Report: Millennials important for beauty growth

DENVER — Millennials are emerging as one of the most influential generations of consumers and are shaping up to be critical to growth in the beauty sector. 

Although beauty represents a $47.9 billion market in the United States, with 14% attributed to drug stores, there are challenges in growing the market. 

“Trips across the key mass channels are down — and particularly in drug, so that’s very alarming,” according to Christina Spizzirri, a director at Nielsen’s North America buy division, who presented an Insight Session called “Beauty and the Millennials” on Sunday. 

Nielsen’s six-month study on the beauty sector demonstrated an “alarming rate of low ad effectiveness in the beauty sector,” she said. 

So beauty suppliers need to target millennials — consumers ages 18 years to 24 years — in order to find growth, according to Spizzirri. Over the next six years, millennials will contribute to 70% of consumer packaged goods growth. Forbes estimates that there are 80 million millennials in America, representing a quarter of the population. 

“This is the most diverse and connected generation,” Spizzirri said. “They are just now starting to find their voice.”

According to Nielsen’s report, most millennials spend most of their income online, own a smartphone, seek natural or organic products, and are invested in sustainability.

“Millennials are more willing to pay a premium for products with healthy attributes — more so than any of the other generations,” Spizzirri said. In the past four years, the beauty sector saw a 24% growth rate in natural and organic products. 

Nielsen’s study also revealed the generation’s diversity.  

“It is more important for millennials that we are thinking of ways to reach the multicultural consumer,” Spizzirri said.

Only 56% of millennials are white, and Hispanic Americans represent the leading beauty consumers. “That’s where the growth is in beauty,” Spizzirri said.