For Indigenous-owned Cheekbone Magnificence Cosmetics Inc., the influence of the
Purchase Canadian motion
has been unmistakable.
Jenn Harper, founding father of the St. Catharines, Ont.-based cosmetics model, stated the corporate noticed a 52 per cent enhance in enterprise within the interval between January and April, in contrast with the identical interval final 12 months — with a 190 per cent surge in March particularly.
Harper stated her firm has seen important development throughout politically pushed occasions earlier than, resembling in 2020 with the Black Lives Matter motion. However they’ve all the time been short-term boosts to the enterprise. She is extra optimistic concerning the present development Cheekbone Magnificence is experiencing as a result of variety of prospects who’ve change into repeat patrons. Cheekbone Magnificence’s gross sales revenues are within the seven-figure vary, with
e-commerce gross sales
for 2025 anticipated to develop 40 per cent from 2023, the corporate stated.
This new curiosity has led her to rethink the corporate’s targets of specializing in the U.S. to develop: She is now pivoting to constructing her buyer base in Canada first, she stated.
“(We would like) to actually change into a Canadian make-up model that every one Canadians learn about,” Harper stated. “We’re right here to construct a model that’s going to final generations, similar to our Indigenous roots.”
Cheekbone isn’t the one Canadian cosmetics firm that has seen heightened curiosity and loyalty from Canadian magnificence patrons in response to the
commerce battle
launched by the Trump administration in January: Trade gamers each small and huge informed the Monetary Put up they’re seeing gross sales surge, and are optimistic the change will final.
“We now have seen a groundswell of exercise and in the end possibly a everlasting shift in client behaviour to assist Canadian enterprise,” stated Charles Wachsberg, the co-founder of Apollo Healthcare Corp., a serious Canadian well being and sweetness non-public label producer headquartered in Toronto. Wachsberg stated the corporate has produced greater than 64,000 merchandise, together with lotions, shampoos, child merchandise and pet merchandise. The corporate was taken non-public for $327 million in 2021 and has nine-figure gross sales, the corporate stated.
“I’d say that our Canadian enterprise has surged in all probability within the neighborhood of 20 per cent because the commerce battle started,” Wachsberg stated, including that Canadian consumers are paying shut consideration to product labels as they store, looking for the maple leaf and checking the place the product originates from. “They’re searching for out Canadian innovation and Canadian content material of their behaviours, and so they’re ready to pay extra for it.”
This development within the Canadian magnificence trade builds on an current trajectory. In accordance with market analysis firm Circana Inc., magnificence was Canada’s quickest rising trade within the first half of 2022. The non-profit Commerce Facilitation Workplace (TFO) Canada estimated the Canadian magnificence and private care market amounted to $11 billion in income in 2023, forecasting the market to develop 1.76 per cent between 2023 and 2028. Australia-based market analysis agency Ibisworld Pty Ltd. pegged the Canadian beauty and sweetness product manufacturing market in Canada at $4.2 billion in 2024, which elevated 0.1 per cent in 2024.
The query is whether or not the commerce battle will allow development within the sector in Canada or hinder it.
Commerce affiliation Cosmetics Alliance Canada recognized about 60 Canadian manufacturers inside the sector, with most being small- to mid-sized firms.
“Their market share as we speak shouldn’t be wherever close to that of the massive manufacturers, however there are actually alternatives for them to develop,” stated Darren Praznik, the group’s president and chief govt. “And positively retailers are expressing a better curiosity in them.”
Vancouver-headquartered skincare firm Elleboxco Inc., working as Blume, has seen a dramatic surge in Canadian gross sales, together with via its varied retail companions, resembling Sephora Canada and Amazon.com Inc., in keeping with its founders Bunny and Taran Ghatrora. The venture-backed firm, which launched in 2018 and has raised greater than $3 million in keeping with Osler, Hoskin & Harcourt LLP, is on tempo for eight-figure revenues this fiscal 12 months, Bunny Ghatrora stated.
