Charlotte Cardin Announces The Beaches as 2025 Billboard Canada Women of the Year

Charlotte Cardin is passing the torch.

After winning Billboard Canada's inaugural Woman of the Year award last year, the Montreal pop singer-songwriter announced this year's winner: The Beaches.

"I'm so happy for them!" she said, opening the envelope and smiling. "It's so well deserved. They've been killing it for a long time. They're really, really, really awesome girls."

The reveal came at the end of a special interview session presented by L'Oreal Paris and in partnership with iHeartRadio Canada as part of this year's Billboard Canada Women in Music.

Cardin and iHeartRadio host Shannon Burns got on a video call with The Beaches to deliver the news on Friday (August 29) — the same day the band were celebrating the release of their brand new album, No Hard Feelings.

"I just wanted to congratulate you and tell you that I love you guys and I think your music is so amazing," Cardin told the band, who gathered together to hear the news. "I’m just rooting for you always, always, always."

The Beaches will accept the award on October 1 at Billboard Canada Women in Music at Rebel in Toronto. It comes amidst the biggest year of the Toronto band's decade-plus-long career.

The've taken the viral success of 2023's "Blame Brett" and used it to level up, finding a dedicated fanbase, playing major festivals and gearing up for their biggest ever headlining show at Toronto's Scotiabank Arena on November 6. The band talk about their journey in a brand new Billboard Canada cover story, released today (September 2).

It's the first time a full group has accepted the prestigious Women of the Year award, and it puts them in a lineage with Cardin — who also represented Canada as Global Woman of the Year at Billboard Women in Music in Los Angeles in March.

"I still feel so honoured to be the first Canadian Woman of the Year for Billboard," Cardin told Burns. "I got to meet a bunch of artists that I really admire. And I got to witness performances that I will never forget. It was only celebrating women and there was no competition. It was about elevating each other. It was really beautiful and very powerful to be a part of that."

Charlotte Cardin has recently been announced as an ambassador for L'Oreal Paris, who is presenting this year's Woman of the Year Award at Billboard Canada Women in Music.

"It's my first beauty partnership ever," says Cardin. "L'Oreal has always been a brand that's just been so aligned with my values. It represents women of all ages, nationalities. It's feels like it's been a part of my life for so long, because I remember my grandmother using L'Oreal to do her makeup and my mom and my older sister. It empowers women to be themselves and to use makeup, if you want to, to enhance what's already beautiful. It's not about hiding It's just about feeling good about yourself on the inside first and foremost."

Billboard Canada Women in Music is about celebrating the trailblazing women of the music industry and empowering the next generation. Cardin says there's still a lot of work to be done when it comes to equity and representation, which is why it's great that this initiative exists.

"If you look at statistics, it's very apparent that, you know, there's still a lot of work to be done," she says. "There's less than 15% of the industry total that's represented by women. We're talking musicians and technicians and producers and artists and managers. That's quite insane because we represent 50% of the population."

She has two pieces of advice for the next generation of women in music. First: "be nice."

"It's something that just seems so obvious, but it's not," she says. "It's such a small industry. And music is supposed to be a beautiful thing, and it's supposed to be fun to make. People want to work with people that they enjoy being around."

The second: "take your time to make music that they're actually really proud of."

"If you put out music that you're not really proud of, because you just want to ride a wave, or you just want to get it out quickly, you might regret it down the road...If you don't actually love your songs, you still need to perform them every time you play a show. So it's important to love the music you make."

Cardin has had a busy year touring the world and scoring a new Billboard Canadian Hot 100 hit with "Feel Good," which was also a hit in France. She'll release the new song "Tant pis pour elle" this Friday (September 5), an infectious revenge fantasy which she describes as "a sassy, electro French pop song."

Congrats to The Beaches for this year's honour.