Beauty News: Shiseido to Buy Bare Escentuals
In all my years of collecting Bare Escentuals I’ve come to associate the brand with Leslie Blodgett’s face. This has become something very important to me because I honestly can’t associate many brands with faces, it somehow makes the makeup experience more personal as if Leslie is my best friend, telling me all about the new makeup coming out from season to season.
Leslie and her company, Bare Escentuals, is joining forces with Shiseido.
Have a jump to learn the beauty news.
Shiseido, Japan’s largest cosmetics company, has agreed to buy Bare Escentuals for $1.7 billion. In my experience not alot of people take note how huge Shiseido is. You go to your local Shiseido counter to purchase posh cosmetics but what you may not realize is Shiseido produces a slew of other brands available under the Shiseido name that are exclusive to Japan and certain Asian countries. Actually, much as we think of Covergirl as a drugstore brand, Shiseido is in fact thought of in drugstore terms as well since they produce a slew of inexpensive face care, cleansers, and makeup items that you may have never laid eyes on since it lives outside the realms of the US.
So indeed Shiseido has 1.7 billion dollars to spare, it’s probably chump change for them.
I do find it intriguing that they chose Bare Escentuals as a lead in for their brand to move forward in a fast growing natural ingredient cosmetic market, GO green makeup! Although Shiseido holds it’s own in the Asian market the idea of BE and Shiseido strikes me as somewhat odd. However, as I see it things will pretty much be business as usual for BE and I doubt that Shiseido will influence the brand so much� that you won’t recognize it.� I do believe much of the creative marketing behind it flows from Leslie, this is her baby after all.
From what I understand Shiseido hopes to strengthen their presence within the US market which to me is understandable because as I mentioned above the average makeup user associates the Shiseido name with a posh, high end counter cosmetic and nothing outside of that.
1.7 billion dollars may seem like alot of money but in terms of popularity within the US market, Bare Escentuals holds it’s own against Shiseido and takes in about a more in revenue. There is much to gain from this merger for Shiseido but one wonders what BE will get out of it.
I look forward to seeing how BE evolves or if any changes will take place when the move is finally in place.
What do you think of the Bare Escentuals Shiseido deal?
Anything interesting about it for you?
Do you think BE might change because of it? Pricing wise? Product wise?
Do share!
Leslie has already addressed BE fans in a letter on the BE site if you’d like to read it visit bareescentuals.com