Washington Post: For Russian Women, Whiff of the Good Life

Thu Apr 29 12:49:30 UTC 2004

For Russian Women, Whiff of the Good Life 
$5 Billion Cosmetics Industry Entices Consumers With 'Small Joys' of
Luxury 
By Susan B. Glasser
Washington Post Foreign Service
Thursday, April 29, 2004; Page A19 

MOSCOW -- Galina Vladimirova is a believer in what she calls "the
Russian cult of makeup." Tucked neatly inside her purse one recent day
were her latest acquisitions of lipstick and eye shadow, her first
Armani purchases. They were more than twice as expensive as any makeup
she had ever bought, even for a woman who spends up to $150 a month on
cosmetics.
"It makes me happy every day to know they are there," she said. "It's an
accessible part of the good life."
In the beauty boomtown that is Moscow today, she is no exception. Just a
generation removed from the time when their mothers and grandmothers
resorted to the peasant trick of reddening their cheeks with beets,
Russian women today spend twice as much of their income on cosmetics as
Western Europeans do -- 12 percent of their entire paychecks on average,
according to research firm Comcon-Pharma.
Perhaps no other cosmetics market in the world is as hot as Russia's,
which has quintupled in size over the past four years and is forecast by
industry analysts to triple again, to $18 billion, by 2010.
The "lust for beauty," as the weekly Russian business magazine Expert
dubbed it, is more than a success story about what happened when
consumer culture met pent-up Soviet demand. It is also very much about
the identity of Russian women in economically uncertain times and how
they have rejected Soviet stereotypes while refusing to embrace
American-style feminism.
In a country where the new archetype is the Cosmo Girl -- and where
circulation of Cosmopolitan magazine is higher than in any place outside
the United States -- makeup is still about liberation, about affordable
luxury and about what's required to get and keep a man.
"Russian beauty is beauty made natural," said Larisa Sidorova, an
analyst at the Validata market research firm who conducted extensive
focus groups last year on Russian women's attitude toward beauty.
"Russian women differ from other women in the sense that they want
miracles from cosmetics."
At Arbat Prestige, an oasis of self-improvement on Lenin Prospect, the
owner claims that more money is spent on makeup per square foot there
than in any other cosmetics store in the world.
"What can I say?" said Natasha Lutsenko, an impeccably turned-out
teacher wearing a leather coat with a fluffy collar as she shopped for a
birthday present for her mother. "There's a cult of femininity in Russia
now."
Never mind the mystifying economics of it, how a $20 tube of lipstick
wouldn't seem to make sense as a mass-market proposition in a country
where average salaries have only just now hit $200 a month. In this, as
in so many things, Russia has taken its own path, and it definitely
includes luxury lipstick, eye shadow, mascara, face creams, body lotions
and other miracles in a bottle.
"A Russian woman will spend all her salary on a Chanel perfume," said
Anna Dycheva-Smirnov, an industry researcher. "Russian women are very
particular about how they look, even if they are just going to the
bakery." 
At a time when at least a quarter of Russians live in poverty, the
country manages to spend 1.3 percent of its gross domestic product on
cosmetics -- compared with an average of just 0.5 percent in Western
Europe, according to a report this winter by consulting firm Ernst &
Young. Researchers at Comcon-Pharma found that 76 percent of all female
Russians older than 10 use makeup.
The total Russian cosmetics market reached more than $5.2 billion last
year -- even more, for example, than the country's consumer electronics
sector. And it is continuing to grow at a rapid pace with annual
increases of at least 25 percent, according to several analysts.
Some sectors, such as direct sales in the Russian provinces by U.S.
cosmetics firms Avon and Mary Kay, are still recording annual growth
rates of 50 percent to 80 percent -- a full decade after they arrived in
Russia. Homegrown products are also booming. Kalina, the leading Russian
firm and maker of the Black Pearl line of face creams, reported a 73
percent rise in profits last year on sales of $157 million.
Now ranking just behind France, Germany and Britain in total sales,
Russia could soon become the European cosmetics capital. Arbat Prestige,
a Russian company that has built the largest chain of cosmetics and
perfume stores here, plans to invest $500 million in new stores just
