Chances are, unless you’ve been paying close attention in the cosmetics department at Nordstrom or Bergdorf Goodman, you haven’t heard of Elemis. Until 2005, when it began selling in British retail outlets, the London-based skin-care brand was available only in spas. Only in 2006 did it begin expanding into a select number of high-end U.S. stores.

But this year, Elemis inked a deal that will assure its visibility in the international market. Starting in October, four of its products—including a tiny jar of Pro-Collagen Marine Cream, normally priced at $124 for 1.8 ounces—will be placed in the amenity kits that are distributed to British Airways business-class passengers around the world. Elemis will also take over the operation of B.A.’s eight airport spas in New York and London, including one at J.F.K., a major U.S. hub for international travelers. Elemis won’t disclose the terms of the five-year deal, but even without taking the dollar value into account, it represents a jackpot.

More than 2 million people will come into contact with Elemis each year, not counting the airport spa offerings, says Oriele Frank, the company’s director of marketing. “You have a brand that’s relatively young, just launched into the retail market,” she says. “This came at the right time.”

According to Terry Daly, divisional senior vice president for service delivery at Dubai-based Emirates airlines, on any standard international flight there are more than 750 different hard items—cutlery, crockery, paper coasters, toiletries, pillows—that the carrier has procured. Some are branded and some aren’t. “For the airline,” Daly says, “none of these items represents as big an investment—and for the vendor, none of these items represents as big an opportunity—as the onboard amenity kits.”

Stuffed with pampering samples to brighten the journeys of first- and business-class passengers, those little bags are important marketing tools for some of the world’s largest cosmetics companies—and launching pads for up-and-coming competitors. Contracts that represent millions of investment dollars to the airlines normally turn over every three or five years and are fiercely coveted. For a new brand just gaining traction, a deal with an international carrier can mean the difference between breakout success or languishing in obscurity.

B.A. has helped make the names of companies including Molton Brown, a maker of British beauty products that was relatively unknown in the U.S. until its toothpaste, lotions, and shave gels showed up in B.A.’s trans-Atlantic amenity bags as part of an eight-year contract with the carrier. L’Occitane, the 31-year-old French skin-care company, signed a $4 million, three-year deal with Delta in 2002, when it was working to expand its sales in the U.S. Today, the brand is a household name.