How GLP-1s Are Shaping Beauty and Fashion

“One shot makes you hot” is the tagline for the newest TV series from producer Ryan Murphy, “The Beauty”. It centres on a mythical injection that allows people to become instantly gorgeous, features Bella Hadid and premieres on Jan. 21.

The premise is perhaps inspired by the 2025 film “The Substance” (Tagline: “Have you ever dreamt of a better version of yourself?”), but also reflects a growing obsession with the concept of an injectable transformation, and one that might not be so mythical after all.

In the US, the world leader in general consumption, and consequently of obesity, glucagon-like peptide agonist (or GLP-1) drugs have reached stigma-busting levels of widespread usage. An October Gallup poll of 16,946 US adults found that an average of 12 percent — about one in eight — were current users, while consulting firm PwC said that between 17 and 20 percent of US households had someone taking a GLP-1 in October 2025, up from 14 percent six months prior.

This figure is especially remarkable considering the medication’s high barriers to adoption — a hefty price point (sometimes upwards of $1000 per month before discounts or insurance), weekly injection format and gnarly side effects (commonly nausea, rarely pancreatitis or gallbladder disease). Many of those hurdles, however, are coming down. While there’s still no solve for the unwanted side effects, President Donald Trump announced late last year that GLP-1 drugs from Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly will be offered for more than half off through TrumpRx, the US government’s forthcoming direct-to-consumer website offering discounted prescription drugs. Already this year, Novo Nordisk launched its Wegovy pill in the US, which can be purchased directly from the Swiss manufacturer for $149 a month. Eli Lilly’s own GLP-1 pill is set to release by March.

These changes are likely to spur growth again: Morgan Stanley estimates GLP-1 drug sales will peak in 2035 at $150 billion, compared to $15 billion in 2024, but the bank has already had to up its forecast once.

The category has already had effects on attendant industries — not only beauty and wellness but apparel, food, beverage, travel and hospitality, according to Alison Furman, a consumer insights lead at PwC. These impacts range from the obvious (GLP-1 users are likelier than non-users to book wellness-focused getaways) to the inexplicable (they buy fewer condiments and much less alcohol.)

“What we’re seeing now in terms of shifts in consumer behaviours and consumer preferences, we believe, is only scratching the surface,” she said.

That may be cause for concern. While GLP-1s have been used to treat diabetes for over 20 years, their use for weight loss has only come around recently. Studies on the long-term effects of staying on GLP-1s, which is necessary for them to work, have yet to be conducted.

Apparel: More ‘Fluid Fit’ and Fewer Plus Size Influencers

GLP-1s are, by and large, slimming down the population. A recent Gallup poll found that the rate of obesity in the US has decreased from a 2022 peak of 39.9 percent to 37 percent in 2025, or by about 7 million American bodies.

This has caused at least a minor recalibration in apparel inventory planning. A September 2025 study by the retail consultancy Impact Analytics warned of a shrinking populace and billions of dollars in potential risk “unless brands start planning for the shopper of 2027, instead of the shopper of 2022,” chief executive Prashant Agrawal said. Some analysts have advised retailers to shift from the standard 1-2-2-1 size ordering model — twice as many M and L sizes as S and XL — to a 2-2-1-1 proportion.

But a key risk for brands “is treating GLP-1 adoption as a simple story of shrinkage,” said Laura Yiannakou, a senior strategist at trend forecasting agency WGSN.

“While retail data does point to growing demand for smaller size curves in some markets, that is only part of the picture,” Yiannakou said. It’s common for patients who stop taking GLP-1s to regain as much as two-thirds of their lost weight, and new research suggests they do so faster than those coming out of diet and exercise programmes.

Yiannakou predicts an influx of “dynamic fit solutions” in adjustable silhouettes, oversized garments and “multi-size fit” sizes from M to XL. Good American, the Khloe Kardashian-founded denim brand, for instance, sells a line called “Always Fits” that claims to offer “one-size-fits-four” jeans from 00-4 to 28-32.

While more “body-confident” options — like comfortable shapewear — will also take hold, the GLP-1 wave has had a regressive effect on the “body positivity” movement that began gaining steam in the late 2010s.

