Paolo Rezzara, President of The Kirshener Group, answers some questions on how international markets are faring in our industry. He also talks about the vision of his group during these challenging times.
You recently took part in Cosmoprof Worldwide Bologna. How would you describe your experience?
“Finally, after 3 long years, we were back in Cosmoprof Italy! This event has been long awaited and it has exceeded our expectations, especially considering everything that is going on in this world today.
The slight drop in visitors was well balanced by the quality of the meetings we had, with distributors attending from most of the world visiting us to learn the latest trends and brands we represent.
The Kirschner Group attended in force to this event, with 12 international representatives and 16 of our top brands exhibiting. We were busy from the beginning to the end of the event and It was great to see all our partners and friends that we missed for such a long time …”
Do you see our industry soon returning to the performance levels we used to before the pandemic?
“We are certainly heading in the right direction. The beauty business is healthy and distributors are hungry for the new coolest brands to bring back to their Countries.
Both our retail and professional businesses are growing well and have already surpassed pre-pandemic sales, even if we see the retail business growing at a faster rate than professional.
The market has been looking for innovation for the past 2 years and if you have the right products and the right distribution connections you can really build successful partnerships.
Our international division started 17 years ago and we now work with all of the best distributors in retail and professionals in over 100 Countries.
At Cosmoprof we launched our new line BARBASOL that has generated an incredible flow of visitors to our booth. BARBASOL is the US leading brand for men shaving and grooming electric tools for the retail market, sold in over 100,000 doors in the USA. We had numerous distributors placing orders by the containers right there at the booth.
Other Kirschner Group lines that generated great success were MANIC PANIC (leader in direct die hair colours for retail consumers), SUTRA (professional hair tools) BOSLEY (hair loss treatment line), PMD (Exclusive beauty tools) and the many retail and professional brands of AMERICAN INTERNATIONAL.
Key words in our booth and all over the show were sustainable packaging and clean beauty ingredients, which we have in many of our lines”.
In your opinion, what are the most promising areas in the world for professional hair business?
“Generally speaking, every territory is now very promising If you have the right relationships and products that can fit today’s consumer needs.
However, the USA was the territory that reacted faster from the beginning of the pandemic and within less than a year was back at full speed, showing today the same energy as pre-Covid.
Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Australia were slower to recover due to the more severe Covid limitations, but they are now free and ramping up fast.
We hope all of Asia will open soon and we look forward with enthusiasm to the upcoming Cosmoprof Asia in November”.
How have trade fairs changed after two years of postponement?
“During the past two years we almost haven’t had any beauty shows and this was a major change for our industry.
Our company was able to pivot very quickly and back in the summer of 2020 we started a series of seasonal Virtual beauty shows which allowed our brands to keep in contact with distributors offering exciting incentives and being able to present their latest products.
Now that most markets are open, we are back in full force and exhibiting with our company booth at all major Cosmoprof exhibitions for the pro-business and attending with our brands the many ECRM both in US and International for the retail business”.
What is Kirschner’s plan for the near future?
“The Kirschner Group is aiming to continue improving our services to the industry and consolidate our leading position as the world’s largest beauty representative organization covering the professional and retail business with over 60 representatives strategically located in the key markets all over the world.
We are in process of hiring new representatives, both in retail and professional, to strengthen our relationships and deepen our markets penetration.
We are also in process of launching some exciting new representation at the upcoming Cosmoprof Las Vegas, both for the US and International markets.
If you want to know more about our successful business and the hottest brands in beauty you can bring to your market, come and visit us at the next major beauty event or contact us at intlsupport”.
