Revlon will be faced with a strategic challenge when it takes over management of Elizabeth Arden’s fragrance portfolio later this year.
In Q4, the Miramar, Florida-based company saw a sales divide emerge between its celebrity license and designer fragrance arms of the business.
With several major fragrance brand licenses in its portfolio, including Britney Spears, Mariah Carey, Justin Bieber and Nicki Minaj, Elizabeth Arden is a leader in the celebrity fragrance market.
However, in Q4 2016, net sales of non-Elizabeth Arden branded fragrances dropped 5%. The company put this down to “lower sales of distributed fragrance brands”.
Revlon is due to acquire Elizabeth Arden for approximately $870m later this year
Conversely, net sales of the company’s designer fragrances grew 5%. This was put down to strong performances by the John Varvatos and Juicy Couture fragrances. White Diamonds and Curve also showed growth in Q4.
For Elizabeth Arden’s own-brand, net sales grew 14% with double digit growth observed across skin care, colour and fragrance. Overall in Q4, Elizabeth Arden announced net sales of $192.7m, up 9.8% on Q4 2015.
The company saw North American sales perform well, up 2.6%, and a stable performance internationally, where sales grew 1.6% compared with the prior year.
For the full year, however, net sales decreased 0.4% on 2015, totalling $966.7m.
GAAP net loss per diluted share was $2.49. Overall, net sales in North America dropped 2.7%, but international net sales remained buoyant, up 5.6% compared with 2015.
Revlon is due to acquire Elizabeth Arden for approximately $870m. On 16 June, this represented a 50% premium on Elizabeth Arden’s closing price of $9.31.
Since Arden’s Q4 results were released, however, its share prices jumped up 45% on the past year, reaching $13.95.