Blume’s Canadian gross sales have grown 35 per cent year-over-year thus far in 2025, with 25 per cent development general, the corporate stated.
Nonetheless, regardless of swelling demand from native patrons, Canadian magnificence firms aren’t proof against the destructive penalties of a commerce battle. Smaller manufacturers are notably weak, particularly in the event that they rely on U.S. gross sales.
“A Canadian enterprise can’t survive with out the U.S. market,” Cheekbone’s Harper stated. “We want the U.S. client.”
Canadian magnificence corporations can face greater prices related to manufacturing their merchandise as nicely, since many elements and packaging parts can’t be sourced domestically.
Blume, for instance, makes use of German chamomile flower as certainly one of its product’s elements and sources bottles and droppers from China.
“The beauty trade might be one of the vital internationally built-in,” stated Beauty Alliance’s Praznik. “They manufacture and distribute and promote their merchandise in provide and distribution chains which can be like an online world wide.”
In truth, many small Canadian-owned manufacturers trying to develop and develop internationally typically find yourself getting purchased out by massive American firms that may function on a much bigger scale. Examples embody Toronto-founded MAC Cosmetics Inc. and skincare firm DECIEM Inc., proprietor of manufacturers resembling The Extraordinary, each acquired by The Estée Lauder Corporations Inc.
“Our trade has been very supportive of free commerce world wide and that’s as a result of it has meant nice efficiencies in manufacturing,” Praznik stated, citing advantages from higher high quality and cheaper merchandise to extra choices for the buyer. “So, everybody has benefited.”
As Canadian cosmetics firms grapple with the
fallout from tariffs
, they’re weighing a wide range of methods.
Whereas Blume has primarily targeted on North American gross sales, the Ghatrora sisters stated the commerce battle has prompted them to extra critically take into account increasing to international locations resembling the UK and Australia to diversify the corporate’s buyer base.
Praznik stated some Canadian producers are evaluating whether or not they can import Chinese language-made parts on to Vancouver and never through the U.S.
Others are trying into utilizing customized producers in different international locations to make sure merchandise and keep away from tariffs. For example, one possibility can be to make a product for the U.S. market within the U.S., whereas manufacturing merchandise for Canadians and different international locations in Canada, Praznik stated.
Montreal-based Groupe Marcelle Inc., alternatively, has all the time prioritized the Canadian market, with some exports to the U.S. and on-line gross sales to different international locations, stated the corporate’s president David Cape.
Groupe Marcelle is Canada’s largest home-grown cosmetics firm, with revenues of about $147 million in 2024 in keeping with Ibisworld. Its manufacturers, together with Marcelle, Watier and Annabelle, are offered via retailers resembling Customers Drug Mart throughout the nation.
Most of the firm’s merchandise are manufactured in Montreal, which suggests it has not wanted to move on greater prices to Canadian shoppers, Cape stated.
On the onset of the Purchase Canadian motion, Cape stated many magnificence patrons in pursuit of Canadian-owned manufacturers started making an attempt out Groupe Marcelle merchandise for the primary time and main retailers approached the corporate instantly to find out how they may meet the extra demand.
However jittery shoppers could but counteract the nationalist sentiment driving the Canadian magnificence trade’s present development. Commerce tensions have induced many shoppers to tug again on their discretionary spending, in keeping with a
TD Economics report
in March.
Marcelle is seeing barely extra development in its mass magnificence strains, that are at extra reasonably priced value factors in contrast with its status Watier line, as shoppers are being extra cautious with their {dollars}, Cape stated.
Whereas there is a bonus with shoppers to being a Canadian firm, Cape stated the commerce battle continues to be not good for the economic system general.
“We need to see it come to an finish and the earlier the higher,” stated Cape. “And even when it does, we nonetheless hope that … individuals will bear in mind shopping for Canadian is an effective factor for our nation in any state of affairs.”
• E mail: slouis@postmedia.com
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