Reimagining Retail: Ageism in Beauty and the Shift Away From “Staying Young”

On today’s podcast episode, we discuss how the beauty industry is venturing into untapped markets, how the conversation of ageism in beauty fits or diverges with the greater trend away from diversity and inclusion, and how brands market to older people while staying relevant with younger audiences. Listen to the conversation with our Senior Analyst Sara Lebow as she hosts Principal Analyst Sky Canaves, Analyst Arielle Feger, and CEO and Founder of Ageism Is Never In Style® Jacynth-Bassett.

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Episode Transcript:

Sara Lebow (00:00):

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(00:23):

Hello, listeners. Today is Wednesday, March 19th. Welcome to Reimagining Retail, an eMarketer podcast made possible by Trax. This is the show where we talk about how retail collides with every part of our lives. I'm your host, Sara Lebow. Today's episode topic is about how the beauty industry is venturing into untapped markets. Before we tap into that, let's meet today's guests. Joining me for today's episode we have two podcast regulars and a special guest. First up, it's our analyst Arielle Feger. Hey, Arielle.

Arielle Feger (01:00):

Hi. Thrilled to be here.

Sara Lebow (01:01):

Thrilled to have you. Also thrilled to have with us another one of our analysts, Sky Canaves. Hey, Sky.

Sky Canaves (01:06):

Hi, Sara. Happy to be here too.

Sara Lebow (01:08):

And also with us on the podcast is a special guest. We have founder and CEO of Ageism Is Never In Style, Jacynth Bassett. Hey, Jacynth, welcome to the pod.

Jacynth Bassett (01:19):

Hello. Delighted to be here.

Sara Lebow (01:21):

Delighted to have you. Okay, so we've talked about rapid growth in beauty and wellness, particularly in e-commerce, which according to our forecast will account for one in $4 spent on beauty and cosmetics in 2028. But there's more to the expansion of beauty and skincare on the whole than just selling more products to existing consumers. We're seeing this industry branch out and find new consumers to sell to.

(01:50):

So Sky, why don't you kick us off by telling us how the beauty industry is venturing into these untapped markets.

Sky Canaves (01:57):

So that's really been the great growth opportunity for the beauty industry. As you mentioned, it's hard to sell more products to the same consumers. So it really lies in offering a broader range of products that can serve more beauty consumer needs. And there's been a focus on underserved groups as well as some emerging demographic groups like men, Gen Alpha girls and teen boys. And older consumers have always been a focus of anti-aging products, for example, but they can be so much more than that. And I think particularly as anti-aging has moved more towards medical aesthetics and cosmetic procedures, there's maybe less of a need for beauty products to have a strong focus on.

Sara Lebow (02:42):

Yeah. Jacynth, where does the conversation of ageism and anti-aging products come into this?

Jacynth Bassett (02:48):

Well, obviously, I mean, you could argue anti-aging is somewhat completely in conflict with the concept of ageism, which is all about embracing ageing and feeling confident and comfortable to age however you want. And anti-aging is basically telling us that we should be preserving youth and always striving to be younger. We've definitely seen... It's funny and you say it's emerging markets, obviously older consumers aren't a new consumer, it's just that their interests and demands are changing. There's still obviously a massive interest in anti-aging, but we're also seeing the emergence of the longevity sector, which is much more focused on promoting healthy aging that's projected to be worth at least $600 billion by 2025, so this year alone. And we're also seeing more and more women, particularly over 45, over 50, saying that they want to look healthy rather than young, so 72% are saying that.

(03:42):

And they have the commercial power. They're being called the super consumers for a reason because the wealth is shifting. Our populations are aging and the wealth is shifting with them. So brands are having to wake up to that.

Sara Lebow (03:53):

What is the difference between looking young and looking healthy when it comes to the beauty industry?

Jacynth Bassett (03:59):

Well, that is a very good question. Of course, for a lot of people they are pretty much interlinked. But I think for a lot of women, what we find is in particular, it's more about being the best version of themselves today rather than trying to reverse or to erase signs of aging like wrinkles and obviously other skin care concerns. It's just trying to be the best version rather than essentially trying to look like you were 25. As we often say, it's aspirational, not delusional. A woman in her 50s isn't waking up today thinking she's suddenly going to be 25 tomorrow. She's thinking, okay, how can I be the best version of me?

