Beauty blogger and info businessman Valeria Chekalina charged with tax evasion for 300 million rubles. And this amount is negligible compared to real estate worth 1.37 billion rubles and income of 3 billion rubles from the cosmetic brand Letique. The “company” figured out how the Chekalins’ business empire works and why the stylist, whom the blogger accused of fraud, could become the main character of this story.
“I am not afraid of the new Instagram* algorithms and the fact that they will stop promoting me. I have my audience, and I know how to keep such a high activity, as I have been holding for 5-6 years, ” spoke in a Forbes interview last year Chekalina, known under the nickname ler_chek. 10.4 million people subscribed to the blogger on Instagram, and 692.1 thousand people to the Telegram account. Her husband is a businessman Artem Chekalin is no less a media person, to which 4 million people subscribe on Instagram.
The couple got married in 2012. According to Chekalina, the main income then fell on her husband, who until 2015 was engaged in customs clearance of imported fruits and vegetables. But after the ban on the import of agricultural products from Turkey, Chekalin’s company went bankrupt. According to SPARK, in 2014-2016, Chekalin was indeed the general director of MT-Project LLC, which was engaged in the wholesale trade in fruits and vegetables, but its bankruptcy was filed only on March 3, 2023.
Chekalina created an Instagram page back in 2011, where she first posted purely everyday things: food, workouts, her own photos. After the failure of her husband’s business, Chekalina began to actively maintain a “mom blog”, and then moved on to the topic of fitness. And over time it began to bring real income.
Later, she started running marathons for weight loss, one of the largest took place at the end of the summer of 2020. Then the prizes were an Audi A3 car and a cash reward of 3 million rubles. Apart from fitness and proper nutrition Chekalina taught subscribers to “pump financial thinking” in her marathon “New Life” and was going to give knowledge on investment. The average cost of cheap fares for these marathons ranges from 2,000 to 5,000 rubles.
In Novaya Zhizn, Chekalin said that was born in a wealthy family, but his parents did not buy him an apartment, so he decided to earn it himself. mass media notethat Artyom’s father is “a big businessman and official”. However, information about the entrepreneur Alexander Chekalin, who would have a direct connection with the family of bloggers, could not be found in the public domain.
In 2020 Forbes placedChekalin to 7th place in the ranking of bloggers who earn the most on Instagram. Then the publication estimated her advertising revenue at $ 0.61 million. In the January ranking of the most popular Instagram pages from “Medialogy”Chekalina took fourth place. At the blogger’s birthday party last year spokeEkaterina Varnava, Philip Kirkorov and Valery Meladze.
Promises and huge mansions
Moscow Department of the Investigative Committee March 7 arousedcriminal case against the Chekalins. They were accused of non-payment of taxes for 311 million rubles. The Metropolitan Prosecutor’s Office presentedaccusations. The investigation found out that Chekalina created an individual entrepreneur, switched to a simplified taxation system with an allowable income limit of 150 million rubles a year, and in 2020-2022 split the fitness marathon business. Income exceeded the limit, but Chekalina was not going to switch to the general taxation system, so she registered her earnings with her husband, his mother, Chekalin’s brother Arkady and his wife Anna, writes Mash. According to him, since 2020, Chekalina has been able to spend about 990 million rubles in this way and underpaid the state 329.6 million rubles.
According to the TFR, Chekalina evaded paying value added tax during the 3rd and 4th quarters of 2020, from the 1st to the 3rd quarters of 2021, as well as personal income tax for 2020-2021 for a total amount of more than 311 million rubles.
Searches passednot only for the bloggers themselves, but also for their family members. It was reported that the officers came down to the Chekalins’ mansion with an area of 400 sq.m. in the elite cottage village “Ilyinka Lanehouse” in the Moscow region. There, among other things, they found 8 kg of pure gold of the 999th test.
According to the “Company”, bloggers are building another mansion of almost 2.2 thousand square meters. in the no less elite village of Agalarov Estate in Istra near Moscow. Similar house in the same area costsalmost 600 million rubles, but Telegram– Channel Shot, citing its own data, estimated its construction at 1 billion rubles.
Bloggers have other real estate as well. So, according to the “Company”, Valery Chekalina recorded:
- An apartment in Tolyatti with an area of almost 210 sq. m (sold in November 2013);
- A mansion in the Agalarov Estate with an area of 2.2 thousand m (from 600 million to 1 billion rubles);
- An apartment in the residential complex “Zilart” with an area of 74.7 m2 (approximately 30 million rubles).
