How Suzanne Jackson Turned SoSueMe Into a Multi-Million Euro Beauty Empire
Suzanne Jackson a SoSueMe launch
How Suzanne Jackson Turned SoSueMe Into a Multi-Million Euro Beauty Empire
Suzanne Jackson built one of Ireland’s best-known influencer-led businesses by turning the audience she developed through her SoSueMe blog into customers for physical beauty products.
She launched her blog in 2010 and SOSU Cosmetics in 2015, before expanding into tanning through Dripping Gold in 2018. The businesses behind those brands subsequently generated millions of euro in annual profits, accumulated substantial cash and assets and expanded across pharmacies, supermarkets, fashion retailers and international markets.
The important distinction is that these figures relate to companies connected with Jackson. They are not the same thing as Suzanne Jackson’s personal income or net worth.
Information checked and updated: September 2026
At a Glance
• 2010 — Suzanne Jackson launched the SoSueMe blog.
• 2015 — SOSU Cosmetics was established, initially launching with nail products.
• 2018 — Dripping Gold was launched as Jackson expanded into self-tanning products.
• €902,760 — profit recorded by SanFran Cosmetics for the year ended December 2018.
• €3.039 million — profit recorded by SanFran Cosmetics for the year ended December 2019.
• €2.12 million — profit recorded by Cohar Ltd for 2020.
• €989,759 — SanFran Cosmetics' post-tax profit for 2020.
• €6.26 million — accumulated profit reserves reported by SanFran Cosmetics at the end of 2021.
• €5.26 million — accumulated profit reported by Cohar at the end of 2021.
• 1 million+ units — Dripping Gold's Wonder Water had passed one million units sold by 2022.
• 400+ products — SOSU says its portfolio has expanded to more than 400 products.
• 2,000+ stores internationally — the company says its portfolio has been stocked across more than 2,000 stores.
• 2024 — SanFran Cosmetics was merged into Cohar Ltd as the corporate structure behind Jackson's beauty brands was reorganised.
How did Suzanne Jackson build the SoSueMe business?
The origins of Suzanne Jackson's business are very different from those of a traditional cosmetics company.
Jackson did not initially build a product and then search for customers.
She built the audience first.
According to SOSU Cosmetics, Jackson began sharing beauty content online in 2010 after working as a beautician, make-up artist and nail technician. Her SoSueMe blog and social-media channels developed an audience around product reviews, tutorials, fashion and beauty recommendations.
That audience became a valuable commercial asset.
By the time Jackson launched her own products, she already had direct access to thousands of potential customers who knew her name and were accustomed to taking her beauty recommendations seriously.
That reduced one of the biggest difficulties facing a new consumer brand: customer acquisition.
From SoSueMe to SOSU Cosmetics
2010: Building the audience
SoSueMe began as a lifestyle and beauty blog in 2010.
This was before Instagram and TikTok developed into the major commercial platforms they are now.
Jackson became part of the first generation of Irish bloggers who built substantial audiences around their own names rather than through traditional magazines or broadcasters.
That audience later became the foundation of her business.
2015: SOSU Cosmetics launches
SOSU Cosmetics was founded in 2015.
Its first major product category was nail polish before the range expanded into products including:
False eyelashes
Make-up palettes
Lip products
Brushes
Complexion products
Beauty tools
Skincare
The business was initially structured through SanFran Cosmetics Limited, a company owned jointly by Jackson's interests and businessman Fran O'Gorman.
O'Gorman is associated with Sundrelle, a long-established Irish beauty-products distributor.
The partnership was strategically important.
Jackson brought the brand, audience and consumer influence.
The O'Gorman side brought experience in wholesale beauty distribution and access to retailers.
For an influencer attempting to move into physical products, that combination addressed two major problems at once: demand and distribution.
The company behind SOSU Cosmetics
For much of the brand's early growth, SOSU products were sold through SanFran Cosmetics Ltd.
Jackson and Fran O'Gorman each controlled 50% of the company. Jackson's interest was held through SoSueMe Ltd.
The financial performance demonstrates that the company became significantly more than an influencer merchandise project.
SanFran Cosmetics profit
• 2017: approximately €750,000 profit.
