More and more exports for the Italian cosmetics industry

The global economic scenario has not slowed down the industry: a 12.5% in foreign sales to nearly 8 billion euros is expected in 2024 (+8.5% in 2025).

Cosmetica Italia has presented the 48th edition of its Trend Survey (Indagine congiunturale), the semi-annual event that analyses the performance of the Italian cosmetics industry, highlighting the main trends in progress. The report looked at the second half of 2024 and the first six months of 2025, confirming the industry's growth trend and its responsiveness also spite of a general scenario characterized by critical issues and shifting balances.

The 2024 closing projections, in fact, show revenues in excess of 16.5 billion euros (up 9.2% from 2023) and a forecast for 2025 of 17.7 billion euros (up 6.9% from 2024).

Export quadrupled over two decades

A major contribution comes from exports, growing already in 2021, closing 2024 at +12.5%, reaching record sales close to 8 billion euros. Equally positive are the 2025 projections that forecast exports to grow further by 8.5%, to a value exceeding 8.6 billion euros. Over a 20-year period, the contribution of exports in the total turnover of the cosmetics industry in Italy has doubled from 23% in 2003 to 48% at the end of 2024. In absolute values, exports of Made in Italy cosmetics have more than quadrupled from 1.8 to just under 8 billion euros over the same period.

Domestic consumption and distribution channels

According to preliminary indicators, domestic consumption in 2024 is close to 13.4 billion euros, with an estimated growth of 6.7% compared to 2023, mostly driven by the performance in traditional and digital channels (+6.8%) and a smaller increase in the professional channels (+4.9%).

Details on the performance of individual distribution channels, in both 2024 estimates and 2025 forecasts, show similarly positive trends.

Perfumery will close 2024 with +10.2% and consumption close to 2.8 billion euros, while e-commerce will register a 10.8% increase, exceeding 1.2 billion euros. With an estimated value of 2.1 billion euros, the pharmacy channel will grow by 6% and mass retail will reach 5.5 billion euros (+5.1%).

Professional channels also show solid expansion. Hair salons will end 2024 with a 5% increase, standing at nearly 620 million euros, while beauty salons will reach 216 million euros, up 4.7%. Direct sales show a smaller increase of 0.8%, with a total value of 355 million euros.