Travel Retail fulfilling the growing appetite for men’s grooming products?

By: Pepi Sappal • email: info@trunblocked.com

Men are now outspending their female counterparts in both fashion and grooming worldwide in a bid to be more presentable and youthful. Barclaycard’s latest statistics, for example, confirm that British men spend on average 154.90 GBP a month on clothes, shoes and grooming products – compared with 124 GBP spent by women. This trend appears in many other parts of the world, too, like Australia and the U.S. as well as across all retail channels, including Duty Free and Travel Retail.

The male grooming/beauty market is booming because, simply put, men are paying more attention to their appearance. According to Allied Market Research, the global male ‘personal care’ market is expected to reach around US$166bn with a CAGR of 5.4% between 2016 and 2022.

Prominent players in the beauty market such as L’Oreal, Estee Lauder, Revlon and Coty have taken advantage of this trend by growing their range of men’s grooming products across their retail channels.

NEW MEN’S RANGES

L’Oreal, which boasts a strong line-up of men’s products, recently launched celebrity former footballer David Beckham’s new grooming brand, House 99. This comprises 21 grooming/skincare products and is available in both domestic and duty free markets. L’Oreal Travel Retail kicked off the DF & TR launch of House 99 at Heathrow Airport earlier this month.

Revlon/Elizabeth Arden also recently introduced its men’s grooming brand – American Crew – to travel retail through listings with cruise and ferry operator Tallink/Silja Line as well as to major European/EMEA airports like Frankfurt, Copenhagen, Oslo and Istanbul. The presence of the brand at these airports is highlighted by an engaging brand corner featuring a Harley Davidson.

Frank Andreassen, Business Development Director of Revlon/Elizabeth Arden Travel Retail, believes that the American Crew range, comprising 21 SKU’s, fills a gap in the market for men’s grooming solutions. He says it will ”drive the beauty category by adding true new products and solutions” for the large group of male travellers who are ”untapped potential within the Travel Retail beauty category”.

L’Oreal’s Travel Retail Managing Director, Vincent Bolnay, also believes that DF & TR is an important channel for this market, as customers are more likely to ”try out new brands when they travel and become loyal customers of these brands later”.

‘SIGNIFICANT’ MALE CUSTOMER BASE

L’Oreal’s upmarket skincare brand, Kiehl’s, which boasts a significant male customer base (approximately one third), ensures its stores are now designed to make both men and women comfortable when they shop, according to Kiehl’s President, Chris Salgardo. Indeed, ”retailers have responded to the growing demand for male grooming products with store designs matching men’s needs, says Deborah Weinswig, Founder and CEO of retail think tank Coresight Research.

To capture the growing demand for male beauty products in TR, L’Oreal launched the Male Grooming Club shop at Singapore Changi Airport in partnership with Philips, back in 2016. The outlet offers travelling male passengers a range of shaving/grooming services from professional barbers, using Philips shavers and skincare products by the L’Oreal Paris Men Expert range.

The aim of the pop-up store was to help the two brands to better capture male customers, providing an opportunity to widen their customer base as they showcase their products to male travellers”, says Weinswig.

GROWING WORLDWIDE DEMAND

Although the biggest market for men’s beauty/grooming products is currently North America, Asia Pacific accounts for the highest growth rate for the overall market, with the primary contributors being India and China. So the L’Oreal/Philips Male Grooming Club location at Changi Singapore is ideal.

Retail experts believe that the demand for male cosmetics will continue to grow worldwide. We’re not just talking about millennial males, but the 40+ market, too. The 40+ group, representing almost two-thirds of travelling shoppers, should not be ignored by travel retail as they are ”just as important” as millennials, according to Counter Intelligence Retail (CIR).

CIR’s Communications Manager, Julia Padgett, confirms that the ”latest insight shows that the largest increase in spending power is coming from male beauty shoppers” and that the male shopper is ”more important than ever”.

Travel retail experts also believe that men are more digitally connected than women when they are at the airport, so digital offers are key to capturing this increasingly robust male market.

So, given the growing number of male beauty shoppers, are travel retailers creating more shelf space to accommodate the increasing range of men’s grooming products coming to market? The tide does appear to be shifting. Although female products still dominate retail shelf space, there are signs that smart DF & TR operators have started to expand their men’s ‘grooming/beauty’ ranges.

Tallink Category Manager P & C, Trin Vallimäe, for example, confirms that Tallink has seen a ”positive trend for male grooming products”, so the introduction of American Crew was made to ”strengthen its assortment for the male customer”.

This is a story worth following.