Revlon is suing several former employees over claims they “sabotaged” the company's decades-long fragrance partnership with Britney Spears and steered the business to a competitor.
In a case filed Monday (August 26) in Manhattan federal court, lawyers for Revlon and its subsidiary Elizabeth Arden allege that four former employees stole trade secrets and breached their contracts when they jumped ship to new rival Give Back Beauty and took the Britney bill with them.
Although an initial delay in re-signing Spears' 20-year fragrance deal was “attributed to Ms. Spears being busy with other matters,” Revlon claims it eventually realized its own executives were orchestrating a corporate heist.
“Revlon and Elizabeth Arden were completely unaware that the Revlon team itself was actively sabotaging one of their most valuable licensing relationships,” the company's lawyers claim.
The lawsuit does not name Spears as a defendant or accuse her of any wrongdoing.
As defendants, the suit names the four employees — Vanessa Kidd, Dominick Romeo, Reid Mulvihill and Ashley Fass — as well as Give Back Beauty itself. None of the individual defendants immediately returned messages seeking comment on the suit's allegations.
In a statement to Bulletin boardGive Back Beauty vehemently denied the allegations: “Allegations that Give Back Beauty engaged in any type of misconduct are completely baseless and unsupported by the facts. We will defend both our company and our employees against these allegations and respond more fully to them through the appropriate legal channels.”
Then, at the height of her powers, Spears signed a deal with Elizabeth Arden in 2004 to develop signature fragrances and other cosmetics. When “Curious” was released later that year, it quickly became the best-selling fragrance of the year, reportedly raking in over $100 million in sales.
According to a 2013 report by Hollywood Reporter“Curious” had sold more than 500 million bottles in its first decade, and the overall Spears-Arden collaboration, with several other fragrances, was bringing in $30 million a year in sales.
According to the new lawsuit, Revlon had historically renewed its partnership with Britney at five-year intervals, and the latest iteration was set to expire at the end of 2024. When negotiations began late last year, the company says it had “every expectation that the relationship will continue.”
However, according to the lawsuit, Give Back Beauty had launched a “campaign to acquire the Britney Brands fragrance business,” including contacting Elizabeth Arden staff as early as February: “This was clearly a carefully planned and executed acquisition by GBB for Revlon perfume. business.”
Although Revlon says it struck a tentative deal with Britney's team, the deal wasn't finalized until May, when executives who had worked on the deal began “standing out at GBB.” Less than a month later, the suit says Give Back Beauty signed its own deal with Britney.
“The speed with which Britney Brands signed its agreement with GBB was unprecedented for the Britney Brands organization and could not have been achieved without the benefit of Revlon employees' deep knowledge of proprietary information about the relationship and unlawful use of this information by GBB. ,” Revlon's lawyers write.
The lawsuit takes particular aim at Kidd, a senior vice president for global fragrance marketing who had spent years working on the Britney account and was reportedly the first to come on board.
“At the same time Defendant Kidd was negotiating with Britney Brands on behalf of Revlon, she had interviewed and accepted a job offer with GBB,” the company's attorneys wrote. “Kidd effectively acted as a double agent, helping GBB take the Britney Brands business away from the plaintiffs, while she was charged with boosting expansion for Elizabeth Arden and was supposed to do so.”
The suit alleges that before she left, Kidd had access to more than 250 electronic files containing proprietary information, including Britney's collaboration. Revlon says the “logical conclusion” is that she was “arming herself and her new employer” with information that could be used to “quickly rebuild the supply and distribution chains that Elizabeth Arden had spent 20 years developing.” .
In technical terms, the lawsuit accuses the former employees and Give Back Beauty of theft of trade secrets and so-called tort in their businesses and contracts. It also accuses the individual employees of breaching their contracts and breaching their duty of loyalty to Revlon.
In a statement to Bulletin boardRevlon emphasized that the lawsuit did not accuse Spears or her team of wrongdoing and said “we appreciate our 20-year partnership and wish Britney the best.”
“As a company, we will always take steps to protect our intellectual property,” Revlon said in the statement. “We filed this complaint because it became clear to us that GBB and the four former employees named in the lawsuit unlawfully used Revlon's proprietary information and trade secrets — and we are confident of the merits of our case.”
