The Rise of C-Beauty

Big cosmetics names like Estee Lauder and Dior have held places in the market for a long time and they don’t plan on moving out anytime soon. You’ll see them in any cosmetics section in the US without fail, but their online presence is not as nearly as strong as their staging at the front of every Sephora.

In China, however, you might not see some of the popular names on any shelves because they are digital-native brands; they use networks of influencers to sell their beauty products directly to consumers. With the growth of e-tailers like Alibaba, more and more of these Chinese brands like Hedone are popping up and gaining popularity because brand names are becoming less important to Chinese youth, who instead care about the opinions of celebrities (influencers), country of origin (a growing preference for domestic Chinese brands) and most of all, low prices.

““There’s a cultural difference between Western and Chinese digital-native brands””

These digital-native brands have little American competition to worry about because of price and the fact that it is difficult for American brands to even get their products into China in the first place. With fun, trendy marketing, a focus on effectiveness in things like skin lightening and acne, and low prices, these direct to consumer brands are taking off in China are showing no signs of slowing down in the future.

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