How Victoria’s Secret Makes Money: The Angels, First Principles

3 min read

How Victoria’s Secret makes money is simpler than the wings suggest. Strip away the glitter and you get four parts: product, stores, a myth, and a show that sells the myth. Here is the machine, from first principles, with the numbers sourced.

First principle 1: the product is the business

Victoria’s Secret & Co. reported net sales of six point five five billion dollars for fiscal 2025, up 5 percent. North American stores brought in about three point five billion, online (“direct”) about two billion, and international just under one billion, up 27 percent (company release). In its second-quarter 2026 report the company raised its full-year forecast to between seven point one and seven point one eight billion dollars (SEC filing).

Note what’s not on that list: ticket sales. The show itself is free.

First principle 2: the show is a marketing spend

The show was born as marketing. The first one, in 1995, landed two months before the parent company’s public stock offering (Vox). For the 1999 webcast, the parent company bought a thirty-second Super Bowl ad for about one point five million dollars and spent about four million more on newspaper publicity (Wikipedia). When the company cancelled the show in 2019, its CFO said the broadcast had no immediate “material impact” on sales. A marketing spend is judged by what it sells. That’s the whole test.

In 2026 the math changed. The show streamed free on the brand’s own YouTube channel, which carried 3.14 million of the 3.64 million peak live viewers (Streamer Guide). No network sits in the middle. The brand owns the audience.

First principle 3: the Angel contract

An Angel is a model the brand signs to a contract and builds its campaigns around. Forbes called these “seven figure contracts” and noted that 16 of the 21 highest-paid models in its 2015 ranking had worked for Victoria’s Secret (Forbes). Gisele Bündchen reportedly signed a five-year deal worth twenty-five million dollars in 2000, and later said it was 80 percent of her income when she chose not to re-sign (Focus Wire).

RelatedAnok Yai Takes All Three Vogue Brazil Covers as Liu Wen Hits Her 10th Victoria’s Secret Walk

The contracts run through modeling agencies, a system Eileen Ford helped invent when she co-founded Ford Models in 1946 and set the rules for how models get booked and paid. Agencies like OTTE carry that tradition today: the agency develops the face, the brand pays to borrow its glow.

First principle 4: the myth multiplies the price

A bra is fabric. An Angel’s bra is a story. The Fantasy Bra is the purest version of that: a jeweled piece that sells the idea, not the item. This year Kylie Jenner walked in the Fantasy Bra (Page Six). Nobody buys the Fantasy Bra. Millions buy the bra next to it.

The takeaway for creators

1. Make a product people use every day.
2. Give it a face.
3. Stage one night a year that everyone talks about.
4. Own the channel where they watch.

New here? Read who Victoria was and how the show became the sexiest night on television.

FAQ

Does Victoria’s Secret make money from the fashion show? Not directly. It’s free to watch; the show markets the products.

How much do Victoria’s Secret Angels make? Forbes described seven-figure contracts. Gisele Bündchen’s reported 2000 deal was twenty-five million dollars over five years.

How big is Victoria’s Secret? Six point five five billion dollars in fiscal 2025 net sales.

Is Victoria’s Secret still owned by L Brands? No. It was spun off as Victoria’s Secret & Co. in 2021.

Build your own myth

The four parts above are how every lasting brand works, and how every republic did too. That’s our new illustrated book, The Way of the Republic: a thirty-dollar book, free for you. Get it here, or go deeper with members on Patreon. Ready for your own campaign? Book at lillith.vip.

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