Arielle Feger (04:35):

I think this ties into kind of a larger trend in the beauty industry where it's a focus more on wellness and health versus looking a certain way or an aesthetic. So I definitely think that kind of goes hand in hand with this, marketing aging gracefully, aging healthily towards older consumers.

Jacynth Bassett (04:55):

We're seeing the term pro-age being used a lot. And if I'm honest, it's still being co-opted, we do see it a lot interchangeably with anti-aging, and we see a lot of beauty brands almost being a bit scared and tentative knowing when to use it. But pro-age is much more about having a positive attitude to getting older and being, as I say, the best version of yourself today, rather than denying the existence of aging, which essentially is what anti-aging is about.

Sara Lebow (05:22):

Yeah, it's interesting you talk about beauty brands being scared to enter this conversation. Right now, we're in this era, at least in the US and I think across the industry, but definitely in the US, where we're seeing brands trend away from diversity and inclusion efforts. The most obvious recent case of this is Target saying that they're doing away with DEI. How does the conversation of ageism and beauty fit into that or diverge from that?

Jacynth Bassett (05:51):

It's quite interesting because ageism has actually traditionally not been included in the DE&I conversation. It's something that a lot of us have talked about how it needs to be part of the wider conversation around inclusivity, but because of the fact it hasn't been included, we're not seeing such a rejection of it. Absolutely. I very much believe we should be championing diversity and inclusivity across all communities, but I don't think we're seeing it being rejected when it comes to age. I see certain brands are actually now putting age at the forefront a bit more when it comes to inclusivity than maybe other points of diversity. Which it should never be zero-sum. It should never be either. But I think when it comes to age, the reality is we are all aging. As I said, we have aging population. By 2030, one billion of us will be over the age of 60. So it's a commercial need for brands to have to wake up to whether they want to or not, they having to. So I don't think that they're going to be shifting away from the age conversation as much.

Sky Canaves (06:54):

Right. I think ageism has been somewhat insulated from that backlash because it is universal and a lot of the backlash we see has more of an us versus them slant to it in the sense of othering the experiences of the diverse groups that are seen as benefiting from these policies. And for the beauty industry as a whole, it can't roll back the diversification of the products and the consumers that it serves because that would just shrink its growth. So it would ultimately be very counterproductive, as even some of the brands and retailers that are changing their focus are seeing with the calls for a boycott on Target, for example.

Jacynth Bassett (07:35):

Absolutely. I think the other thing though, which is really interesting, and I think this is where the wider conversation of other forms of diversity, inclusivity, we could see a rollback or there hasn't been a much progress in itself, but we were starting to is the fact that the majority of age representation has still predominantly been through a white lens. And there's not much diversity amongst those who are older in terms of the visuals we see. So we were starting to see a shift towards being able to include more forms of diversity. As we always say, there's as much difference in individuality, in uniqueness as we get older as there is, if not more than when we're younger. But that could be where we see a slight step back is when that conversation and drive to have more diversity of older individuals, we could see a step back. But as Sky says, the reality is we're all aging, ageism is the only ism that every person can experience. Aging is a universal experience. So it's nonsensical, and I think it's less likely to be affected by this pushback to DE&I.

Sara Lebow (08:38):

I'd agree that it's less likely to be affected. One of the reasons is that some of these tech billionaires who are pushing for the rollback of DE&I are extremely invested in the conversation of aging, are the ones leading that conversation and that-

Jacynth Bassett (08:55):

But I'd say they're the ones leading the longevity anti-aging conversation to be fair, but they're still part of it. I realize that they're not being, as Sky said, they don't feel excluded from it.

Sara Lebow (09:05):

Sure.

Jacynth Bassett (09:06):

So they're personally vested in the conversation as much as everybody else, even though I strongly believe you should not have to be personally affected by something to be an ally. But there we go.

Sara Lebow (09:16):

Yeah.

Arielle Feger (09:17):

Agreed.