To Artem Chekalin:
- Apartment on Serpukhovsky Val in Moscow with an area of 150 sq.m (approximately 60 million rubles);
- Two apartments on Dekabristov Street in the north-east of Moscow (83 sq.m., about 20 million rubles and 38. sq.m., 10 million rubles, respectively);
- A country house in Ilyinka Lanehouse in the Moscow region with an area of about 400 sq.m (approximately 130 million rubles).
In 2018, Chekalina purchased a Porsche Cayenne car (about 11 million rubles), which she sold in 2021. In the same year, she got a Bentley Continental GT V8 (about 17 million rubles). Recorded on the husband:
- Lamborghini Urus 2021 (about 28 million rubles);
- Mercedes-Benz G-Class Amg G 63 2021 (about 25 million rubles);
According to Shot, Chekalin loves to drive fast, thanks to which he has received more than 400 fines for 500 thousand rubles.
The Chekalins’ lawyer, Mikhail Mushailov, stated Gazete.ruthat bloggers “do not face any punishment.” “A criminal case can be initiated against a person, or it can be initiated simply because of the commission of a crime by unidentified persons. In our case, the second situation takes place, ”he explained. Mikhail Mushailov and the representative of the Chekalins, Yulia Gromova, did not answer the Company’s questions.
On March 7, the bloggers themselves did not communicate with subscribers and the media. The next day, Chekalin said on his Instagram page that they had paid 1.5 billion rubles in taxes over the past year and a half and planned to pay off the debts presented so as not to bring the matter to prison.
Chekalina, in her stories, thanked subscribers for their support and at the same time advertised her new product– Producer’s online course “PRO-launch with Valeria Chekalina”, in which he promises to teach “to make millions of launches”, set up “correct thinking” and, together with a psychologist, “work out negative beliefs”. The basic format will cost 89 thousand rubles, premium – 120 thousand rubles, and VIP with a separate chat and mentor – 179 thousand rubles.
Billions in revenue and a loss-making company
IP Chekalina takes full responsibility for online marathons. According to the most recent data at the disposal of the “Company”, officially in 2021, the IP brought her 150 million rubles.
But Chekalina’s higher income bringscosmetic brand Letique. He does not have his own production, so the products under the contract createten different productions. Letique has two divisions: Letique Cosmetics and Letique Makeup. Under the name of the first, care products are sold: from anti-cellulite wraps to moisturizing masks. Letique Makeup is a decorative cosmetics.
Legally, the Letique business is registered with Bee Fit LLC. In 2021, the company earned 2.9 billion rubles, net profit – 657.7 million. The owners of Bee Fit are Valeria Chekalina (75%) and a certain Roman Vishnyak (25%), the CEO is Artem Chekalin.
The Letique Makeup sub-brand is registered as a separate legal entity – Letik Makeup LLC, 70% of which is owned by Chekalin, 30% by Vishnyak.
The company in 2021 earned 113.7 million rubles, net profit – 60 million rubles. Its CEO is Evgeny Kachaylov, who in 2017 participatedin the elections of deputies of the Left-bank district of Moscow. At various times, he owned and managed several companies, but now Kachaylov occupies the chair of the general director only in Letik Makeup LLC and Letikbad LLC, registered on February 21, 2023. Probably, dietary supplements will soon be released under the Letique brand. Kachaylov refused to answer the questions of the “Company”.
The demand for Chekalina cosmetics is largely artificially shaped, wrote Telegram-channel “Price of beauty”. And as proof, she notes that immediately after the launch of Letique, the blogger launched the “Wheel of Fortune” – an eternal drawing with large prizes, in order to participate in which you need to buy cosmetics. The Wheels interface is built on the principle of roulette, constantly stimulating gambling subscribers to buy more. In December 2021, Chekalina even promised to close loans to ten winners.
As a result, thousands of advertisements for the resale of Letique funds, which were bought up like lottery tickets. “There are even those who spent their entire salary on Letique products, but, without winning the promised apartment, sells new cosmetics at a discount,” the Telegram channel noted.
Moreover, many brand products are secondary. So, beauty blogger Olya RedAutumn foundThere are a lot of similarities between Letique mascara and Cabaret mascara from Vivienne Sabo, body oils with a similar product from Tom Ford, and lipsticks with Charlotte Tilbury lipsticks. At the same time, Letique’s prices are the same as those of luxury brands. However, Letique decorative cosmetics are produced at the factory of the budget brand Alvin D’Or (retailers have a “fork” of prices – 200-500 rubles per product, writes “The Price of Beauty”.
In addition to creams and masks, Chekalina offers buyletique franchise – a shopping “island” in the shopping center “with a payback of 6 months”. She promises a turnover of 600 thousand per month and no royalties. To cooperate with the Chekalins, a potential franchisee must make a lump-sum contribution of 90 thousand rubles and prepare at least 1.19 million rubles as an investment.
