Sander van der Laan, CEO of Europe’s biggest beauty retailer, the Douglas Group tells BW Confidential how he sees the state of the market in the region, and gives his views on brick-and-mortar and online retailing, pricing, the need for a differentiated assortment and on competition from Amazon
Being a beauty retailer in Europe is not easy at present. Growth in the region’s beauty market has weakened, consumers are increasingly price-sensitive and cautious, and online giant Amazon is ramping up its efforts to take a bigger slice of beauty sales, which includes wooing prestige brands.
Indeed, in March, Europe’s biggest prestige beauty retailer, the Douglas Group, lowered its guidance for the 2024/2025 financial year, citing a slowdown in the premium beauty market, especially in France and Germany. The company said it now expects sales slightly above €4.5bn and a net income of €175m, against a previous target of €4.7bn to €4.8bn and net income of €225m to €265m. Although its profitability will still be much better than the €84m of the previous year, as the company was able to significantly reduce its debt thanks to its IPO in 2024.
The retailer is banking on a strategy with a strong omnichannel and premium focus to navigate the market’s challenges. Douglas got into the digital game relatively early in a bid to become an omnichannel player and has seen success in expanding its e-commerce business, which now represents a third of its revenues. In addition to its Douglas and Nocibé e-commerce platforms, the retailer launched a marketplace in 2019, and acquired online pure player parfumsdreams, which sells entry-level products in 2018, and Niche Beauty, which sells high-end lines, in 2019. Douglas now claims it has a 29% share of the online premium beauty market in Europe.
In addition, Douglas boasts a network of 1,920 stores, which it says makes it the largest player in Europe, well ahead of Sephora’s 690 stores and Marionnaud’s 740 stores. Douglas also outlined plans to open 200 new stores by the end of 2026—100 have already been launched. However, observers question whether it needs so many stores, given the growth of online. Douglas’ retort is that its stores still do most of its sales and continue to play a role in 80% of purchases.
As for its focus on premium beauty, the company sees this positioning as a key buffer to the rise of online players, such as Amazon. Part of this premium focus saw Douglas sell online pharmacy company Disapo in 2024, just two years after acquiring it. Douglas says it now has a 22% share of the premium beauty market in Europe, almost double the share of Sephora (which it estimates at around 12%) and four times more than Marionnaud (according to Douglas). At the same time, the retailer continues to drive exclusives and its own brands, in a bid to differentiate it from increasingly fierce competition, and distance itself from a game centered on easy price comparisons.
What was the impact of the IPO on your business?
Firstly, the key objective of the IPO was to reduce the company’s significant debt. Almost €800m of equity was injected into the company, thereby replacing expensive debt. As a result, our financial expenses have gone down, which has led not only to a better net income, but also created more flexibility and a better financial buffer. Secondly, when you list a company, you go through the rigor of an IPO preparation process, so this has made us a better company. And thirdly, being a listed company creates legal and communication obligations, and this has increased the transparency about who we are, what we do, what is going well, and what should be going better.
Are you on a better footing as a result of the IPO to expand?
That has not significantly changed. Before the IPO, 100% of the shares were divided between [private equity company] CVC and [founding family] the Kreke family, and they gave us support to execute the strategy we agreed on two and a half years ago. Post-IPO, we are executing the same strategy, so in that sense, I don’t feel a difference. But we don’t have the burden of almost €300m in interest costs.
The aim of the Let it Bloom strategy was to grow sales to €5bn by 2026. Are you on track?
This €5bn objective was communicated pre-IPO and we no longer comment on it. We had a mid-term guidance to grow the top line of the company with a CAGR of 7%, which means in a few years, we would have been at more than €5bn. More recently, we changed our guidance for this year and now expect to finish slightly ahead of €4.5bn in sales for the current financial year. We have withdrawn our mid-term guidance and will provide an update at the end of the year.
What progress has been made and what needs to be done ?
We want to be the number one omnichannel beauty destination in the 22 markets where we operate. Collectively, we are by far the number one, and are more than twice as big as the number two in those markets. In many markets, we are number one, in some we are number two, while in a few markets, we are below that. So within those 22 markets, we still have an ambition and an opportunity to improve. For example, we opened our first store in Belgium two years ago, now have almost 10 stores there, and will quickly be the number two. For the past two years, and for the next financial year, our focus is predominantly on expanding in the markets where we currently operate—so no new countries yet. But post-2026 we are not ruling out a move to a new market. We are looking at a number of countries, and clusters of countries, around the markets where we operate.
Will the focus continue to be Europe?
We have been in the US, Turkey and Russia, and withdrew from those markets in the past two decades. I cannot rule out that at some point we will move outside Europe, but there are still white spaces in Europe.
Competitor Ulta Beauty is moving abroad, and Sephora continues to expand internationally. Do you feel more pressure to spread your wings outside Europe?
