retail
preferences
.png)
I think it comes down to how inaccessible products for our hair have traditionally been - for a long time we were only able to get Black hair products from Independent hair shops because the Boots on the high street or the local pharmacy didn't have any, and they didn't care to. Many of us are just used to it.
.svg)
-min.png)
Black European women are most likely to shop on e-commerce stores because in most European supermarkets or high street stores there aren’t any suitable options for our hair type.
Most times we have to go out of our way to find a store that sells the hair products we need but the customer service offered is often very poor and the workers aren’t trained on our hair type.
.png)
What is most striking about this insight is that a recent report by Researchandmarkets.com found that Supermarkets were the leading channel in distribution of haircare products in the UK. Yet for Black women this is by far the smallest channel.
Could this be an indication that Black women don’t shop at supermarkets? No. Early results from focus groups by Treasure Tress has shown that a majority of Black women in Britain do their essential household shopping at Supermarkets. This clearly highlights a major difference in buying behaviour when it comes to haircare across ethnic groups.
It would be an area to dig deeper on the full trend report why this is the case.
This trend is habitual because historically Independent stores were the only place where black British women could purchase their hair care products.
As time goes on we expect the UK market to reflect the US market, where major retailers and supermarkets have a larger market share. The largest opportunity exists for supermarkets, however this will require supermarkets gain buy in from Gen Z.