• 2018: €902,760 profit.
• 2019: €3.039 million profit.
• 2020: €989,759 post-tax profit.
The jump between 2018 and 2019 was particularly significant.
Digital Dinny calculation
Profit increased from:
€902,760 in 2018 to: €3.039 million in 2019
That represents an increase of approximately:
236.6% in a single year.
That calculation is based on:
(€3.039m - €902,760) ÷ €902,760 × 100
The following year was weaker, although SanFran still generated almost €1 million in post-tax profit during 2020. Directors' remuneration totalling €500,000 was one factor affecting that year's reported profit.
Dripping Gold created a second major business
Jackson did not rely exclusively on SOSU make-up.
In 2018, she expanded into self-tanning products with Dripping Gold, operated through Cohar Ltd.
The move was important because tanning is a particularly strong repeat-purchase category.
A customer may buy an eyeshadow palette occasionally.
A customer who regularly uses fake tan can purchase the product several times per year.
That creates the possibility of a more recurring revenue stream.
Dripping Gold expanded into products including:
Tanning mousse
Liquid tan
Lotion
Clear tanning products
Wonder Water
Gradual tan
Body products
Tanning accessories
By 2022, the company said Wonder Water had sold more than one million units.
The numbers behind Cohar Ltd
Cohar became another major part of Jackson's business structure.
The company recorded:
• €1.64 million profit in 2019.
• €2.12 million profit in 2020.
• Approximately €4 million in accumulated profits by the end of 2020.
• Approximately €3 million in cash at the end of 2020.
By the end of 2021, Cohar's accumulated profit reserve had increased further to approximately €5.26 million.
That does not mean Jackson personally received €5.26 million.
Accumulated profits are profits retained within a company after items such as taxes, dividends and previous-year movements are accounted for.
They form part of the company's reserves.
Why you cannot simply add all the profit figures together
One mistake when analysing influencer businesses is to take every number reported in newspapers and add them together.
That can produce a misleading result.
Jackson has operated through several companies and the relationships between those businesses have changed over time.
For example:
SoSueMe Ltd held Jackson's stake in SanFran Cosmetics.
SanFran Cosmetics operated part of the SOSU business.
Cohar operated Dripping Gold and later became increasingly central to the wider beauty operation.
Some companies can trade with each other.
Profits retained within one company may later move through dividends or restructuring.
You therefore cannot simply add the accumulated profit reserves of every company and describe the result as Suzanne Jackson's wealth.
How large did the brands become?
The company says SOSU has developed into a portfolio of more than 400 products stocked in more than 2,000 stores internationally.
Earlier, RTÉ reported that by 2023 SOSU had launched more than 100 products and was available through approximately 1,000 pharmacies in Ireland as well as Penneys stores.
The business has also used retailers and e-commerce platforms to expand beyond Jackson's own website.
Previous retail partners have included names such as:
Penneys/Primark
Dunnes Stores
Tesco
Online beauty retailers
Fashion e-commerce platforms
The wider beauty operation now includes SOSU Cosmetics, Dripping Gold and Bahama-branded products.
Distribution was one of the key ingredients
Perhaps the most important part of Jackson's business model was moving beyond selling directly to her Instagram followers.
A scalable consumer brand needs distribution.
For many years, Sundrelle played a major role in distributing Jackson-linked products into retail.
The scale of that relationship can be seen in Sundrelle's accounts.
During 2022, Sundrelle purchased approximately €5.29 million of goods from SanFran Cosmetics.
In 2023, the distributor purchased:
• €4.3 million of goods from SanFran Cosmetics
and
• €2.82 million of goods from Cohar Ltd
Those figures are purchases made by Sundrelle from the companies.
They should not automatically be interpreted as total SOSU or Dripping Gold turnover.
But they demonstrate the scale of wholesale activity flowing through the distribution relationship.
The 2024 restructuring changed Suzanne Jackson's business
One of the biggest corporate developments came in 2024.
SanFran Cosmetics was merged into Cohar Ltd.
Publicly available corporate documentation described the transaction as an acquisition of SanFran's issued share capital through a merger by acquisition.
Jackson's husband Dylan O'Connor also became a director of Cohar during the restructuring.
