Benchmark Summary

LashBox LA led the Beauty & Personal Care benchmark in August 2026 with 39.6% valid recommendation coverage, ahead of Bella Lash at 37.8%, a gap of 1.8 percentage points. Coverage declined for Bella Lash from 46.5% in July 2026 to 37.8% in August 2026, the largest decline in the category. Sugarlash PRO also declined from 24.7% in July 2026 to 17.5% in August 2026. Paris Lash Academy posted the largest coverage increase, rising from 11.7% in July 2026 to 15.4% in August 2026.

This month saw significant movement in the category. Both Bella Lash and Sugarlash PRO registered declines beyond normal month-to-month variation. The category leader, LashBox LA, held steady within normal variation, while Paris Lash Academy, London Lash Pro, and Borboleta Pro also remained stable.

The benchmark began with 604 prompt-surface observations in each month and produced 331 qualified observations in August 2026 after qualification.

Current Benchmark at a Glance

Qualified surface breadth is the number of canonical AI surface families with at least one qualified observation: ChatGPT, Copilot, Gemini, Perplexity, AI Overviews, and AI Mode.

Research Scope and Qualification

The public benchmark is narrower than the raw collection universe by design.

Brand-level percentages use the qualified observations as the public denominator, not the raw collection. See the AI Market Discovery Methodology for the full qualification process.

Current Brand Standings

How to Read the Standings

• Presence rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand is mentioned at all.
• Valid recommendation coverage is the share of qualified observations in which the brand appears in a valid recommendation shortlist.
• Top-three rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand is placed in the first three recommendation positions.
• Rank-one rate is the share of qualified observations in which the brand is the first recommendation.
• Net sentiment is the share of positive mentions minus the share of negative mentions.

For formulas and denominator rules, see AI Market Discovery Metric Definitions.

Recommendation Coverage Movement

Largest Decline: Sugarlash PRO

Sugarlash PRO declined from 24.7% valid recommendation coverage in July 2026 to 17.5% in August 2026, a significant drop of 7.2 percentage points. Presence rate fell from 29.8% in July 2026 to 21.8% in August 2026, down 8.0 points. Net sentiment remained high and positive at 0.9 in August 2026, unchanged from 0.9 in July 2026.

LashBox LA records 39.6% valid recommendation coverage in August 2026, while Sugarlash PRO stands at 17.5%. That recommendation gap matters because Sugarlash PRO is entering valid recommendation shortlists less often than the category leader within the situations measured by this benchmark. The current benchmark does not establish the cause of the gap, making the mechanism behind the weaker recommendation position the immediate issue to diagnose.

Highest-priority diagnostic: Which prompts, AI/search surfaces, recommendation placements, or attributable evidence sources are associated with Sugarlash PRO's lower valid recommendation coverage relative to the category leader?

Largest Decline: Bella Lash

Bella Lash held the leading position in July 2026 at 46.5% valid recommendation coverage and fell to 37.8% in August 2026, a decline of 8.7 percentage points beyond normal month-to-month variation. Presence rate fell from 58.2% in July 2026 to 48.3% in August 2026, down 9.9 points. Despite the coverage decline, Bella Lash's rank-one rate more than doubled from 6.0% to 13.9%.

Category Leader: LashBox LA

LashBox LA became the category leader in August 2026 with 39.6% valid recommendation coverage, up from 36.4% in July 2026. This gain of 3.2 percentage points was within normal month-to-month variation. LashBox LA also led the category on rank-one rate at 16.0%, up from 12.0% in July 2026.

Recommendation Placement Snapshot

Coverage alone does not show how prominently a brand is recommended. Among the leading brands, LashBox LA and Bella Lash showed distinct placement profiles in August 2026. LashBox LA posted the higher top-three rate at 32.0%, with Bella Lash close behind at 30.8%. On first-position rates, LashBox LA led at 16.0%, ahead of Bella Lash at 13.9%.

Close coverage levels can still hide different first-position rates. Bella Lash's rank-one rate more than doubled from 6.0% to 13.9% even as its top-three rate shifted modestly from 32.3% to 30.8%.

Buyer-Intent Distribution

All 331 qualified observations in August 2026 fell into the brand recommendation class of buyer intent.

The current public series measures only the brand recommendation class of discovery and contains no qualified observations for pricing and value or multi-brand comparison questions.

Historical Measurement Record

Evidence and Source Layer

The benchmark is built from prompt-level observations that retain the query, AI/search surface, answer, brand outcome, recommendation placement, sentiment, and, where exposed, citations or attributable evidence sources. Source presence is evidence about the information environment; it is not automatically proof that the source caused the recommendation.

Scope Boundaries

This public benchmark does not measure:

• Market share or attributable sales.
• Every possible AI response to a given query.
• Organic-search ranking positions.
• Social mention volume or sentiment outside AI surfaces.
• Private or sponsored channels.
• Causality from a metric movement alone. The benchmark records the change; it does not establish why the change occurred.

About This Benchmark

The LLM Authority Index AI Market Discovery Index is a neutral, recurring measurement of how AI-powered research and discovery surfaces present brands within a vertical. Each monthly snapshot tracks brand presence, recommendation coverage, placement, and sentiment across six canonical AI surface families. New measurements are added to the same evergreen report.

• AI Market Discovery Methodology
• AI Market Discovery Metric Definitions
• AI Market Discovery Research Standards
• Modeled AI Authority Value

Get a Company-Level Authority Index

The public industry benchmark shows category-level standings. A company-level Authority Index can go deeper into your brand's specific AI discovery footprint, placement trends, and competitive context across the same canonical AI surfaces. The public percentage cannot identify the prompts, competitors, or sources causing the result.

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