“People are more bothered about being thin again, even if they’re not using GLP-1s,” said Mollie Quirk, a UK-based plus-size fashion blogger. Many of her peers have pivoted to wellness content, showcasing their workout routines and meals more as they shed weight; others, like Remi Bader, have seen their careers grind to a halt for not properly disclosing their GLP-1 usage.

Beauty: Firming, Toning, Nipping and Tucking

From weight loss apps to the White House, everybody is trying to sell GLP-1 drugs. But the biggest opportunity may be at the med-spa: In 2025, sales of GLP-1 drugs were already worth more than sales of Botox and filler combined and doubled.

“It has a head-to-toe effect,” said Dr. Bob Basu, the president of the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, whose Houston, Texas practice is split 40/60 between facial aesthetics and body work.

Cautionary tale of “Ozempic face” comes from the drug’s deleterious effects on the skin’s structural proteins like collagen and elastin, but rapid weight loss can also contribute to a loss of bone density and muscle mass. These side effects are sending both men and women to clinics in droves, bolstering not only facial injections but more invasive liposuction.

“I call this the American GLP weight loss revolution,” said Basu, who expects demand for plastic surgery to “skyrocket” as the pill format launches.

As filler sales continue to rebound from “undetectable-era” deflation, patients are not injecting less but injecting differently. More are opting for facial fat injections or so called “regenerative” injectables, like MTF Biologics’ Renuva, that uses donated fat tissue. Meanwhile, cryolipidosis or fat-freezing procedures like Coolsculpting and Kybella are on a precipitous decline, according to Basu and the ASPS.

Topical products that promise firming or tightening benefits are on the up: the Israeli bodycare label Maëlys, known for its body-toning creams and serums, enjoyed an 85 percent sales surge in 2024, according to PwC. Other winners include Sono Bello’s in-clinic body contouring device (up 42 percent) and Rodan and Fields’ suite of dermatological skincare products (up 83 percent).

GLP-1s and Wellness: The New-Old Weight Loss Club

No market has been upended by GLP-1s as fast as the weight loss industry, which has rapidly transformed to make way for the most promising obesity intervention since Fen-Phen.

Weight Watchers, the 62-year-old company, has embraced weight loss drugs as central to its recent rebrand. The platform has returned to its community-forward, meeting-based format partly in effort to create something like a support group for GLP-1 users. (In 2023, the company acquired the telehealth firm Sequence, allowing it to prescribe weight loss medicines directly to users.)

It launched a GLP-1 Success Programme in Dec. 2025. Julie Rice, the co-founder of SoulCycle who was appointed Weight Watchers’ chief experience officer in August 2025 calls GLP-1s “a tool in the toolkit.”

“They give you a little bit of a running start,” she added. “You can quiet the food noise, you can regulate your blood sugar. They give you this opportunity to really make the change alongside these medications.”

In this light, organisations like Weight Watchers and apps like Noom have been all but forced to offer the medications alongside telehealth competitors like Hims & Hers or Ro, and other challengers springing up to offer GLP-1s to the masses. The US startup FuturHealth, focused on weight loss, launched in 2023 and initially offered compounded GLP-1 drugs, but now sells brand name Ozempic and Mounjaro.

At the same time, these businesses are uniquely primed to offer the kind of “holistic” care — including nutritional and fitness recommendations — that physicians say are essential to success on GLP-1 drugs. It’s been a boon financially, too: More than half of Noom’s revenues, for example, now come from GLP-1s.

“A lot of people do start the [medication] thinking they won’t be on it forever, but are using it as this window where they can experience some meaningful health transformation,” said Geoff Cook, the co-founder and CEO of Noom.

The next 10 years will see a deluge of new weight loss medicines and could also see new approvals for GLP-1s to treat substance abuse or chronic inflammation. But analysts are not ruling out the possibility that more research could reveal other downsides of using these drugs.

“There could be something out there that causes a reversal in the trend,” Furman said. “But barring that, we think that this is creating a new appetite economy. We think it’s a physiological disruption, akin to a technological disruption, like Netflix or the iPhone, that’s going to have broad societal implications, many of which we don’t know yet.”

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