“I would not want to switch to henna”: hair dye runs out in beauty salons

Yekaterina Maksimova

According to Lyalya Sadykova, founder of the Hair Curler and Lucky Like salon chain, member of the board of the Association of Beauty Industry Enterprises and Professionals, suppliers assure representatives of the beauty industry that there is a supply of products, but purchase limits have been introduced.

“We are not allowed to buy dyes for future use. Salons can buy about the same amount they bought before March of this year. Average monthly turnover. Maximum - plus 20% over the usual amount. Suppliers have switched to manual regulation so that warehouses are not empty. The stocks will tentatively last until the end of June, as representatives of the brands themselves say, what will happen next is still impossible to predict”, - Lyalya Sadykova explained.

Public Assistant to the Ombudsman for the Protection of the Rights of Entrepreneurs in the Sverdlovsk Region, founder of the Vremena Goda chain of beauty salons in Yekaterinburg, Yulia Silina, claims that masters are already experiencing a shortage of dyes for almost all brands.

“At the beginning of spring, when the beauty industry panicked and tried to replenish the stocks of dyes as much as possible, even then we were unable to purchase everything we needed. That one position was not found, then another. It was then explained to us by the fact that logistics is changing. Like, everything will be, but later. Mid-May - the situation has not cleared up. We work in the VIP segment and, for example, we need the Goldwell brand, which is supplied by Laima-Lux Group. Until February, a tube cost about 650 rubles, in March - almost 1000 rubles. But, most importantly, there is no understanding whether there will be deliveries at all, when, in what volume and at what price. While we are holding on to old stocks, they will last for 2-3 months, and then ... I would not want to switch to henna and basma”, - Yulia Silina assessed the situation.

Market participants note that against the background of a possible shortage of imported professional cosmetics, even the problem of pricing has gone by the wayside. In March, there was a complete mess with the purchase prices for imported dyes: for some positions, the price doubled.

Distributors explained this by the exchange rate, disruption of the usual supply chains and the fact that the Central Bank raised the key rate to 20%. Even the domestic manufacturer, Estel, could not resist then, which briefly raised prices by 100% in March.

The situation has gradually stabilized, but the main hairdressing brands have already risen in price by 10-30% as of March. So, for example, the price of Kapous and Paul Mitchell increased by 30%. Wella, Londa, Estel de Luxe, Nioxin stayed in the 20% growth range. Only the Dutch brand Keune has risen in price by only 9%.

The owners of beauty salons have no doubt: this is not the limit. By the summer, distributors will again rewrite the purchase price, if, of course, there is something to rewrite. And if now the currency difference may not affect the purchase prices so much, then logistics has definitely risen in price by 2-3 times.

“Distributors are now busy with logistics. We understand this. We also understand that in a situation where global brands are massively and non-stop announcing their withdrawal from the Russian market, distribution is extremely problematic. Suppliers now live one day at a time. Most of those stocks that are still there were made in 2021. This is what we are all holding on to. Distributors just don't know yet what to tell us, what to promise us and how to reassure us”, - commented one salon chain owner, who wished to remain anonymous.

Violetta Slavinskaite, commercial director of Parfum (one of the largest national distributors of FMCG products in Russia - ed.), admitted that distributors today are in a situation of complete uncertainty. Many companies refuse to supply their products to Russia (Schwarzkopf has officially announced its withdrawal from the Russian market - editor's note). “Distributors can't do anything. We are powerless. I don’t know how the industry will develop, it’s hard to say now. I hope that in June, when the financial year ends for foreign partners, there will be at least some understanding”, - commented Violetta Slavinskaitė. She is sure of one thing for sure: in the short term, the assortment for the beauty industry will definitely be reduced.

The founder of the network of hairdressing salons "Soviet" (Tambov) Anton Lapin believes that now the salons that operate in the economy segment are in the most advantageous position. “For example, we use the products of the Italian brand Tefia, the purchase price of which has changed slightly. A tube cost 170 rubles, now 190. And we have not yet encountered a shortage. And I know that many of my colleagues in the workshop are now ready for experiments, searching for new dyes and manufacturers, whose products I still call “no name”. Well-known brands will leave, we will replace them with products from other countries, including Asian ones. We decided for ourselves that we would not panic, although there were difficulties - one of our branches had to be closed”, - Anton Lapin added a note of optimism.