Multinationals eye Romania''s cosmetics market

The cosmetics business in Romania has attracted the interest of international players in this industry. “The market is growing by 10 to 15% a year. This is stimulating other international players to come to Romania,” stated Alexandru Rabanca, general manager of Cosmetiques de France, the company that owns the Romanian franchise for Yves Rocher. Estimated at 30 million euros, the cosmetics market has been going up by up 15% annually over the last few years, especially because of the entry of several big international names in Romania. At the same time, the companies have invested more and more money in marketing, allocating hundreds of millions of euros for advertising purposes. Sweden-based Oriflame was recently close to opening a factory in Romania, in northern Bucharest, an investment of up to 50 million euros. This would have been the first local production facility of a cosmetics multinational. In the end however, the offer made by the authorities in the Russian Federation turned out to be more attractive for Oriflame. ZF