Financial focus: Estée Lauder, Beiersdorf, LG H&H and more in our beauty business update

Estée Lauder bullish on APAC fragrance, anticipates prolonged long-term growth phase - CEO​

Estée Lauder Companies CEO remains steadfast in his belief that the fragrance category in Asia-Pacific is poised for extended prosperity.

The US beauty major revealed a 5% increase in fragrance net sales, attributing the growth to notable contributions from Le Labo and Tom Ford.

This increase was underpinned by double-digit expansion in The Americas and the APAC region during its fiscal 2024 first quarter.

La Prairie hopes entry on popular app will improve position in China​

Luxury skin care brand La Prairie is set to make its debut on short-form video platform Douyin in November in bid to improve its position in China’s challenging market environment.

This follows the brand’s recent debut on e-commerce platforms, Tmall and JD.com.

“We were pretty late entering Tmall and JD.com and we are doing extremely well,”​ said Vincent Warnery, CEO of La Prairie’s parent company Beiersdorf.

LG H&H outlines new strategies for five brands across luxury, premium segments amid disappointing results​​

K-beauty major LG Household & Healthcare (LG H&H) has outlined plans to enhance its luxury and premium brands after yet another disappointing quarter.

In Q3, LG H&H’s beauty sales decreased by 15.1% to KRW670bbn while operating profit tumbled by a whopping 88.2% to KRW8bn.

This was attributed primarily to the sluggish recovery in China as well as a slum in travel retail.

HUL will push innovation ‘aggressively’ to maximise opportunities in beauty – CEO​

Unilever's Indian subsidiary is committed to driving innovation in order to uncover potential opportunities within the nation's beauty and personal care market, says its CEO.

Rohit Jawa, CEO and managing director of Hindustan Unilever (HUL) highlighted the firm’s enthusiasm for its beauty and personal care business during the firm’s third quarter (Q3) earnings conference held on October 19.

“We feel very excited about this category. This category has a virtuously strong growth rate, higher profit profile, where we have both the technology, R&D and brand assets… This is a very exciting space, and you should see more and more of our effort going in this direction.”​

MINISO sees fragrances as key to transforming into global ‘super-brand’​

Chinese retail brand MINISO has identified fragrances as one of categories that will be pivotal to its global ambitions, with the firm reporting buoyant demand in Indonesia.

To date, MINISO's entire fragrance category, which consists of products such as perfumes, has accumulated global revenue exceeding approximately USD240m.

“We believe that the perfume and fragrance market holds tremendous growth potential,” ​said Robin Liu, vice president and chief marketing officer, MINISO.