Faced with mounting economic turmoil, beauty sales aren’t faltering yet.

In keeping with data from Circana, prestige beauty sales reached $6.6 billion throughout the first quarter, up 16 percent from the identical period last 12 months (and so continuing 2022’s trend of double-digit increases inside each category).

Mass beauty also continued to swell, ringing in $7 billion in sales — a ten percent increase versus the identical period last 12 months. Each category inside the mass channel saw double-digit dollar sales increases, aside from hair care, which grew 7 percent.

It’s price noting, though, that while the expansion in prestige beauty sales has been largely on account of increasing unit sales, mass beauty sales against this grew mainly due to rising average prices driven by inflation.

“On the prestige side of the business, we’re not seeing these big huge swings in average price, whereas within the mass market, average prices for nearly every category is up double digits,” said Circana’s vice chairman of beauty Larissa Jensen.

While all categories saw overall unit sales grow throughout the first quarter, within the mass market specifically, only makeup and fragrance grew in units in addition to dollar sales; mass skincare unit performance was “relatively flat, and hair care had a small decline in units,” said Jensen.

Makeup led the charge because the fastest-growing category in each prestige and mass beauty, rising 24 percent and 15 percent in sales, respectively, and accounting for roughly one-third of total beauty sales. And, consistent with the so-called “Lipstick Index,” lip makeup remained the fastest-growing prestige makeup segment, growing 43 percent, with designer brands seeing even steeper gains.

“We’re seeing loads more trading up in makeup, where designer brands are performing higher than the market overall in prestige,” said Jensen, noting that the alternative effect has been steadily taking hold in skincare (through which sales grew about 11 percent in prestige, versus 10 percent in mass). She says the phenomenon is principally fueled by increasing consumer education due to TikTok, and the numerous widely followed skincare experts inhabiting the platform.

“The industry has been democratized in some ways by the influx of social media — once a consumer knows they don’t must spend loads on a skincare product, and that they should purchase a mass product that is definitely going to work in your skin, they’re going to do this,” said Jensen. Cetaphil, La-Roche Posay and CeraVe are among the many mass brands which have all benefited from this trend lately.

Fragrance sales grew 15 percent and 13 percent within the prestige and mass markets, respectively, with prestige fragrance sizes under 1 ounce accounting for nearly 40 percent of unit sales — a three-point increase versus last 12 months — as consumers increasingly go for on-the-go convenience.

While the mass market accounts for nearly three-quarters of total hair care sales, prestige hair care sales continued to grow faster throughout the first quarter (11 percent sales growth versus 7 percent). Particularly, leave-in treatments and hair products that addressed thinning, scalp health and warmth protection outperformed the general category.