L’Oréal has reported sales of €43.48bn for 2024, a like-for-like increase of 5.1%, despite a challenging Chinese market.
At the same time, the French beauty giant revealed that long-time board member Françoise Bettencourt Meyers is stepping down after 28 years.
The heiress of L’Oréal’s founder Eugène Schueller will not seek renewal of her directorship at the next general meeting of shareholders on 29 April 2025.
Bettencourt Meyers has served as Vice-Chairwoman of L’Oréal’s board of directors since 2020.
According to the company, Bettencourt Meyers proposed that her family’s holding company Téthys join the board alongside her two sons, Jean-Victor and Nicolas Meyers, to continue the Bettencourt Meyers dynasty’s involvement in L’Oréal.
Téthys is the largest shareholder of L’Oréal.
If its appointment is approved, Alexandre Benais, Deputy CEO at Téthys, will act as the holding company’s representative.
The family also proposed that Jean-Victor replace his mother as Vice-Chair of the board.
News of L’Oréal’s pending boardroom reshuffle follows a strong 2024 financial performance.
“2024 was a defining year as we made L’Oréal future fit and laid many foundations for our next conquests,” said Nicolas Hieronimus, CEO of L’Oréal.
“We augmented our marketing and R&I capabilities with AI and tech, advanced with the harmonisation of our IT, simplified our organisational structures, and strengthened our industrial and supply chain resilience.
“We also continued to sharpen our portfolio: we acquired the Miu Miu licence and Korean brand Dr.G, and took minority stakes in Galderma and Amouage.”
By segment, the company’s Dermatological Beauty division was a standout, growing 9.8% like-for-like and passing the €7bn mark for the first time.
Led by growth from La Roche-Posay, the division outperformed the wider dermocosmetics market, according to L’Oréal.
The company’s Professional Products division grew 5.3% like-for-like, while L’Oréal Luxe grew 2.7% like-for-like compared with the prior year.
L’Oreal’s largest division in 2024, Consumer Products, was up by 5.4% like-for-like to hit €15.98bn.
The company credited hair care as being particularly dynamic in this segment, driven by the L’Oréal Paris brand.
L’Oréal enjoyed robust growth in all geographic markets in 2024, with the exception of North Asia, in which sales declined -3.2% like-for-like.
Contraction was attributed to mainland China, where the beauty market was strongly impacted by softness in the selective segment.
L’Oréal’s Consumer Products category underperformed in China’s mass market.
However, products in its L’Oréal Luxe, Dermatological Beauty and Professional Products divisions outpaced their respective markets in the country.
Looking forward through 2025, Hieronimus added that the brand owner remains “optimistic about the outlook for the global beauty market, and confident in our ability to keep outperforming it and to achieve another year of growth in sales and profit”.
He added: “We expect growth to accelerate progressively, supported by our beauty stimulus plan, which will be driven by an exciting pipeline of new launches and continued strong brand support.”
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