China Shampoo and Hair-care Industry Market Foresight and Investment Forecast Report

The major raw materials of shampoo and hair-care products all come from petroleum and grease. In current years the price of the primary chemical materials is rising steadily that brings great pressure to corporations. Together with the increasing price of water, electricity, fuel, transportation, packing materials and other relevant operating factors, the cost of production dramatically increase. Moreover, the shortage of labor market and raise of salary also add to the growing cost of production. Under such a severe operation environment, the SMEs may be eliminated in the new competition. And the industry is facing a reconstruction.

A research shows that about 20% Chinese will wash hair daily while over 75% will wash hair every 1-3 days. It contains a shampoo market of 30 million Yuan and a hair-care market of 20 million Yuan. From a long-term view, the prospects of the shampoo market are booming. It is predicted that in the next 5 years the annual growth rate of shampoo and hair-care industry will be 1.8%.

Presently there are nearly 4,000 brands and more than 2,000 manufacturers engaging in the production of shampoo and hair-care product. The market competition is fierce. The current market can be divided into three groups according to the occupancy of market share. The first group: the P&G and Unilever take a market share of about 75%. The P&G gain the achievement by successful implementation of multi-brand strategy and localization strategy, the resource and capability of strength, and constant products’ innovation as well as brand creation. And the brands belong to P&G obtains a market share of about 60%: Head & Shoulders for antidandruff; Rejoice for soft hair; Pantene for healthy and shinning hair; VS Sassoon for moisturizing; Clairol for natural-looking hair. And brands belong to Unilever including Lux, Hazeline, and Clear, etc. The second group: the C-BONS takes a market share of about 15% which including brands like Slex, B&W, MINGCHEN (Dihuazhixiu, Mewon, Yicai, LUXIAO), and LAF. The third group: the third group with a market share of about 10% and most brands are domestic brands like TKCL, Houdy, and Aoni.

The shampoo and hair-care product market in large and medium sized cities is mostly taken by P&G and Unilever while the rural market is mostly taken by China’s local brands. And such a condition brings out the best in each other. However, with the lowering brand-channel strategy of P&G and shiseido in current years, the rural market for local brands is gradually taken by famous brands. It causes a much difficult position for local shampoo and hair-care enterprises. The shampoo market in large and medium sized cities is gradual saturated that the indepth value is smaller and smaller. The rural market no longer under the full control of local brands. Therefore, local shampoo and hair-care enterprises should make the transition and get rid of laziness. Only in this way, can they gain a long-term development.

In the aspects of product function, the function of shampoo and hair-care products is extending and detailing from the initial cleaning function to hair-care, nutrition, moisten, and antidandruff, and then further extend to the concepts of hair-blacking, anti-shedding and hair-growing. In 2007 as the most important new brand of Unilever in current decade, the Clean proposes the antidandruff concept of “men and women with different design” and promotes the antidandruff products specially designed for men. It means a start for men shampoo market. Since then the men shampoo products are promoted by local brand B&W, Bioré belongs to Kao, and Head & Shoulders belongs to P&G. This market is heating up and is supposed to be the new profit growing point for the shampoo and hair-care industry.

In the aspects of channels, as a FMCG shampoo can be sold in all channels, such as market, supermarket, grocer, public bath, hair salon, hotels and others. Among which the proportion of supermarket and convenience store is about 40% while that of the supermarket with a super-large storage exceeds 20%, and that of the shampoo as presents is about 20%. For the manufacturers the general distributive model is the traditional commercial distribution, which going through the first wholesale and secondary wholesale, retailing terminals in all level, and reaches the consumer at last. In current years there are some new channels like cosmetics franchise stores, E-commerce, group purchase and so on. The proportion of selling volume is increasingly growing.

The major raw materials of shampoo and hair-care products all come from petroleum and grease. In current years the price of the primary chemical materials is rising steadily that brings great pressure to corporations. Together with the increasing price of water, electricity, fuel, transportation, packing materials and other relevant operating factors, the cost of production dramatically increase. Moreover, the shortage of labor market and raise of salary also add to the growing cost of production. Under such a severe operation environment, the SMEs may be eliminated in the new competition. And the industry is facing a reconstruction.

Here, we’d like to express our sincere gratitude to China Spices Association, China National Commercial Information Center, China Hair & Beauty Association, National Statistics Bureau of China, General Administration of Customs, International Information Institute, National Institute of the Ministry of Commerce, National Tsing Hua University Library, Institute of Market Economy of the State Council Development Research Center, and Beijing Qinghua Forward Market Research Center, etc. Thank you so much!

Notice: all the market data, especially the corporation list data in this report is only for business reference. Please don’t take the data for enterprise publicity. Thank you! Or Forward shall not take any responsibility for any consequences!

Qianzhan Business Information Co., Ltd. Industry Research Center
Research Team of Air Separation Plant Industry