over the next two years.
"Finally everybody realized what's happening here and started to pay
attention to this market," said Dycheva-Smirnov, vice president of
Staraya Krepost, a marketing research firm that specializes in
cosmetics. "The new birth of the Russian cosmetics market is only 10
years old. It grows very fast, just like children when they are small."
Vladimir Nekrasov is preparing to bet half a billion dollars on it.
Nekrasov, 43, president of Arbat Prestige, forecasts that his 14 stores
in Moscow will take in $250 million to $300 million this year -- up from
$56 million three years ago.
"Life is hard here, people are tired and they spend more money here than
people in other countries on this," Nekrasov said of the "small joys" he
sells in his stores. "It's a sip of oxygen for people in conditions of
this dirty and exhausting city."
His shops are something of a wonder in a place unaccustomed to service
with a smile. Friendly consultants answer questions and offer
personalized makeup advice. He stocks as many as 50,000 different items
and arranges luxury products on one side of the store, more moderately
priced brands on the other. Nekrasov says he offers Russian women
"emotional support" and "their piece of happiness" along with the
aromatherapy and cellulite-fighting potions that would have been
impossible to obtain in the Soviet past.
In fact, he evokes that era for customers who are nostalgic for it but
who are also grateful for a choice in lipstick colors that ranges beyond
pink. 
A well-known collector of socialist realist art from the Soviet period,
Nekrasov has hung canvases from his personal collection all over his
Moscow shops -- including one room in his Prospect Mira store that
features World War II portraits of Stalin and the bloody battle of
Stalingrad.
But for many women, the voracious and seemingly unquenchable desire for
makeup is all about overcoming that Soviet past.
"We spend a huge amount of money on cosmetics in Russia because, first
of all, it was not long ago when such variety came to Russia. So for
many it feels like, 'Finally we got it!' " said Maria Taranenko, beauty
editor for the Russian edition of Elle magazine.
Indeed, there's hardly a woman in Moscow of a certain age who doesn't
remember the opening of the first real cosmetics store here in 1989, an
Estee Lauder shop still known fondly as the "Golden Rose." Many can
recount how they stood in line there, or when exactly they bought their
first tube of Lancome lipstick. One woman recalled placing her expensive
moisturizer in a prominent place in her living room, so all who visited
would see it.
Natalya Arkhipova remembered the strange eye affliction that started to
plague her girlfriends not long after they bought their first French
mascara in the early 1990s. Their eyelashes became stiff, as if they
were popping out of their heads, and they couldn't leave the house for
days. All because they had no idea how to properly apply the stuff --
they had smeared their lashes with multiple coats of mascara and then
refused to wash it off, because it was so expensive.
"It was our first experience, no one taught us," said Arkhipova, a
nutritionist. She, for one, was hooked. "I saw myself turning from an
ugly duckling to a swan. Like all Russian women, I would save and save
money for cosmetics."
Sidorova, the pollster, said the obsession with cosmetics is "from
Soviet times, when people focused on the way they are perceived by
others. Russians lack confidence from that era, and lack of confidence
means they do not allow themselves to be natural."

In the post-Soviet era, the ideal in Russia has become more strongly
feminine, according to Sidorova, who said that participants in focus
groups in several cities came up with the same definition of a Russian
beauty: a woman in a dress, with long blond hair, elaborate makeup and
hairdo, and high heels.
"We are not moving toward the unisex look like in the rest of the world,
which connects to a negative attitude toward feminism," she said. "We
are moving in a different direction."
Not long ago, she recalled, Dove soap tested its slogan here, "You are
beautiful the way you are." It was, Sidorova said, "a complete failure
to Russian women. They don't believe in beauty itself. Beauty should be
made."

()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()
Dr. Michael A. Denner
Russian Studies Program
Stetson University
Campus Box 8361
DeLand, FL 32724
386.822.7381 (department)
386.822.7265 (direct line)
386.822.7380 (fax)
http://www.stetson.edu/~mdenner
http://russianpoetry.net

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