Sara Lebow (09:17):

Well, so one more thing I'll say on this is aside from my personal belief in investing in DE&I being the right thing to do beauty and many other markets, but beauty in particular, there's a commercial interest in diversifying. If you're expanding your products to people with darker skin tones, with people with skin differences, with people of different ages and different genders, then you're quite literally expanding your market. If you're selling to men and gender diverse people, you're expanding your market. So I think here it's a really clear path. If I'm a beauty company, I want to be not just invested in what's right, but in expanding my market.

Arielle Feger (09:58):

Yeah, it's a numbers game.

Jacynth Bassett (09:59):

It is.

Arielle Feger (09:59):

The more people that you can aim a product at, the more sales you're going to rack up and the more trust and affinity that people are going to have for your brand. So I think it's kind of like a multi-pronged strategy.

Jacynth Bassett (10:13):

I think the problem is is that what we find is a lot of brands are still... And we're seeing both established big, big global brands recognizing the need to shift focus and start to embrace older consumers as well as emerging challenger brand doing that. What they're always concerned about though is alienating younger consumers because we have such a youth-centric society. Coming back to what you said earlier about, well, what is the difference between looking healthy and young? We have internalized ageist stereotypes and attitudes from as young as the age of four. So there's still this traditional perspective that the only way to capture older audiences is still by perpetuating youth-centric ideals. And I think that's where there's a big concern.

(11:03):

But there's definitely a shift and there's more and more studies and data and commercial cases proving that actually it's about an intergenerational age-inclusive approach. And actually you don't alienate by including older audiences, you can actually inspire, you can show role models, you can actually really encourage younger audiences to engage by seeing people that they want to become when they're older, rather than just feel like, oh, it's all downhill from 30 onwards.

Sara Lebow (11:32):

I mean, so beauty like any other market, you have your core consumers and you want to be able to age with them while also attracting new younger consumers. We've talked about this in fashion a lot. Like a standard example we've used before is Abercrombie and Fitch has done a great job of aging with its core consumer while also maintaining being an exciting brand for younger consumers. How can beauty brands do this? How can they remain relevant or become relevant with older consumers?

Jacynth Bassett (12:01):

So I think it all comes down to around branding, keeping it fresh, keeping it contemporary, and not resting on stereotypes or old outdated attitudes that an older consumer wants something that's not contemporary and fresh. You just need to ensure that you have representation and visuals that also speak to them, but it can still be done in a really cool contemporary way that actually also appeals to younger consumers. And you can also have products that maybe also cater to the different needs or the different demands that that consumer has. Perhaps, for example, a lot of women as they get older, their lips may be thin, the skin around their lips thin, but that doesn't mean you can't have a great lipstick or a great balm that could also cater to all ages and you can show it on different ages. It's that intergenerational inclusive approach that I think is really key.

Sky Canaves (12:48):

And I think there's also a lot of upward aspiration in beauty, as you mentioned. Where we've seen Gen Alpha wants the brands that are popular with Gen Z. And then Gen Z is looking to discover the brands that are popular with millennials. I think we saw that recently with Glossier, they're the quintessential millennial brand, but they've really appealed to Gen Z with new products-

Sara Lebow (13:12):

I'm wearing Glossier right now.

Jacynth Bassett (13:12):

As am I

Sky Canaves (13:15):

Yeah. Like fragrance, for example. And we've also seen some new brands that position themselves more to towards a more mature audience and really stand their ground there and have been able to capture a wider net of consumers by not necessarily catering to the Gen Z or Gen Alpha trends. I think MERIT-

Jacynth Bassett (13:37):

Look at Jones Road.

Sara Lebow (13:38):

Yeah, exactly. [inaudible 00:13:39]-

Sky Canaves (13:38):

That's a great example. They are the brand founded by the legendary makeup artist, Bobbi Brown, whose eponymous brand is now owned by Estée Lauder, and she relaunched her own brand. She got on TikTok, she spoke to people in a very authentic, real way. They can see her, they can see her products, they can relate to her. And it's not just the consumer who's in her demographic, but it's the younger consumer as well. That is really finding appeal.

Arielle Feger (14:06):

She's got wisdom.

