Chinese President Xi Jinping has sought to stem the rise of niang pao, an insult meaning “girly boys,” as he attempts to overhaul the country’s youth culture and encourage masculinity.
But as Xi approaches his second decade in power, he may have to get used to Chinese men with a penchant for smoky eyeliner and false eyelashes, and the companies that cater to them.
“I think I’m more masculine than most heterosexuals,” said Xi Er, a 28-year-old who uses a nickname for anonymity. “I dare to go to work in a skirt. They dare? They are restricted by their prejudices.”
After several years of double-digit growth, China’s fledgling men’s beauty market is expected to top $10 billion this year and double again in the next three years as local and foreign companies target hundreds of millions of new customers.
Xi Er, who works in the tech sector and lives in the southern megacity of Shenzhen, said she started wearing makeup during a trip to Thailand in 2017 to celebrate her university graduation.
She now uses Xiaohongshu, a super Chinese app that is a combination of Pinterest, Instagram, Amazon and TripAdvisor, to post videos on topics such as the “benefits of wearing false nails on [the] workplace as a guy.” Xi Er ranks a group of new Chinese brands among her favorites.
A screenshot of Xi Er with the text “Husband, do you think my new press on nails are beautiful?” © Xi Er/Xiaohongshu
Male beauty is still a fraction of the overall Chinese market but is expanding rapidly, in line with other Asian markets including South Korea and Japan. Goldman Sachs has forecast that total spending on cosmetics in China will reach $120 billion by 2026, up from $82 billion in 2021.
In China, the beauty market has traditionally been dominated by a handful of foreign brands, including France’s L’Oréal, South Korea’s AmorePacific, Japan’s Shiseido and the US group Estée Lauder.
Despite the threat posed by Xi’s crackdown, analysts said China remains a critical market for beauty companies.
“China is the only region in the world that is growing, so cosmetics companies need to manage these political challenges and continue to sell their products,” said Yu Sato, a Tokyo-based cosmetics industry analyst at SMBC Nikko, the Japanese brokerage. .
The male beauty boom comes as local Chinese companies are gaining market share from foreign rivals.
Post-95s are among the most nationalistic consumers we’ve seen in a long time. At the same time, they are much more independent.
Chinese brands including DearBoyFriend and Make Essence are booming, reports Jing Daily, a trade publication covering China’s luxury market, in part because they market directly to first-time makeup wearers, introducing them to the world of makeup. beauty.
Mark Tanner, managing director of China Skinny, a Shanghai-based market research group, pointed to a paradox: Younger Chinese consumers are increasingly patriotic, but “less play by the rules.” This means that many prefer to support local brands, but shrug off the crackdown on the “sissy boy.”
“Post-95 consumers are among the most nationalistic consumers we’ve seen in a long time. At the same time, they are much more independent. . . and not be too conformist,” Tanner said.
The trend poses a long-term challenge for beauty industry incumbents. For years, South Korean beauty groups led by AmorePacific and LG Household & Health Care have benefited from the massive popularity of K-pop and Korean dramas. In 2015, South Korea overtook the US and Japan in China’s cosmetics market to become the second largest player, after France.
Today, LG Household & Health Care and AmorePacific make more than 30 percent of their sales in China. Brands like AmorePacific’s Hera, Innisfree, Laneige and Sulwhasoo have long been household names in China, but declining demand is taking its toll. Hera is reported to have closed almost all of its physical stores in the country, and Innisfree, Amore’s core mid-market brand, is cutting its locations from 600 to 140.
Overseas groups hope a focus on e-commerce will help them retain market share or regain lost ground, but analysts warn that bigger challenges are emerging. National brands are often better at understanding local tastes and quicker to act on new trends. As they grow, they also attract staff who prefer to work for local businesses.
Tanner said that for Korean and Japanese cosmetics groups in China, the “golden years are over.”
“Korea, in particular, was at the forefront of the ‘girly man’ craze. . . It’s no longer just about showing up with a ‘Made in Korea’ sticker on the back. But it is like that with almost all categories and all foreign brands. . . you have to work much harder.”
Japanese luxury giant Shiseido is among the brands doubling down on China, as is its toiletries unit, which was spun off last year.
Yuki Takahashi, chief operating officer of the new company, Fine Today Shiseido, which sells skin care items aimed at men in China, said Beijing’s push to eradicate the coronavirus is a bigger problem for sales than the Xi’s anti-sissy crusade.
“China’s biggest risk to us right now is logistics under the government’s zero-Covid strategy. We’ve handed over the power to the local team to take care of these business continuity plans so they can handle issues quickly.”
Scott Chen, managing partner in Asia at L Catterton, a global private equity firm, remains optimistic about the sector, despite the fallout from the zero-Covid policy, which has “interrupted the rise of national brands”.
“The underlying factors that bode well for the industry remain intact and history has shown that consumer confidence and spending often rebound quickly after every downturn,” Chen said.
Still, many business leaders are trying to recover from last year, when the common prosperity campaign wiped hundreds of billions of dollars off the value of Chinese companies.
Both the European and British Chambers of Commerce told the Financial Times that while Beijing’s focus has shifted to more pressing threats, such as the collapse of the property sector, it would be a mistake to believe that politics is over.
“It has clearly taken a backseat to the immediate problems facing the country. . . however, common prosperity remains China’s long-term ambition,” said Steven Lynch, managing director of the British Chamber of Commerce in China.
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Despite that threat, Xi Er’s experience points to signs of greater acceptance among ordinary Chinese.
On the day the city of Shenzhen lifted a city-wide Covid lockdown in late March, Xi Er met with a group of customers.
Typically, her makeup routine includes primer, foundation, and a Kim Kardashian-inspired contour before brushing strokes of salmon-pink blush across her cheeks.
Complementing her newly dyed red hair, she added a touch of sparkle to her smokey red eye. Xi Er wore a Marvel-themed T-shirt and a pair of pink sequined pants.
“Every customer I met that day praised my fashion sense,” she said.
Additional information from Maiqi Ding in Beijing
Source: news.google.com