Ulta is not a direct competitor at this point, as it is not active in any of our markets, even if with their acquisition of Space NK in the UK, they moved a bit closer. The other company you mention is a competitor, but has not recently entered new countries within our markets. In that sense, those players have not created additional turbulence.
How is your assortment changing, especially given the need to differentiate from competitors such as Amazon?
A core pillar of our strategy is that we want to be the number one omnichannel beauty destination in all our markets. Two thirds of our sales come from stores and one third from e-commerce. That balance is quite different by country—we have countries where e-commerce is already more than 40%, others where it represents 20%. We believe in the combination of these two channels. Although e-commerce is growing a bit faster, our stores play an important role for product trial, experience and advice. Secondly, we want to focus on premium and selective beauty and on selective brands. The distribution landscape is changing quite fundamentally. Driven by Covid, different online players secured more authorizations from selective brands. And recently, we see that Amazon is starting to get certain authorizations, so that creates a new dynamic in Europe. To differentiate ourselves, we focus on five core categories: Fragrance, skincare, color cosmetics, haircare and accessories. In addition to that, we offer six adjacent categories within our online partner program. So our offering in terms of categories is broader, and within those categories we want to go deeper, so we offer more brands and more products.
Thirdly, we are building differentiation in our assortment. Exclusive brands are an important pillar and we also want to grow the offer of our own brands. We also want to grow our in-store beauty services and our partner program. So we have a number of levers to build points of differentiation—including the shopping experience in our stores. If some of the selective brands are also available on certain e-commerce platforms, it will at the end of the day, become a price comparison game—and your competitor is online just one click away. This means that pricing becomes more important, so we want to make the portion of our portfolio where we are exposed to pricing smaller, so we can differentiate with other elements beyond just price.
Does Amazon worry you? If more brands sell on Amazon do they risk damaging their traditional retail partners?
We should not underestimate Amazon. However, their position in the US is significantly bigger than in Europe—in general, not in beauty specifically. In Europe, Amazon has focused on the bigger countries, but not so much on Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia, Portugal, Estonia and Lithuania. We operate in 22 markets. Amazon does not have the same size and position in each of those markets. Secondly, more recently, Amazon has started to focus on premium beauty, and we observe that closely. A high volume, mass market, category-spanning shopping platform like Amazon has a lot of qualities, but it is surely not curation. If selective brands decide to sell anywhere, this would indeed challenge the positioning and business model of selective retailers, but would also greatly change the positioning of selective brands. Being available on Amazon is not enhancing a premium positioning. There are only a few companies so far that are embracing Amazon in Europe.
However, some of this is difficult to stop, so we need to develop elements to differentiate ourselves. The first thing is to have an omnichannel strategy. The second is our more than one century of brand power in Europe and beauty expertise with 17,000 beauty advisors. Thirdly, we are offering products the competition doesn’t have. Data shows that in Germany, Amazon’s volume is a lot more than we thought. We are, by far, still the number one, but we need to make sure that we remain competitive, and our strategy reflects that.
A high volume, mass market, category-spanning shopping platform like Amazon has a lot of qualities, but it is surely not curation. If selective brands decide to sell anywhere, this would indeed challenge the positioning and business model of selective retailers, but would also greatly change the positioning of selective brands. Being available on Amazon is not enhancing a premium positioning
Douglas Group
CEO Sander van der Laan
TikTok Shop is also on the rise, could it potentially cause problems for traditional retailers like yourselves?
We see TikTok—I didn’t say TikTok Shop —more as an opportunity than a problem, because it allows us and brands to build their brand and communities. TikTok is very specific, in terms of the age of the audience—it is more for younger consumers— and is more active in the lower price product range. We see TikTok Shop as something that is developing and has developed well in the US and UK. We are not selling yet on TikTok Shop, but are thinking of different propositions.
Could Douglas have a storefront on TikTok Shop, or would this put you at the mercy of its algorithms?
I don’t think you will find a Douglas storefront on TikTok Shop for the reason you just mentioned. We are discussing different ideas and directions, but it is too early to say what we will do.
Do your own brands account for 20% of your sales, and how do you see their growth?
We do not disclose this number, but our own brands do not represent 20% of our sales. Our own brands are the Douglas Collection, the Nocibé Collection and the three brands that we own: Jardin Bohème for fragrance and one.two.free! and Dr. Susanne von Schmiedeberg in skincare. With our own brands, we are doing a relevant percentage of sales, but it is much lower than 20% in sales value. In volume, however, it is bigger because the average price is less than many brands we sell. We want to grow the share of our own ranges, but at the same time, we are in the business of premium beauty retail. I have previously worked at retailers where 60% of sales were in own brands. That is not something I see for Douglas.
What are the main difficulties in France and Germany and what are you doing to mitigate them?
