Kline calls China’s online beauty sales “astounding.”

Online or on the high street, Chinese consumers continue to be drawn to anti-aging skin care. According to The NPD Group, Inc., total prestige beauty (skin care, makeup, and fragrance products sold mainly in department stores and Sephora stores in the top 10 cities in China’s mainland, increased 21% over 2010. The skin care and makeup categories each showed healthy growth of 23% and 17%, respectively.
 
In prestige skin care, all the segments exhibited steady growth, with face and moisturizer capturing nearly half of skin care sales. By attribute, anti-aging continued to lead, accounting for half of the skin care category sales. Hydrating and whitening skin care products also boosted category growth.
In prestige makeup, the face segment captured 59% of the category’s dollar share and increased 18% in dollar sales from 2010.

Lip products also plumped the growth in makeup, up 26.5% in 2011. On the other hand, sales of eye products were soft (up 6%) due to mascara’s sharp decline of 3% in dollars and the slower paced sales of eye shadow and eyeliner.