Thom Brodeur: The Powerhouse Redefining Beauty Pageantry for the 21st Century
Thom Brodeur is not just disrupting the global pageant industry—he is rewriting its rulebook. With a fearless vision and an unshakable commitment to innovation, this tech titan turned pageant mogul is leading a $30 billion industry-wide transformation. But do not mistake his ruthless ambition for recklessness—Brodeur operates with surgical precision and an unyielding sense of integrity.
“The beauty pageant industry has been stuck in a time warp for decades,” Brodeur says. “It is time for a full-scale revolution—one built on transparency, empowerment, and actual innovation. I did not come here to play small. Small minds and small wallets will not get the job done.”
From Silicon Valley to the Global Spotlight
Brodeur’s rise to power was not an accident. His technical genius and digital dominance made him a force to be reckoned with long before he ever set foot in the pageant world.
Armed with degrees in political science and economics from Youngstown State University and executive leadership credentials from Thunderbird School of Global Management, he made a name for himself as a tech disruptor before tech disruption was cool.
His tenure as GoDaddy’s first Chief Marketing Officer reshaped the company’s global identity, propelling it from a scrappy upstart to a dominant force in web services. As EVP of Global Development at Marketwired and President & COO at the first social network for women’s health – EmpowHER – Brodeur consistently turned industries inside out, amplifying digital engagement and monetizing content in ways competitors had not yet considered.
“I thrive in industries that need shaking up, need breaking up, or that aren’t keeping pace with change,” he says. “From Internet business services to the newswire industry to women’s health – I have had a front-row seat at the tables of change. It is time for the century-old pageant industry to change or die. I love this industry, so dying is not an option.”
Breaking Beauty’s Old Guard
As CEO of Yandy.com, he transformed the brand from a lingerie and swimwear retailer into a cultural movement centered around inclusivity and empowerment. His strategic alliances with Miss USA and Miss Teen USA were just a warning shot—a signal to the industry that Brodeur had arrived, and he meant business.
Then, he acquired and rebranded Reina Belleza Universo into Queen Beauty, an international competition built for the modern woman. Today, Queen Beauty is a licensed brand to another innovation founded by a brilliant woman and Brodeur friend, Holly Lynch – a first-ever streaming network dedicated exclusively to beauty, fashion, and pageant programming – The Queen Beauty Network (QBN.)
“Traditional pageantry is suffering because it has ignored important market shifts and evolutionary queues,” Brodeur says bluntly. “I am not here to throw more hair and makeup at it. I am here to move the industry forward in a different way. It may be uncomfortable, but it is necessary.”
Tech Meets Tiara: The PageantFans™ Revolution
Brodeur’s next move is nothing short of revolutionary. Seeing an industry built on exclusivity but lacking innovation, he created PageantFans™—the first-ever creator platform for the pageant industry. With over 600 million fans and nearly 9 million contestants across 350,000 competitions around the world, PageantFans™ is the only platform designed to allow the beauty queen creators on it to own, manage, and monetize their name, image, and likeness while giving fans closer, more engaged, VIP experiences and access to their favorite beauty queens and pageant competitors all over the world. This digital juggernaut promises to drag pageantry into the 21st century.
“For decades, pageants have been controlled by a handful of gatekeepers, dictating who gets access, opportunity, and success,” Brodeur explains. “We’ve raised a lot of money to ensure PageantFans™ puts power back into the hands of the women on whose shoulders this worldwide industry has been built.”
The Reckoning: Power, Transparency, and the End of the Old Guard
While some in the industry are scrambling to protect outdated power structures, Brodeur is pulling back the curtain on pageantry’s darkest secrets—demanding leadership overhauls, contract reform, operational transparency, and financial accountability.
He is not just shaking the tree—he is surgically pruning it into something bigger, healthier, and more sustainable. And the world is watching. His calls for industry reform have been featured on CNN, The New York Times, ABC’s Good Morning America, Nightline, and others. He is not just a player in the space anymore—he has become one of the most powerful voices in the industry, advocating loudest for its chief asset – the beauty queens who power it.
And yet, for all his disruption, Brodeur operates with a cause-no-harm leadership style. He leads with strategy, empathy, and an unwavering commitment to doing right by those the system has left behind.
The Future of Pageantry is the Beauty Queen Economy
Where Brodeur goes, industries follow. With Queen Beauty, PageantFans™, and a relentless drive to modernize the industry, Brodeur – sometimes described as the ‘King of Queens’ – is synonymous with the movement he is leading.
When Forbes asked Brodeur what his end game was; he had this to say.
“I want to create at least $100 billion in economic value for the women who compete in pageants. Could you imagine even 1 million of the 9 million women who compete every year becoming financially independent and millionaires because we tip the scales in their favor? That is a $1 trillion-dollar economic impact in the world. Do you know how much more money pageant systems and the ecosystem would earn if we flipped the switch to favor enriching the girls themselves? Game-changing. And I am just the game changer to do it.”
Whatever the outcome of his quest, we were impressed with Brodeur’s deep knowledge of the landscape; his unapologetic belief that the global pageant industry’s best days are ahead of it, and his indefatigable commitment to being a champion of change; however unpopular or thankless it may be.
