How the Beauty Industry is Taking a Stance on the Ukraine Crisis
The geopolitical conflict between Russia and Ukraine has had the world in psychological grip over the last month, and the corporate world has not been spared. With large corporations like Netflix halting their operations in Russia, brands are under much scrutiny in terms of how they are reacting to the crisis. The beauty and skincare industry is showing great strides on this front, with large conglomerates to small indie brands making their own efforts to stand in solidarity with Ukraine.
L’Oreal, one of the world’s largest beauty conglomerates, has shown some of the most comprehensive efforts through a “solidarity plan”, which is outlined in detail on their website. This includes a number of initiatives such as providing financial and medical services to L’Oreal’s 352 Ukrainian employees, a global employee fundraising and volunteer program to help Ukrainian victims, as well as up to 5 million euros worth of donations to UNICEF and the Red Cross. Beyond this, L’Oreal has also halted its operations in Russia, by closing all physical and e-commerce stores.
While it is no surprise that a brand as large as Loreal is capable of executing such a wide scale action plan, smaller beauty brands are also stepping up to help in ways they can. For example, Upcircle, which is known for its sustainable beauty products, is donating 1 euro for each of its cleansing balm products that it sells to Razom for Ukraine. Grande Cosmetics also donated 50% of its proceeds to the Ukrainian Red Cross from march 10th to the 12th.
These brand initiatives give us some good insight on how to go about doing social good by answering two key questions.
- Should brands take stances on socio-political issues?
The short answer is…Yes. Aside from the moral and ethical reasoning behind taking a stance (i.e you’re doing good), there is a commercial case for brands taking initiative towards certain causes. Consumers of today are extremely cause-driven in their purchases, especially millennials, who represent the largest generational cohort to date (22% of the US population). 52% of millennials prefer to shop at retailers who share the same values as them. Also, a study from 2019 across 12 key markets found that 28% of consumers encouraged others to buy a product based on the brand’s business values or causes.
2. What are some strategic factors to consider when taking a stance?
Core Capabilities and Brand Characteristics.
Big brands like L‘Oreal have the financial and operational capacity to take large scale initiatives such as the one we’re seeing with Ukraine. However you don’t necessarily need to make a big splash in order to make an impact. Like we saw with the smaller beauty brands, taking initiative in line with your brand’s value system and capabilities can still be impactful. Matching donations is one thing, but there are so many other avenues that brands could take such as leveraging your brand’s online community to bring awareness to certain issues and sharing resources. Taking a more product-specific approach is also a viable option. An example of this in the context of the Ukraine crisis is Unilever (parent company of brands like Dove and Axe) providing 5 million euros worth of essential hygiene products to the humanitarian relief effort.
Transparent and Authentic Communications
How you communicate your efforts to your consumers is extremely important, as this determines how a brand’s intentions are perceived. The worst thing that a brand can do is to come across as “all talk” or “bandwagoning”. To avoid this, being transparent and communicating the tangible impact of your initiative is key. L’Oreal did great with this through a dedicated web page that detailed every aspect of their solidarity efforts for Ukraine. This could have been further solidified through social media content, as well as an email marketing campaign to subscribers. On the flip side, content saturation could also be a problem and may even be perceived as performative. Finding a balance between informative, inspiring content that is succinct and palatable should be the goal.
Final takeaways
With consumers prioritizing social good when informing their purchase decisions, and brand accountability being at an all time high, doing nothing is simply not an option anymore. This is especially true when it comes to global crises like the one we are currently witnessing in the Ukraine. When coming up with an impactful social good strategy, brands should take into consideration their operational capacity, brand values and their target audience. Communicating these efforts should be built on authenticity and transparency, making sure to highlight the tangible impact brought about by the initiative.