On the problematic nature of such a business in 2020 toldblogger Anna Cherednichenko. According to her, the management of Letique forbade franchisees to hold promotions, but at the same time they themselves launched discounts and sweepstakes on the official website, the margins of cosmetics were low. “If there is an Instagram ad from the founder [Валерии Чекалиной]- run to buy. No advertising – no one remembers us, ”Cherednichenko said. The concept of a business model was also alien to the Chekalins, they saw the following scheme: profit is revenue minus production costs and rent. At the same time, “for some reason, they did not take into account the salaries of employees, taxes and other expenses,” Cherednichenko was surprised. And there are dozens of such victims throughout the country, clarifies Shot.
At the end of December 2021, the Chekalins’ business empire became even wider – a blogger, along with Anna Chekalina, who is married to Artem Chekalin’s brother Arkady, launchedlingerie brand Leani. The general director of Leani LLC is Arkady Chekalin (30%), the beneficiary is his brother Artem (the remaining 70%). The brand’s financial results for the past year are unknown, but, according to Kompaniya’s estimates, Chekalin’s underwear sales have brought at least 9 million rubles since the creation of Leani, excluding taxes and commissions.
Deal with investigators as revenge
The security forces’ hunt for the blogger family could have started with a conflict between Chekalina and her former stylist Elvira Yankovskaya, the author of the Telek Telek YouTube channel, who specializes in bloggers and their sales, notes in an interview with Kompaniya. In August last year, Chekalina statedthat celebrity stylist Yankovskaya has been deceiving her for a long time by selling fake luxury brand products. The blogger, along with other victims, of which there were more than 15 people, filed a class action lawsuit against the stylist, estimating their damage at more than 8 million rubles.
Yankovskaya denied her guilt, but the Perovsky Court of Moscow placed her under house arrest on February 4, he wrote. Super.ru. At the same time, right before the searches at the bloggers’ houses, Yankovskaya was released from house arrest, notes Mash. The author of the Telek Telek YouTube channel did not rule out that the stylist could make a deal with the investigation. However, her lawyer is in every possible way deniesstating that the searches at the Chekalins and the court’s refusal to extend Yankovskaya’s house arrest “have nothing to do with each other and are under the jurisdiction of different departments.”
Before the luxury controversy, in 2021, Chekalina and Yankovskaya created the Le Force sportswear brand (website preservedin the archive).
To do this, they created LEA LLC, where the stylist acted as the general director. There is only one person on the list of employees working for the company. The company has not yet provided information on income to the authorities.
In general, tax avoidance is a common savings option for bloggers selling courses, notes the author of the Telek Telek YouTube channel. Moreover, it used to be “openly taught.”
For example, makeup artist Gohar Avetisyan worked according to such a scheme, recalls YouTube blogger Victoria Yutubnaya, author of the YouTube channel. The make-up artist had six websites of the same course, indicating different IPs in the payment details.
Meanwhile, the interlocutors of the publication disagree about the reputational consequences for the Chekalins in their games with the state. Yutubnaya believes that subscribers now unfamiliar with the revelations of the Chekalins will look at this family from a different angle, since in many public places where bloggers have not previously appeared, “they are exposed as information gypsies.”
The author of the Telek Telek YouTube channel is more skeptical. As an argument, he cited the example of infoblogger Alexandra Mitroshina, who was charged with 200 million rubles of debt to the state last year by the tax authorities. According to the interlocutor of the “Company”, the blogger sold several more courses, the income from which went to pay the fine and continues to work. According to his observations, part of the audience is sure that the searches are “just the start of a “warm-up” to a new course.”
The author of the Telek Telek Youtube channel calls “cunning and permissiveness” the main reasons for bloggers’ fraud with taxes.
– Telek Telek
And checks will not end on the Chekalins. A large-scale audit of the Federal Tax Service awaits several dozen more bloggers, including the author of the “Marathon of Desires” Elena Blinovskaya, the wife of rapper Dzhigan Oksana Samoilova, the founder of the business club “Transformer” Dmitry Portnyagin and others, wrote Telegram– channel “112”. Kommersant’s sources in the Investigative Committee told about the same.
As for the Chekalins, the head of the New People party, Alexei Nechaev, unexpectedly stood up for them. He stated that they “did not make a house and a car for themselves on government contracts and corruption schemes”, but “earned money themselves and spent it as they saw fit”, and in general “they are the very drivers of the economy that the authorities constantly talk about, not corrupt officials who should be ashamed. Nechaev promised to discuss this topic at a party meeting with Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin. “Such family businesses need to be supported, not clipped on their wings on takeoff,” concluded Nechaev.
