How Instagram and a New Zeitgeist Are Driving Skin Care’s Growth

The skin-care race is revving up. The category’s rally, which got rolling roughly 18 months ago, is steadily gaining momentum. Sales of prestige treatment products are running 14 percent ahead in the U.S. for the latest 12-month period, ended in May, according to the NPD Group’s total measured market. That compares with a 9 percent increase for 2017 and 3 percent for 2016. Those figures make skin care beauty’s emerging growth engine, outpacing makeup. Color cosmetics is still a larger category — with $2 billion in first-quarter sales versus $1.5 billion for skin care — but its sales gained just 4 percent in the latest 12-month period, according to NPD. “Makeup is still booming in some of the less-developed markets,” said Carol Hamilton, group president of the Luxe division of L’Oréal USA. “But the growth of skin care is beating makeup in every single market.” The generational shift that has electrified makeup is also behind the surge in skin care. “What’s new and different is you now have the Millennials incredibly interested, passionate and turned on to [the category],” said Jane Hertzmark Hudis, group president at Estée Lauder Cos. “When you add the Millennials to the ageless [those over age 45] you get explosive growth.” The U.S.

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