Specialist
Former managing director at L'Oréal SA
Agenda
- Key consumer trends across skin care, cosmetics and fragrances
- Brand positioning and growth outlook across L'Oréal's (PAR: OR) four key categories – L'Oréal Lux, Active Cosmetics, Consumer Products and Professional Products
- Key growth and innovation opportunities across regions and product categories
Questions
1.
What 2-3 key trends you have noted in the global beauty landscape over the past 12 months, touching on the performance across the key categories such as skincare, cosmetics and fragrances and what you think is important to highlight?
2.
Do you expect the make-up category to rebound to pre-coronavirus levels?
3.
Do you think that rebound and growth will be led more by the premium cosmetic market or the mass market, or do you think it will be across the board?
4.
You mentioned the success of L’Oréal’s Active Cosmetics division. How impressively has Active Cosmetics grown throughout coronavirus? Do you think it was purely that online digital strategy and channel that drove the growth here, or what was the real buoyancy for Active Cosmetics through these past 12-18 months?
5.
Do you think the growth from EUR 3bn to EUR 5bn will be driven largely by China and the potential there?
6.
Do you think expanding margins for Active Cosmetics can come through the scale effect of what L’Oréal brings, as well as some further pricing power that L’Oréal can achieve through these brands?
7.
The channel shift to digital has significantly benefited Active Cosmetics. Have any categories in the global beauty market been negatively impacted by these channel shifts, including fragrance? What is your outlook on the channel changes given that big department stores such as Sephora are closed? How does that impact L’Oréal and which categories within L’Oréal does that impact?
8.
How does moving to a digital strategy change cosmetics and beauty, given these categories have such an interactional and one-on-one dynamic? How do big brands and companies such as L’Oréal get over that hurdle? What does it mean for innovation and new brands coming to market?
9.
What do you think of the leadership changes at L’Oréal? Do you think this will ultimately change the strategic direction of the firm? Do you think new management might bring something new to the way L’Oréal does business or approaches its growth?
10.
Are there any possible risks of new management at L’Oréal that might not get focused on?
11.
What is your outlook for L’Oréal’s Professional Products division, how it’s digitised and how it’s been brought back into growth even though it’s quite a small part of the company? Do you think it still remains one of the four key pillars for L’Oréal, and do you expect further growth here? Could this remain a low-growth but important division for the company?
12.
You touched on distribution problems in the Consumer Products division. Have you noticed L’Oréal attempting to change this and capture younger consumers? Is there a structural distribution issue?
13.
Do you think innovation is needed around key brands in L’Oréal’s Consumer Products and mass market portfolio? Does the company need to start pushing new brands into the mass-premium segment? Do you think the company is capable of doing this?
