From $15 Billion to $1.4 Billion: Olaplex Finds a Home at Henkel
Olaplex IPO’d near $15 billion in 2021 and sold for $1.4 billion. Henkel now owns it.
Beauty
The business and culture of beauty — brands, rituals, and the stories behind what we put on our skin.
Fifty Years of Gucci: L’Oréal Takes the Crown Jewel
L’Oréal prises Gucci beauty from Coty in a 50-year licence — the prestige-fragrance duel escalates.
Simplify to Grow: Waldencast Sheds Obagi
Waldencast is shedding Obagi to become a pure-play color-cosmetics company around Milk Makeup.
Going Global: Rhode’s First Step Into Latin America
Rhode’s first move into Latin America shows e.l.f. scaling a celebrity brand worldwide.
Sale or Float? The $10 Billion Question Over Boots
Boots is at a fork — a ~$10 billion trade sale or a London listing — with suitors circling.
Discipline Over Hype: Glossier’s $45M Reset
Glossier’s $45M debt deal signals a maturing, retail-disciplined chapter — not another hype round.
Lighter Rules, Same Safeguards: The EU’s Cosmetics ‘Omnibus VI’ Deal
The EU agreed to cut cosmetics red tape — €363M a year — without gutting its safety net.
The Scent of Scale: Givaudan’s Eurofragance Deal
Givaudan adds a fast-growing Spanish fragrance house to its empire — scale buying scale.
Catching Up With the World: America’s First New Sunscreen Filter in Two Decades
The U.S. finally cleared a sunscreen filter Europe has used for decades — bemotrizinol.
Out of the Mall: Bath & Body Works’ First Big Wholesale Bet
Bath & Body Works leaves its own four walls for the first time at scale — landing in Ulta.
From Faces to Follicles: e.l.f. Brings ‘e.l.fordable Luxury’ to Hair
e.l.f.’s move into haircare extends a simple, ruthless idea: take what’s expensive, make it cost $6–$10, and sell it where the internet shops.
The Race for India: L’Oréal’s Innovist Deal and the New Beauty Map
L’Oréal’s June 18, 2026 deal for India’s Innovist turns the industry’s favorite slogan — win India — into a signature.
When the Mirror Starts Talking: L’Oréal’s Bet on Conversational Beauty
L’Oréal’s June 17, 2026 partnership with OpenAI is a bet that the next era of beauty is sold through conversation, not just images.
You Already Told the Algorithm Who You Are. Now It Will Pick Your Perfume.
Estée Lauder's new Scent Scanner reads the images you've pinned and turns your visual taste into a Jo Malone fragrance — the beauty counter's latest move to meet you where your taste already lives.
K-Beauty Stopped Exporting and Started Buying — Starting in Provence
For years, Korean beauty conquered the world from Korea. A quiet deal for a 70-year-old French cosmetics maker marks the moment K-beauty's money decided to own the means of production abroad.
The Beauty Counter Gets a Lab: Inside L'Oréal's Five-Minute Skin Scanner
L'Oréal's Cell BioPrint reads the proteins in your skin in five minutes and tells you whether your serum will even work. After a CES debut, it's now arriving in Lancôme stores.
After 13 Years on the Sidelines, L'Oréal Makes Its India Move
L'Oréal hadn't bought an Indian company since 2013. Its majority stake in digital-first Innovist is a bet that the future of beauty is being written in Bengaluru, not just Paris.
The Beauty Counter Moves Into the Chatbot: L'Oréal Bets Big on OpenAI
L'Oréal's alliance with OpenAI is a wager on where beauty gets discovered and sold next — inside the chat window, where 900 million people a week already are.
The Korean Sunscreen Hunt Enters a New Chapter
A Reddit thread about bemotrizinol captures the bigger story behind Korean SPF: shoppers want featherlight daily protection, while U.S. rules still decide which formulas can cross the shelf.