Former L'Oréal Executive is the New CEO of La Prairie.

Beiersdorf Group recently announced that Philippe Lamy will take over as CEO of its leading luxury skincare La Prairie Group AG, with the appointment taking effect on April 2. Can this new CEO, who has extensive experience in beauty and retail in the Chinese market, take La Prairie to new heights?

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Beauty "Veteran":

Former L'Oréal Executive With Extensive Experience in the Chinese Market

From Philippe Lamy's resume, he is a beauty and luxury retail expert who has spent time in both giant groups and startups, has international & multicultural background, and is familiar with the Chinese market.

△Philippe Lamy

Prior to joining La Prairie, Philippe Lamy spent 8 years at the Italian fashion brand Loro Piana. Loro Piana has a history of 150 years and was acquired by the LVMH Group in 2014. From January 2014 to August 2016 he was The General Manager of Loro Piana China.

Philippe Lamy has more ties with China.

Earlier in his career, Philippe Lamy served as Chief Operating Officer of Hermès Chinese luxury brand Shang Xia for nearly three years. In addition, he had a 13-year career at L'Oréal Group, holding a number of leadership positions in markets such as Asia Pacific and the Americas.

Commenting on the appointment, Philippe Lamy said: “It feels good to be back in the skin care industry after more than a decade away. I am honored to take on this role in the leading luxury beauty La Prairie and I am very excited about the opportunities ahead. La Prairie is magnificent and the company has continued to establish its branding position over the past few years.” 

The previous CEO of La Prairie was Patrick Rasquinet, who was in charge of the luxury house since 2010. In the future, he will focus more on his diverse role on the Beiersdorf Executive Board overseeing the Pharmacy & Selective division, which includes a number of brands such as Eucerin, La Prairie and Chantecaille.

“Philippe Lamy is a strong leader, a visionary strategist, and an expert in the luxury retail industry. He is well positioned to push La Prairie forward in the coming years and help the company reach full potential to become the kind of luxury house that we envision.” Patrick Rasquinet commented. 

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Increase Online Channels + Deep Cultivation of High-End Services of Department Stores.
La Prairie returned to high growth in the Chinese market 

According to Beiersdorf's latest financial report, La Prairie achieved strong growth in fiscal 2021, driven by the recovery of the travel retail business, with a growth rate of 20.1%. Especially in the Chinese market, La Prairie's sales are above market average, and also higher than the level before the pandemic crisis at the end of 2019.

The data shows that in the global market La Prairie developed rapidly in 2017, 2018 and 2019 - the three years before the pandemic, with growth rates of 11.50%, 38.50% and 20% respectively. It fell by 23.9% in 2020.

The reason why La Prairie can return to the "peak" in the Chinese market in 2021 is closely related to its increase in online channels and the deepening cultivation of beauty salons in department stores.

According to the "2020 High-end Luxury Beauty Brand Consumption Trend Report", 11 high-end beauty brands, including Helena Rubinstein, La Prairie, CPB, Givenchy, Chanel, etc. increased by an average of 243.74% in June 2020 compared with January. The attention of major brand flagship stores has also increased to varying degrees. Obviously, high-end beauty consumption still has a lot of room for development in the Chinese market.

In recent years, unlike "noble lady brands" such as Estée Lauder's La Mer and L'Oréal's Helena, which have vigorously embraced the Internet and China's younger generation of consumers, La Prairie has kept a relatively low profile. It wasn't until February last year that La Prairie officially entered Tmall and opened a flagship store. On the day of opening the store a number of popular products were sought after by consumers.

While expanding into new channels, La Prairie has maintained a strong momentum in the Chinese department store channel. The person in charge of a department store told the Cosmetics Business Online (CBO) reporter that in recent years La Prairie's sales in its department store system have increased year after year, and especially the brand's beauty shop appointments are in high demand.

The reporter also saw on the social platform that even though La Prairie is relatively low-key, there are still a large number of recommendation notes in the Little Red Book. In particular the PLATINUM RARE series, which is priced at more than 10,000 yuan, is widely praised.

Unlike other high-end beauty brands that aggressively cooperate with brand ambassadors & “traffic” stars, the La Prairie's low-key marketing in the Chinese market pays more attention to the "texture" under the digitization. Last year La Prairie collaborated with Ding Yi, a well-known Chinese abstract artist, to create the "A DREAM OF ETERNITY " visual art exhibition with the theme of breaking through the boundaries of time and jointly exploring the eternal beauty from multiple perspectives.

Today, in the context of the uncertainty of the current environment of the pandemic, the Chinese market has almost become the main market of the world's major beauty giants to create stability. For Beiersdorf, La Prairie is naturally a major player in the Chinese market, and it is more secure to choose a helmsman with rich experience in the Chinese market.