Western Europe

In 2023, a year characterised by the ongoing cost-of-living crisis and high inflation, Poundland was one of the more active players in general merchandise stores in the UK, placing a strong focus on pricing and expanding its product range. In March…

Within general merchandise stores, department stores accounted for significantly more value sales than variety stores in Turkey in 2023. The only major player in variety stores is German global player Tchibo, while there are three significant players…

Driven by significant price increases, overall health and beauty specialists saw strong growth in value sales in Austria in 2023, roughly at the same level as retail offline overall. Consumers' willingness to spend in this category has generally…

Health and beauty specialists in Belgium continued to enjoy positive growth in current value terms in 2023. However, this driven mainly by inflationary pressures, as retailers, squeezed by rising input costs, were forced to raise their prices. Within…

Health and beauty specialists continued to see some benefit from consumers’ return to retail shopping in Denmark in 2023. However, although the Danish economy as a whole was performing relatively well in 2023 with falling unemployment and inflation,…

Health and beauty specialists in Finland is the second biggest non-grocery channel in Finland and is a category of growing importance. One of the main reasons for this growth is that pharmacy products are mostly essential. A high share of overall…

Beauty specialists benefitted from the continued post-pandemic return to increased time spent socialising and working outside of the home in France in 2023. Demand rose in categories like colour cosmetics, among others. Similarly, optical goods…

Following a marginal decline the previous year, health and beauty specialists in Germany recorded moderate value growth in 2023, mainly driven by the rising demand for beauty and personal care products. With rising overall costs in Germany,…

Health and beauty specialists saw current value growth in Greece in 2023. Players in the channel are working hard to differentiate their offers and adapt to evolving market trends. The Body Shop launched a store in Athens that is sustainably designed…

Sales in health and beauty specialists slumped into a negative performance in Ireland in 2023, following a positive pattern in 2022. We note that the 2022 growth was primarily driven by the growing health and wellbeing and preventative health trends,…