France is a mature market and penetration of selective beauty is already very high. In addition, the local political and economic context adds to the current tough situation in the world. Also, in France the competitive landscape is changing. The number one beauty retailer is a French company, the number two is our French brand Nocibé, and the number three is also a French company. Lastly, the e-commerce share in France is underdeveloped. E-commerce in premium beauty is now starting to catch up; however, the online channel is also more price sensitive. All of this has led to slower growth in the French beauty market recently, while the rest of Europe was booming. To address these challenges, we launched a nationwide transformation plan, including a new store concept. To meet demand for well-being we offer a holistic approach to beauty with our own, selective, and exclusive brands, personalized services and treatment cabins in most of our stores. We also relaunched the Nocibé online shop last year.
In Europe, we are seeing in our numbers, but also in the markets, a slowdown in the growth of premium beauty. In Germany, the market is flattish year to date, and we think that will improve a little. In most of the other markets we see growth, albeit at a lower base. Market research implies that for the next years, premium beauty could grow 3% to 4% in continental Europe.
How will this slowdown impact your plans?
With our strategy ‘Let it Bloom’ we aim to be the number one beauty destination in all our markets, to offer the most relevant and distinctive range of products, a customer friendly omnichannel experience and to ensure an efficient operating model. These four pillars are the right priorities. We are adjusting to an extent the speed at which we do certain things, or the way we do certain things, but our strategy is not changing. We still believe that the premium beauty market will continue to grow, although at a slower pace. In our IPO prospectus, we outlined 5% to 6% growth for premium beauty in continental Europe. If the signs now point to 3% to 4%, that would probably have an impact on our mid-term financial plan. We need to make sure that we are extra focused on costs, which is what we are already doing.
You plan to open 200 stores, will that be reduced?
We are half-way there. We said that by the end of 2026 we intend to have 200 incremental stores versus two years ago, and that we want to refurbish 400 stores in a three-year timeframe. That plan is still there.
Given the growth of online, do you need more stores?
We do not only open stores, but close stores. In France, Germany and Italy, our store numbers will remain the same. Most of our openings will be in Belgium and Central and Eastern Europe. In Poland, we have 170 stores for a population of 42 million. There are still towns in Poland with 200,000 people where there is no premium beauty store. These markets are developing, so we are differentiating our expansion versus Germany, France and Italy, where the focus is on refurbishment and relocations. In France, we renovated 80 stores in the past three years, and just inaugurated a flagship store in La Defense shopping center in Paris. There are different dynamics by market. E-commerce will grow faster, but two thirds of our sales still come from stores.
In terms of pricing, do you see more promotions?
I’ve been in retail for my entire career, and I was surprised by how much price and promotional activity we have in selective beauty. It is not our intention to be more promotional. However, if customers need to save money, they wait until the product is promoted before making the purchase. That doesn’t mean that we have become more promotional, but that the customer has become more promotion sensitive. Post Covid, there was a lot of inflation, and many brands took advantage of that a bit too much. In addition, there is a premiumization trend, so brands were launching more expensive products, and some went too far. I’m happy that inflation has normalized and brands are now back to 2% to 3% price increases. In our most recent financials, our sales rose 4%, but gross profit margin as a percentage of sales came down, and that is the result of those dynamics. It’s not because we have become more aggressive from a promo perspective, but it is the mix and customers that are changing.
Given the context, will the level of discounting worsen?
I don’t expect an improvement. The world is becoming more digital, more e-commerce, more AI, more TikTok, and more comparable, so I expect pressure on prices and on the margin of brands that are less selective. So being selective or doing things exclusively is important to create differentiation and to manage profitability.
Douglas Group factfile
• Retail brands: Douglas (omnichannel) Nocibé (omnichannel), parfumdreams (online only), Niche Beauty (online only)
• No of stores: around 1,920 (as of June 30, 2025)
• Omnichannel markets: 22 (Germany, Switzerland, Austria, France, Monaco, Belgium, the Netherlands, Spain, Andorra, Italy, Portugal, Poland, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Croatia, Estonia)
• Fiscal year 2023/2024 (Oct 2023-Sept 2024) sales: €4.45bn, +8.7% vs previous year
• Fiscal year 2023/2024 net income: €84m
• Target sales fiscal 2024/2025 (Oct 2024 -Sept 2025): slightly above €4.5bn
• Target net income fiscal 2024/2025: ~ €175m
• Sales by channel: 67% stores; 33% e-commerce
• Sales by segment: DACHNL (Austria, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, The Netherlands) 47%; France (France, Monaco) 19%; Southern Europe (Andorra, Croatia, Italy, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain)15%; Central & Eastern Europe (Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia) 15%; parfumdreams & Niche Beauty 4%
• Sales by retail brand: Douglas 76%; Nocibé 19%; parfumdreams 4%; Niche Beauty 1%
• Loyalty card members: 59 million
• Europe total market share: 22%
• Europe e-commerce market share: 29%