Sara Lebow (14:07):

Yeah. Well, so I'm glad you bring up Bobbi Brown and Jones Road because that's a great example of someone using social media to appeal to both a younger and an older audience. She went super viral years ago at this point on TikTok for making a video where she slathered her face in foundation sort of mocking or riffing off of what an influencer who said that it wasn't a good foundation had done to try using the foundation, went really viral on TikTok. Which obviously, so we tend to associate TikTok with young folks, but I think that there's a big conversation of the role of influencers in diversification and beauty, but particularly with older people, there's this stereotype that influencers are not older people. But Facebook is a big platform for influencer marketing, we have a lot of influencers who are specifically older people influencers. So I think that that is one area that makeup brands can be, that beauty brands can be investing in and are investing in to be identified with different populations.

Jacynth Bassett (15:15):

And don't forget, I mean Instagram's also massive. We've got strong connections with Ageism Is Never In Style all the way from nano up to global macro influencers over 50 who've got millions of followers. And one of the things that's really beautiful, exactly on that point is how many, particularly millennials and Gen Z are engaging and going, oh my God, you've actually made me start to feel better about getting older and actually about embracing it. What we're also seeing is a lot of influences. We actually have our own content creator network. These are majority women in their 50s who are really excited to work with brands that align with their values, and they're also calling on brands to stop using, going back to what we said at the beginning, this sort of more anti-aging language and brands are having to respond.

(15:59):

We've seen it with products around skin tone. These content creators, these influencers make a difference, and they're actually driving the conversation and driving this social movement as much as the commercial one that brands are having to sit up and listen and go, hang on a second, these people are going to be really influencing their followers. And what we also see with older consumers is they also really build loyalty with their followers. So their followers really trust what they say and the brands that they vouch for and the brands that they use. So it really actually has a double pronged approach. You get that older consumer who follows them, but also we say the younger consumer who's going, I'm now looking for a new approach that's actually a lot more about embracing age.

Sara Lebow (16:43):

Yeah. I mean that's why Fenty has the following it does. It was one of the first brands, if not the first brand, to have as wide a range of skin tones as it did. And I want to underscore one thing that you said earlier, Jacynth, which is that when we talk about ageism, it tends to be a white centric conversation. But ageism and racism and beauty are not different conversations, they're part of the same conversation. So I also think that's another place where beauty brands can be finding influencers from different populations with different skin tones or skin types that age differently.

Jacynth Bassett (17:19):

Absolutely. A lot of conversation when it comes to aging with beauty brands is still very much kind of round wrinkles, but actually when we speak to our community and a lot of community with different ethnicities are saying actually with darker skin, it's more about pigmentation that changes with age. So again, brands have opportunities to target different skin concerns in that way and understand that it's so important to understand points of intersectionality and how all these different communities and groups all interlink. And actually going back to this whole conversation about opening up opportunity, it's serving them in a really authentic way. What's not alienating different customers. It's just inclusivity. I mean, how can you think that's a bad word? Ultimately, inclusivity is good for everyone.

Arielle Feger (18:06):

And you can almost... I think you Jacynth if you said something to the opposite effect earlier, talking about how ageism is viewed very through a white lens, but also this could be a vehicle to open up the conversation to other ways to be more inclusive. It's like you said, everyone ages. This is something everyone has in common. So maybe there's a way that beauty brands can kind of use it to kind of open the door to talking about other ways to be-

Jacynth Bassett (18:39):

Exactly. And then going to more points of intersectionality.

Arielle Feger (18:41):

Yeah.

Sara Lebow (18:42):

Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a great point to end it on. Thank you so much for being here, Jacynth. Really appreciate it.

Jacynth Bassett (18:48):

Thank you for having me.

Sara Lebow (18:49):

Thank you, Sky.

Sky Canaves (18:51):

Yes, thank you. Really enjoyed the conversation,

Sara Lebow (18:53):

And thanks, Arielle.

Arielle Feger (18:54):

This is really fun.

Sara Lebow (18:55):

Thank you to our listeners and to our team that edits the podcast. Our editors are always in style. We'll be back next Wednesday for another episode of Reimagining Retail, an eMarketer podcast made possible by Trax. And on Friday, join Marcus for another episode of The Behind the Numbers Show.