Prestige Fragrance Maintains in Market

In US department stores, prestige beauty products totaled $799 million for February 2013, according to recent findings from The NPD Group. Total beauty saw an increase of +3%. Fragrance, representing 25% of prestige beauty dollars, saw no change from the previous year. Skin care, representing 35% of prestige beauty sales, grew +4% and makeup, representing the lion’s share of the prestige beauty business at 40%, grew +3%.


Year-to-date (January and February) 2013 sales of total prestige beauty (with an extra week in January) amounted to $1.5 billion, an increase of +15% versus one year ago. When adjusted for the extra week, total prestige beauty was still upbeat with a +4% growth versus a year ago. Looking at the individual categories’ year-to-date dollar performances, Fragrance increased +11%, but was only up +1% when adjusted to reflect a four week January 2013, Makeup increased +17% and was still up +5% when adjusted, and skin care posted a +16% increase and was still up +5% when adjusted.