliable – albeit that the main thing they can be relied upon to do is sell us something.
Which brings us to the crux of why we may have reached Peak Kardashian, and why, like an overripe Stilton, this once-fragrant family is beginning to pong. The Kardashians basically invented influencer culture, turning themselves both collectively and individually into lucrative brands via their reality TV show, Keeping Up With The Kardashians, which first aired on E! in 2007. Conceptualised by Kris “Momager” Jenner, not even she could have predicted how talked-about or successful the show would be. During its 14-year reign, it pushed the “famous for being famous” concept to the limit, its addictive blend of high drama and pure escapism making stars of the entire family.
A phenomenon which they promptly leveraged, segueing seamlessly from primetime TV to social media, a medium made for the sort of self-absorbed oversharing which the Kardashians have made their own. Soon, Kim & Co were making over $1m per Instagram post, and spearheading a string of sponsored partnerships, from Kim’s “Kimojis” (paid-for emojis that earned her $1m per minute) to a video game that reportedly earned her $80m.
A slew of businesses followed, including Kylie Cosmetics (launched in 2015, it made Kylie Jenner a billionaire aged 21), KKW Beauty and KKW Fragrance (Kim’s riposte, launched in 2017), Good American (Khloé Kardashian’s inclusively-sized denim range, launched in 2016), 818 Tequila (launched by Kendall Jenner in 2022) and Safely (Kris Jenner’s plant-powered cleaning brand, launched in 2023). The family also shill vitamin supplements, wellness drinks, baby products and swimwear – not forgetting SKKY, a private equity fund headed by Kim and entrepreneur Jay Sammons, launched in 2022 with the intention of investing in consumer and media businesses, digital commerce and hospitality.
Anything else? Why yes, since you mention it. We haven’t even covered the jewel in the family crown that is Skims, Kim’s shapewear brand, launched in 2019 and currently valued at $4 billion. Peak Kardashian or not, it’s unlikely that its legion of fans is close to reaching Peak Skims, mooted to go public soon on account of its incredibly rapid growth (insiders claim it took Nike 10 years to get to a $100m valuation: it took Skims six months).
But other family businesses are doing less well. Kris Jenner’s Safely is underperforming, likely because there’s little synergy between a cleaning product and Kris (she was roundly mocked after claiming in an interview that she used them to clean her own house every Sunday). Kim has already stepped down from Skky, after the fund failed to reach its $1b investment target, while Kylie’s fashion label, Khy, has failed to maintain its initial momentum, largely as a result of underwhelming, overpriced products. Kylie Cosmetics has also failed to keep up with ever-changing beauty trends, with competitors such as Selena Gomez’s Rare Beauty and Hailey Bieber’s Rhode stealing a march.
As the world’s most successful influencers, it’s arguably inevitable that when influencer culture peaks, so, too, will the Kardashians. The best influencers are heartfelt: the worst, heartless hard sellers whose main concern is their own revenue stream. Dwindling engagement figures suggest that social media users are turning against perfectly curated images, boastful videos and the relentless selling of products, and are craving authenticity and connection. This is not the Kardashians’ strongest suit.
It’s not so much that the Kardashians have taken their eyes off the ball as that they’re in danger of misjudging the goal posts. Kylie Jenner’s saccharine love-fest with her unlikely boyfriend, the actor Timothée Chalamet, seems to be grating on some of her fans, judging by some of the comments generated by Sunday’s appearance at the Golden Globes (he’s been called a “delicate dreamboat”, while her family have been dubbed “a byword for vulgarity”).
Two days before Christmas, Kim dropped a short film called Santa Baby on Instagram, which featured her rolling around on the floor in skimpy underwear in a room tricked out to look like a crack den (“what in the methamphetamine Christmas blasphemy is this?” asked one user).
According to MJ Corey, whose Kardashian Kolluquium initiative has been using media theory to track the family through an academic lens since 2018, we haven’t yet reached Peak Kardashian, largely because the culture is too fragmented to peak any more.
“I don’t know that any cultural phenomena can ‘peak’ – instead we have increasingly brief cycles of hyper-virality, often within niches,” she notes. “The family is well-suited to an increasingly fractured media landscape because there are so many of them and their dynasty now spans generations. They are still able to ride periodic waves of virality, as witnessed anytime Skims drops a satisfying new cameo for a latest campaign.
“But we do seem to have moved beyond the era of Kim ‘breaking the internet’ with a magazine cover. We do not see as many Kim clones roving the streets as we did during the height of Instagram. But again, the dilution of what we once knew as a cultural Kardashification tells us more about the state of media itself than the family’s cultural power, which I believe to be enduring.”
Whether it endures in 2025 remains to be seen.