Kering's $2bn new purchase

Fragrance is hot, hot, hot 🥵

I’m still on the beach.

Good morning everyone. I hope you’re all having a wonderful first week of summer. I am in a house with some of my friends out east this week. Then it’s my birthday and I’m turning 29. Then I’m going to Washington state for a bit. I hope my newsletter cadence remains IMPECCABLE, but if it doesn’t, that is why.

• The Barbie marketing team has really impressed me. First of all, they got me to buy two tickets to opening night for a 10:30pm screening. But this Barbie dream house in Malibu in partnership with Airbnb is something else. “Located in sunny Malibu, the oceanfront mansion features panoramic views and serves as the perfect backdrop for Ken’s picture-plastic paradise. Fans will be able to request to book Ken’s bedroom in the Malibu DreamHouse for two individual one-night stays** for up to two guests each on July 21 and July 22, 2023. All stays will be free of charge – because Ken couldn’t figure out how to put a price on Barbie’s Malibu DreamHouse – after all, Ken’s thing is beach, not math!” Damn, they do not like that man.

• Kering (the French luxury group behind Gucci, Balenciaga, McQueen…) reportedly paid $2bn (cash) to acquire Creed. The acquisition is Kering’s first beauty purchase, and it was bought of the hands of BlackRock Long Term Private Capital Europe and chairman Javier Ferrán in an all-cash transaction. Why do we care? Well, fragrance is having a moment right now — candles, perfume, and home scents. “Luxury fragrance is experiencing very strong growth,” said Rich Gersten, investor and founder of True Beauty Capital. “Investors and buyers are attracted to growth segments so it is not a surprise capital is flowing there.” LVMH recently reported that its perfumes and cosmetics business group saw organic revenue growth of 27% to over $7 billion, compared to 2020. In 2022, 53% of Coty’s (Gucci Beauty, Chloe, Kylie Cosmetics) fiscal 2022 net revenues of $5.3 billion were attributable to prestige fragrance. Last week, Nylon published a great piece about the new fragrance brands changing the world of perfume. I lovveeee writing and reading about fragrance so maybe I’ll do a longer piece about this soon, it’s such a fun industry.

  

  Truuuuuue