The clean beauty space witnessed a 9.8% growth of all product classes in 2022 as the COVID-19 pandemic waned and retailers saw a shift from e-commerce back to the brick-and-mortar channel.
According to Kline & Co.’s Clean Beauty Global Series 2022: United States Market Analysis and Opportunities report, the market continued to shift away from the nature-inspired segment to brands that positioned themselves as “truly natural.” However, due to a large number of prominent nature-inspired brands such as Garnier, Aveeno, and Kiehl’s, the segment retained the most market share.
Category/Segment Performance
Makeup registered a strong 17.0% growth, leading to total sales exceeding pre-pandemic levels. The clean space continued to find new and improved ways of product innovation involving products that served a multi-tasking function.
Meanwhile, says Karen Doskow, Director of Kline’s Beauty and Wellness practice, hair care continued to register increased growth coming out of the pandemic, despite the realization that hair care cannot be 100% clean because of certain chemicals that are required to create scents. Doskow says this is a reality that both brands and consumers seemed to have accepted.
The Top 10
The top 10 clean beauty companies all registered growth in 2022, leading with over 47% market share (to find out which companies are in the top five, see below).
“They held a considerable share in the skin care product class,” says Doskow, “but only L’Oréal had a strong market share in most categories, with a 31.3% sales share in the hair care product class.”
M&A activity in the industry was robust — notables moves include Procter & Gamble signing an agreement in January to acquire Tula Skincare, Famille C acquiring Ilia Beauty in February, Helen of Troy completing its acquisition of Curlsmith in April, and Amorepacific acquiring Tata Harper Skincare in September.
Outlook
So what’s next for the clean beauty industry? According to Kline’s research, growth is expected to soften significantly from the 9.8% recorded in 2022, due to the challenging economic climate and market saturation.
“In addition, inflation and a potential recession is on the horizon,” says Doskow, “It remains to be seen how consumers respond and if some of them will be reluctant to open their wallets and spend the extra money on clean beauty products.”
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