Overall Data

After the off-season in July, the beauty market rebounded in August with Qixi festival promotions playing an important role.

According to National Bureau of Statistics’ data, the total retail sales of social consumer goods reached 3357.1 billion yuan, a YoY increase of 0.5%. Among all the categories, cosmetics performed exceptionally well. Its retail sales amounted to 28.4 billion yuan, with a YoY growth rate of 19% ^[1].

Online sales contributed a lot to the whole market’s growth. Data from Alibaba shows that the GMV of beauty products (such as skincare, makeup, body care, fragrance, etc.) across all Ali-owned platforms was 14.11 billion yuan in August, increasing by 23% YoY^[2].

Skincare segment

Table 1

Most categories in the skincare segment increased in August. Among them, beauty services had the highest growth rate, 114.49%. Most beauty services are part of the beauty enhancement business, such as hyaluronic acid injections and botox injections. Except for May and July, this category kept increasing in 2020, implying that consumers’ demand for such services steadily increased.

Lip care and Facial care set also had great increase rates in August, 52.29% and 40.20%, because many beauty brands chose these two categories as their Qixi festival promotion products.

It is usually in late August, when the climate becomes drier, when Chinese consumers’ demand for facial care and hand care increase.

Table 2

Table 3

The TOP20 Skincare Brands List (Table 2) showed that international brands outperformed domestic brands in August (with 15 international brands VS 5 domestic brands).

Whoo, a Korean brand, ranked first in the TOP20 Skincare Brands List for the first time in 2020. Its excellent performance was attributed to the great sales of its one gift box, Whoo Seven-pice Skincare Set. The second popular skincare product in the TOP10 Skincare Products List was also a facial care set, again proving the popularity of a set box in some gift-giving festivals.

Makeup segment

Table 4

The sales of makeup sets doubled in August while lip makeup and perfume sales both increased by over 50%. These three categories were all popular gift choices in the Qixi festival.

Table 5

In the TOP20 Makeup Brands List, YSL replaced Florasis to rank the first in August. Most brands in the list launched special products for the Qixi festival (For more details read How Beauty Brands Prepare for Chinese Valentine’s Day). The TOP1 brand, YSL, even launched 7 different kinds of Qixi gift boxes themed “Hunting for Love.”

Perfect Diary, a popular domestic brand that has ranked first or second in the past months, ranked 7th in August. It didn’t launch any new products for the Qixi Festival promotion this year.

Jo Malone, a perfume brand, entered this list for the first time. During the Qixi festival, Jo Malone launched a gift box containing five flower perfumes, which later gained much traction online.

Table 6

In the TOP10 Makeup Products List, Florasis had 3 products ranking first, second (powder products) in addition to a new product at sixth rank. This product, Florasis Eastern Beauty Makeup Set,  was specially designed for 2020 Qixi festival and helped Floasis gain much traction during this competitive festival.

YSL had two products entering this list, its new lipstick and classic lipstick gift box set, which could satisfy consumers’ gift-sending needs.

Overall, there are some points worthy of attention:

First, festival promotion is a good chance for beauty brands to boost sales. Many brands, such as Whoo, YSL, MAC, and Dior, all benefited from this year’s Qixi festival promotion while Perfect Diary didn’t, and its ranking subsequently dropped.

Second, gift box/ set, including facial care set and makeup set, is popular during the festival. They are proper gift choices since they are convenient and well-packaged.

Third, although domestic brands have gradually risen within the beauty industry (especially in the makeup segment), consumers still tend to choose famous international brands for gift-giving. That’s one of the main reasons why international brands performed better in August.