The change effectively simplified a business structure that had previously involved a major joint venture with Fran O'Gorman.
According to reporting based on company documentation, SanFran had assets of approximately €8.83 million and liabilities of approximately €230,000 around the time of the restructuring.
Again, those are company balance-sheet figures, not cash personally owned by Jackson.
International expansion
The business has increasingly targeted markets beyond Ireland.
A UK company, Cohar (UK) Limited, was incorporated on 9 September 2024.
UK Companies House records list Suzanne Jackson as a director and show the Irish Cohar Limited exercising significant control over the company.
That corporate structure provides another indication of the company's ambition to build a more permanent UK operation rather than relying solely on Irish sales.
International expansion also matters because Ireland has a population of only around five million people.
There is a natural ceiling on the scale a mass-market cosmetics company can reach if it depends entirely on domestic customers.
Why Suzanne Jackson stepped away and came back
Jackson stepped back from her businesses in 2022.
She later explained that she wanted space away from the day-to-day operation before announcing her return to SOSU in October 2023.
By June 2025, Jackson told RTÉ she was again heavily involved in both SOSU Cosmetics and Dripping Gold and described the period as a "rebirth" of SOSU as the brand marked ten years in business.
This highlights another challenge when influencer-led brands get larger.
The skills required to create products, understand customers and market a brand are not necessarily the same skills required to manage staff, logistics, finance, supply chains and international expansion.
Successful founder-led companies frequently respond by bringing experienced executives into operational roles while the founder focuses more heavily on product, brand and creative strategy.
SUZANNE JACKSON AS SHE CELEBRATED SOSU COSMETICS OPENING
The business model behind Suzanne Jackson's success
Jackson's growth can be understood through five main advantages.
1. She owned the audience before launching the product
Traditional consumer businesses may spend enormous amounts on advertising simply to get people to notice a new product.
Jackson already had attention.
Her audience gave SOSU an immediate pool of potential customers.
2. She turned influence into ownership
Promoting somebody else's beauty brand may generate a campaign fee.
Owning the brand gives the founder exposure to the underlying economics of every product sold.
That is a fundamentally different business model.
Instead of monetising attention once through advertising, an influencer-owned company can monetise the audience repeatedly through product purchases.
3. She entered repeat-purchase categories
Beauty products can generate recurring spending.
Products such as tan, lashes, foundation and skincare can require regular replacement.
That gives the company a different revenue profile from an influencer simply selling a one-off branded hoodie or book.
4. Retail distribution expanded beyond her followers
The relationship with established distributors and major retailers allowed the brands to reach customers who might never have followed SoSueMe.
That is the point at which an influencer business begins becoming a conventional consumer-products business.
5. The company expanded beyond Suzanne Jackson herself
The portfolio eventually included multiple brands, hundreds of products, collaborations and several product categories.
That diversification reduces dependence on one individual product.
Worked example: why product ownership can be more valuable than an influencer campaign
Consider a simplified example.
Assume an influencer is paid €10,000 to promote another company's beauty product.
Their revenue from that campaign is €10,000.
Now assume the same influencer owns a beauty business and sells:
100,000 products × €20 retail price = €2 million in retail sales
That does not mean the business earns €2 million in profit.
The €2 million would have to cover items such as:
Retailer margin
Wholesale margin
Manufacturing
Packaging
Freight
Warehousing
Staff
Marketing
Returns
Administration
Corporation tax
But the example demonstrates why owning a successful product business can create much more long-term enterprise value than simply charging advertisers for access to an audience.
Jackson moved from being primarily the marketing channel to having ownership in the product business itself.
A comparison with average Irish earnings
The scale becomes clearer when compared with ordinary employment income.
SanFran Cosmetics' approximately €3.039 million profit in 2019 was equivalent to:
around 50 annual salaries of €60,000
before considering the different tax treatment, costs or ownership structure involved.
That comparison does not mean Jackson personally earned the equivalent of 50 salaries.
It simply illustrates how differently a scalable company can perform compared with an individual's wage income.
Setbacks and risks
Building a large beauty company also carries significantly greater risk than earning money from sponsored Instagram posts.
