As the “youngest-ever self-made billionaire” at 21, according to Forbes, Kylie Jenner seems to be dominating the game. While the “self-made” moniker may be a bit of a stretch, given that she is the youngest girl in one of America’s wealthiest and most media-savvy families, poker players know that the game is far less about the hand you are dealt than it is about the way you play it.
Being dealt pocket aces means you start the hand in the best position, and there’s no doubt Jenner was born with more aces than she can count. Part of the Kardashian media empire, the world watched the youngest member of the clan grow up in front of their eyes, live on TV in Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
Starting on the show at age 9, Jenner grew up knowing nothing else, living her tween and teen years in the middle of one of the biggest media extravaganzas of the time. Whether you were a fan or a hater, it was impossible to be alive in the Western world and not hear about Keeping Up with the Kardashians.
The young Kylie grew up in that media maelstrom, learning the ropes from the inside through osmosis and observation. She turned the newfound media attention into a growing makeup empire as a teenager, using her social media platform to answer questions about her lip gloss and other makeup products & tips.
While it’s clear the youngest member of the Kardashian family was dealt a very strong starting hand from the start of this game, it’s equally clear that with Kylie Cosmetics, a company that got her on the cover of Forbes’ “America’s Women Billionaires” edition despite not QUITE being a billionaire at the time, she knows how to play her cards in the thick of the streets.
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Emerging from the Kardashian Shadow
The flip side to growing up Kardashian must be the intense spotlight. It’s a family whose every move is scrutinized by the paparazzi, and not always in the kindest or most respectful ways. While they arguably bring a lot of that on themselves through over-the-top antics and family drama, trying to navigate an environment like that as a tween and teen while under the intense glare of the media spotlight, regardless of the advantages vast wealth and influence might bring, is a uniquely tricky ask.
Just navigating that path is a challenge, and history shows that many young people who achieved superstardom, like child actors and musicians, aren’t able to make it out the other side without severe dysfunction and hardship, even death. Jenner, on the other hand, walked that path while building a major cosmetics brand in her teens.
Imagine you’re dealt two black aces. Life is good — you get to start the game with the best hand possible. But then the flop comes, and it’s six-seven-eight of hearts. You still have a good hand, but suddenly the game requires a new focus to navigate properly.
It’s an imperfect analogy, but Jenner played her tricky flop to perfection, selling 51% of the Kylie Cosmetics brand to Coty for $600 million, scooping in a $340 million after-tax pot. After that, she backed away from the business mogul life to focus on having and raising her children.
While her private life hasn’t been smooth, in comparison to her famous family, she seems downright grounded. She spent the pandemic cohabitating with the father of her second child, Travis Scott, despite the pair breaking up just prior. Now, she’s in a happy relationship with the hottest actor of their generation, Timothée Chalamet.
Poker in the Family
The poker references aren’t out of the blue here – Jenner is an avid recreational homegame player, and comes from a family steeped in that tradition. In 2018, she, along with her sisters Khloe & Kim and mother Kris, played in the first annual “If Only” Texas hold’em charity poker tournament benefiting City of Hope at The Forum.
While that occasion spawned a meme at her sister Kim’s expense (mirrored singlasses aren’t QUITE the terrible choice they are popularly shown as), it’s clear that poker is a part of Jenner’s family DNA, and new partner Chalamet fits right in with that. Her fame and odd upbringing have tended to preclude a nightlife for her, but she fills her time playing poker with friends.
She and Chalamet run a home game for their friends, and she’s a regular at Jonas Wood’s annual World Series of Art Poker event. And one of the biggest media stars of her generation is doing her part to bring new players to the game, filming an intro to poker for the Vanity Fair article that goes through the bare basics of how to navigate the felt in no limit hold’em.
We’ve yet to see Jenner on the competitive scene, but who knows what the future holds. One thing seems clear from her early hands in the larger game of life, however — she may have been dealt among the best hands in the game to start, but she learned quickly how to play those cards through some pretty unique and challenging streets, emerging with a huge pot from a board that many previous players went broke on.
Poker has lent many a phrase to the English language, and “playing your cards right” is just one of them. If Jenner plays her actual poker hands as well as she’s navigated her first few hands in life, she probably does pretty well at the felt.
