Victoria's Secret

Victoria's Secret is a US retailer of lingerie, apparel and beauty products, founded on June 12, 1977 by Roy Raymond and his wife Gaye Raymond at the Stanford Shopping Center in Palo Alto, California [7]. Within the beauty market it is known chiefly for prestige fragrance and body care, a line the company describes as "award-winning prestige fragrances and body care" [4]. The business is publicly traded as Victoria's Secret & Co. (NYSE: VSCO) and is headquartered in Reynoldsburg, Ohio [7].

The company remains active and global, operating around 1,380 retail stores across nearly 70 countries [4]. Its beauty catalogue centres on the Bombshell family of scents alongside body mists, lotions, washes and other fragrance-led products.

Roy Raymond, a Stanford graduate, and Gaye Raymond opened the first Victoria's Secret store in 1977 [7]. In 1982 Raymond sold the company to Les Wexner, founder of Limited Stores Inc. of Columbus, Ohio, for one million dollars [7]. Under Wexner's ownership it grew into the largest lingerie retailer in the United States, and the beauty business followed later, with the company entering the cosmetics market in 1998 [7].

After the 1982 sale, Victoria's Secret became part of Limited Brands, which was renamed L Brands in 2013 [7]. On August 3, 2021 it was separated from L Brands and listed as an independent company under the name Victoria's Secret & Co. [7]. Today the parent company also owns the PINK label, launched in 2002 for teenagers and younger women [7], and, per its corporate materials, the Adore Me brand.

The company frames its beauty and wider business around what it calls "Brands that Celebrate and Support," with a stated focus on "championing women all around the world" [5]. Its fragrance marketing carries the tagline "There's a Bombshell in all of us." Within beauty the range is positioned at the prestige tier, and the company markets itself in the United States as its number-one fragrance brand.

Victoria's Secret's signature scent is Bombshell Eau de Parfum, which the company launched in 2010 and describes as "America's #1 fragrance" [3]. The brand built out a wider Bombshell family, including Bombshell Intense, Seduction, Passion, Nights, In Bloom and Bombshell Bronze, and markets the original around notes it identifies as purple passion fruit from Brazil, "Shangri-la peony" and vanilla orchid from Madagascar [3]. Other fragrance collections include Very Sexy, Body by Victoria and VS Signature. The beauty line extends beyond perfume to fine fragrance mists, body lotions, washes and hair-and-body mists.

The fashion publication Who What Wear featured the brand in a ranked list of its perfumes and described Bombshell as an instant and long-lasting hit that "still reigns as America's number one fragrance" [8].

Wikipedia documents several serious issues associated with the company, including workplace harassment, ties between former owner Les Wexner and Jeffrey Epstein, alleged links to Uyghur forced labour in its supply chain, and racial discrimination lawsuits [7].

Victoria's Secret is active and operates globally. It is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, runs roughly 1,380 stores in nearly 70 countries [4], and continued brand activity through 2024 and 2025, including a fifteenth-anniversary campaign for Bombshell [3].