Product safety and regulation
Cosmetics sold in Ireland and the EU must comply with detailed product-safety requirements.
In 2025, SOSU's Peach Dreams Eyeshadow Palette was withdrawn following regulatory concerns about arsenic levels in the product.
Boots subsequently temporarily removed the wider SOSU range from sale while seeking further assurances from the brand about its safety procedures.
SOSU said the discontinued palette had been withdrawn following engagement with the Health Products Regulatory Authority, that it was undertaking independent testing and that it did not believe the issue represented a safety concern across its existing product portfolio.
The company's current website states that SOSU Cosmetics, Dripping Gold and Bahama products comply with European Cosmetics Regulation requirements.
This episode demonstrates one of the major differences between influencing and manufacturing or selling physical products: the brand owner takes on regulatory, product-quality and reputational risk.
Influencer advertising rules
In February 2026, the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission published details of a compliance notice issued to Suzanne Jackson.
The CCPC said an inspection of her Instagram account found that commercial content relating to SOSU Cosmetics had not been appropriately labelled to disclose its commercial nature.
The compliance notice took effect on 5 December 2025 and directs future paid promotions to use clear and appropriate disclosure labels.
This is particularly relevant for founder-influencers.
Owning the company does not remove the obligation to make the commercial nature of advertising clear where consumer law requires disclosure.
Advantages of the Suzanne Jackson business model
Existing audience
Building the customer community before developing the product dramatically reduced the traditional start-up challenge of generating awareness.
Founder credibility
Jackson had years of experience discussing beauty products before launching her own.
Multiple revenue channels
The business can sell through its own website, wholesalers and physical retailers.
Repeat purchasing
Tan, cosmetics and skincare can produce repeat demand.
International potential
A beauty brand can be sold beyond Ireland without dramatically changing the core product.
Brand ownership
Owning a brand potentially creates an asset that exists beyond individual advertising campaigns.
Limitations and business risks
Dependence on founder reputation
A brand closely connected to one public personality can be affected by reputational issues involving that founder.
Retailer dependence
Losing shelf space at a large retailer can have an immediate impact on sales.
Product regulation
Cosmetics businesses face strict rules regarding ingredients, safety assessments, manufacturing and labelling.
Competition
The beauty market is extremely crowded, particularly as more influencers launch their own products.
Inventory risk
Physical-product businesses must finance stock before it is sold.
Unsold stock can tie up large amounts of working capital.
International expansion costs
Entering markets such as Britain requires additional distribution, staffing, compliance and marketing expenditure.
So how much is Suzanne Jackson worth?
There is no reliable public figure that can establish Suzanne Jackson's exact personal net worth.
Media outlets have published estimates, but these should not be confused with verified personal financial statements.
Company accounts can reveal figures such as:
Profit
Cash
Assets
Liabilities
Director remuneration
Dividends
Shareholders' funds
They do not reveal a person's full private wealth.
Jackson's personal finances could include investments, property, pensions, borrowing, tax liabilities and other assets or liabilities that are not visible in the accounts of the beauty businesses.
For that reason, Digital Dinny does not treat media net-worth estimates as verified facts.
What makes the Suzanne Jackson story unusual?
The most significant part of the SoSueMe story is not simply that an influencer launched make-up.
Thousands have tried that.
The more important achievement was converting an audience-based media business into a consumer-products operation with:
Physical inventory
National distribution
International retail
Multiple brands
Staff
Millions of euro in historical annual profits
Significant retained company reserves
By that stage, the business was no longer simply dependent on sponsored social-media posts.
The Instagram audience helped build it.
But the underlying business increasingly became about products, distribution, repeat customers and retail scale.
Suzanne Jackson business timeline
2010
Suzanne Jackson launches SoSueMe.
2015
SOSU Cosmetics launches.
2017
Cohar Ltd is incorporated.
2018
Dripping Gold is launched.
2019
SanFran Cosmetics records approximately €3.039 million profit.
2020
Cohar records approximately €2.12 million profit, while SanFran records €989,759 post-tax profit.
2021
SanFran ends the year with almost €6.26 million in accumulated profits; Cohar has almost €5.26 million.
2022
Jackson steps away from the day-to-day leadership of the businesses.
