A bird’s-eye view of the beauty industry sees the continued growth of social selling, significant consumer mindset shifts and sustainability becoming ever more important in 2025.

CEW‘s 2025 State of the Industry event included reports from Mintel, NIQ and Iced Media and highlighted key factors that impacted the landscape in 2024. Among them, the rise of social selling, consumers seeking balance and well-being, and even further shifts to the digital realm.

Case in point, Mintel’s Sarah Jindal noted that globally consumers are expecting to see themselves reflected in their brand choices. For example, 55 percent of U.S. adults agree that a top priority was ensuring brands’ values aligned with their own, and 63 percent of U.K. adults between 16 and 44 want products designed specifically for their age.

Technology separate from AI is also driving shifts — Jindal pointed to Kao Corp.’s recent discoveries of “two different types of skin based on RNA, and [Kao’s] goal is to create a tool that helps better understand the skin based on biomolecular data” — though AI will help mine insights at record speed for manufacturers.

Sustainability is gaining relevance, too, with 61 percent of U.S. adults “expecting brands to take the lead” on environmental responsibility, and 54 percent of them saying recent climate disasters have impacted the environmental choices they made.

“Fragrance is paving the way for upcycled materials sourcing,” Jindal added, pointing to supplier DSM-Firmenich and the indie brand, Ellis Brooklyn. Conjunctively, consumers are also focusing on underconsumption and low-effort wellness practices, as well as the simpler lifestyles like the “trad wife” trend that has been gaining steam.

“Trad wives” first took TikTok by storm, and spending on the platform tells the story of an increasingly compulsive shopper, said Leslie Ann Hall of Iced Media. Spending increased 150 percent, and 57 percent of daily TikTok users made a purchase on the platform.

“The future of search is social,” Hall said, adding that TikTok has become the preferred search engine for younger generations. “There are 3 billion searches on TikTok daily.”

Eighty percent of sales on TikTok come from shoppable short video, and the remainder come from product tab sales and live shopping. Adaptation of live shopping is much slower in the U.S. than in other markets like China, with founder-led brands leading the charge. “Other brands should give it a shot as long as they have a long and consistent approach,” Hall said.

Ultimately, social shopping is driven by both impulse and the fear of missing out, and it also creates a halo effect for brands with distribution diversified beyond the channel, Hall concluded.

“The social commerce boom is just thrilling in terms of bringing impulsivity to beauty categories,” said NIQ’s Tara James Taylor. From past years, consumer spend is up, but tariffs could drive between a 10 to 20 percent price hike. The mindset is “cautiously optimistic,” Taylor said.

Beauty shoppers are also migrating to Amazon, which Taylor cited as a key driver in the growth of e-commerce. 31 percent of Amazon’s beauty shoppers are coming from the specialty and mass channels, while 5 percent of them are new to the category.