What You Need to Know When Partnering with Beauty Brands

As last week’s article in The Wall Street Journal summarized, the rise of women’s sports, the emergence of numerous star female athletes and significantly increased fandom among women and girls has generated unprecedented interest in partnerships from a category that has until now remained mostly on the sports sponsorship sidelines: beauty and personal care.

The recent explosion in deals between beauty brands and rights holders has been hard to miss, ranging from leading brands such as Glossier, e.l.f. Cosmetics and L’Oreal’s NYX Professional Makeup—which sponsor the WNBA, the Indianapolis 500 entry of driver Katherine Legge, and the NWSL Angel City FC and WNBA New York Liberty, respectively—to smaller players such as hair-care brand Odele, which sponsors the WNBA Minnesota Lynx.

Partnership sales teams are unlikely to have the depth of research on the beauty industry that they have on traditionally active sponsorship categories, so many are playing catch-up to acquaint themselves and pull together relevant information for their pitches and proposals.

Market research giant Euromonitor International identified key trends shaping the category in a report published last month. Those most relevant to the sports partnership space are:

Price Sensitivity. According to Euromonitor, “Consumers are adopting a more deliberate purchasing approach, realizing that they need to make the most of their reduced disposable income, limited by elevated prices in necessities. This isn’t equating to reduced consumption. Rather, beauty consumers are trading down in some categories to afford premium options in others.”

Partnerships with best-in-class teams, athletes and organizations could help bolster or establish a brand’s premium bona fides.

Redefining Value. “In 2024, consumers are adopting behaviors to maximize value from beauty and personal care purchases, such as seeking discounts and promotions (and) utilizing rewards points.”

Sponsorships can serve as the hook for value-based promotions, such as tickets or merchandise as a purchase incentive. Beauty brands also could tie in their rewards efforts with a team or event’s fan loyalty program.

Focus on Ingredients. “Ingredient-specific claims have potential to ask for higher prices. The ingredient-led beauty trend highlights the benefits of specific ingredients…As consumers grow increasingly wary of brands, the trend is developing a sustainability focus, looking to understand ‘greenwashing’ natural ingredient claims and to better understand which claims have scientific consensus.”

Partnerships that include the opportunity for in-person experiential activation, as well as digital content sharing, could provide beauty brands with excellent platforms for educating fans and consumers about their ingredients and product claims.

Crossover between Beauty and Wellness. As beauty brands continue to explore how to position themselves in the wellness/longevity space, according to Euromonitor, they should “emphasize preventative solutions, especially when catering to younger consumers, while brands catering to any age group may consider category extensions across beauty products, vitamins/supplements, foods to support a healthy diet and mental wellness.”

With health and wellness as the cornerstone of most sports activities, beauty products could leverage a team, event or athlete partnership to authentically connect to the attributes of healthy living.