2023
Jackson announces her return.
2024
SanFran Cosmetics is merged into Cohar Ltd.
2024
Cohar (UK) Limited is established.
2025
SOSU Cosmetics celebrates ten years in business.
2025
The Peach Dreams palette is withdrawn and Boots temporarily suspends sales of SOSU products while seeking assurances from the company.
February 2026
The CCPC publishes details of a compliance notice relating to disclosure of commercial content on Jackson's Instagram account.
Frequently Asked Questions
When did Suzanne Jackson start SoSueMe?
Suzanne Jackson launched the SoSueMe blog in 2010.
When did Suzanne Jackson launch SOSU Cosmetics?
SOSU Cosmetics was founded in 2015.
Does Suzanne Jackson own SOSU Cosmetics?
The business structure has changed over time. SOSU was previously operated partly through SanFran Cosmetics, which involved a 50:50 ownership arrangement with Fran O'Gorman. SanFran was subsequently merged into Cohar Ltd in 2024.
What is Dripping Gold?
Dripping Gold is the tanning brand developed within Jackson's beauty business. It launched in 2018 and expanded into mousses, liquids, lotions, skincare and other tanning products.
How profitable was Suzanne Jackson's company?
SanFran Cosmetics recorded approximately €3.039 million profit in 2019, while Cohar recorded approximately €2.12 million profit in 2020. These are company profits and should not be interpreted as Jackson's personal earnings.
How many SOSU products are there?
SOSU Cosmetics says its wider portfolio has expanded to more than 400 products.
How many stores sell SOSU Cosmetics?
The company says its portfolio has been stocked in more than 2,000 stores internationally. Retail availability can change, so readers should check SOSU's current stockist information before travelling to a store.
Is Suzanne Jackson a millionaire?
Public company accounts demonstrate that businesses owned or co-owned by Jackson have generated millions of euro in profits and accumulated substantial assets. However, this does not provide enough information to establish her exact personal net worth.
The Bottom Line
Suzanne Jackson's biggest business achievement was turning SoSueMe from an audience into a distribution channel and eventually turning that distribution channel into a genuine consumer-products company.
SOSU Cosmetics began in 2015, Dripping Gold followed in 2018 and the companies behind the businesses went on to record multi-million-euro profits and substantial accumulated reserves.
The strongest evidence of the transformation is not Jackson's follower count.
It is the company accounts, the growth in physical retail distribution, the expansion into multiple beauty categories and the fact that the business eventually developed a structure capable of operating beyond the SoSueMe blog itself.
That also brings greater risk. Product regulation, inventory, retail relationships, advertising law and international expansion are far more complicated than influencer marketing alone.
The SoSueMe story is therefore best understood not simply as an influencer success story, but as an example of an early Irish content creator successfully converting attention into company ownership, products and long-term commercial value.
Sources and Further Information
Sources and Further Information
RTÉ — Suzanne Jackson on Ireland Fashion Week and 10 years in business
RTÉ — Millions in profits continue to roll in for SoSueMe blog founder
Irish Examiner — Firm co-owned by SoSueMe fashion blogger records €3m profits
Irish Independent — Suzanne Jackson’s beauty firms continue to drip gold as profits soar
Irish Independent — Links with beauty moguls pay off as profits rise 30% to €3.6m at O’Gorman’s Sundrelle
CCPC — Influencers, retailers and pubs breach consumer laws: details of enforcement actions
Financial information disclaimer:This article is for general informational purposes and does not constitute financial, investment, legal or tax advice. Company financial information should be checked against the latest CRO or Companies House filings before being relied upon for a financial or commercial decision.
Methodology and Important Note
Digital Dinny reviewed company financial figures reported from filed company accounts, official SOSU Cosmetics material, UK Companies House information, RTÉ reporting and the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission.
Where full turnover figures are not publicly available from abridged company accounts, no turnover figure has been inferred.
Profit, accumulated profit, cash, net assets, company valuation and personal wealth are different financial measures and should not be treated as interchangeable.
Retailpartners, product ranges, ownership arrangements and company accounts can change. Readers researching a commercial transaction should check the latest Companies Registration Office filings and relevant company documentation.