It was the protagonist of purchases during the pandemic, especially lockdowns, reaching fourth place in terms of consumption and continues to grow: e-commerce represents an opportunity for cosmetic companies – from perfumeries to mono-brand stores, passing through pharmacies and brands that only sell online – which have moved in this direction by offering increasingly refined virtual shopping experiences. Without forgetting the traditional channels which, according to the operators, remain essential to be able to “touch” beauty products and fully experience the values of a brand and the advice of experts.
What is certain is that the end of 2021 sanctioned a renewal of the distribution model of the cosmetic market in the light of the conditions that emerged with the crisis. According to the latest surveys by Cosmetica Italia, the new purchasing and consumption routines have led the market to a value of over 10.6 billion euros, up 8.8% compared to 2020. However, the association warns category, “the technical recession that Italy will go through in 2022, leads to cautious estimates projected to 2023, impacted by the slowdown in the propensity to consume, inflationary conditions and lower flows of international trade linked to the crisis between Russia and Ukraine “. For this year, an increase of 3.3% is expected, followed by a further increase of 3.2% in 2023, which will bring the value of consumption to over 11.3 billion in the next two years.
King of growth is still confirmed e-commerce which in 2021 exceeded the value of 870 million euros with an increase of 23.2%, confirming itself as the fourth choice channel for cosmetics, with an estimated increase of 19.5% for this year and 18% for 2023 supported by the brand integration strategy between online and offline.
E-commerce aside, among the dynamics that characterized last year’s sales emerges the return of perfumery as a second channel, recovering from the temporary overtaking of the pharmacy two years ago, which had suffered less conditioning dictated by the lockdown periods: after the contraction recorded two years ago, its value has returned to close to 1.88 billion with an increase of 21.3%, one of the highest of traditional channels, although the values are still far from pre-Covid levels. On the other hand, the projections for 2022 and 2023 are stable at + 2%.
Large-scale distribution maintains first place with over 4.5 billion spent, up 2.7%, but with very different dynamics within large-scale distribution: assortment and price leverage are among the main drivers that accompany routine of purchase in this macrochannel and serve to explain the great success highlighted by drugstores (specialized in home and toilet) which exceed in value the historical supremacy of hyper and super and become the first channel with a trend of + 5.7% among the 2020 and 2021.