Oriflame sees negative trend

Cosmetics dealer Oriflame Romania posted 10% sales growth to 7.5 million euros in Q1, compared with the 6.8 million euros in the same time last year. “The structure of our offers in that period changed, as we shifted to promoting more affordable products. In order to counteract the negative trend of the market, we applied the policies we had used back in 1997, when we cut down our profits to avoid any expenses we might have been forced to make to regain the market at a later time,” general manager Monica Tatoiu said. Sales grew 16% in volume, though the cheap products came to account for 80% instead of the previous 60% of the total. Although the company has successfully concluded the first quarter, the second, and maybe the rest of the year for that matter, it is showing signs things are following the overall negative trend of the market. “One reason why the second quarter brought decline compared with the same time last year is that we were better off in terms of cash in April 2002. We did not have the ten-day holiday last year, either, and this winter was harder than usual,” Tatoiu said. She feels the prolonged holidays have upset the budgets of many families, which saw themselves forced to cut some spending. ZF