Winners’ Circle

Basket sizes may have been down, and consumers shopped with caution, but a select few beauty brands were the clear winners of Amazon’s Prime Big Deal Days event. According to the Market Defense report, the top three performing skincare brands were CeraVe (13.5% of the category sales share), Medicube (10.2%), and La Roche-Posay (9.6%). The top three performing haircare brands were Nutrafol (23.2%), Nizoral (5.2%), and L’Oréal Paris (4.6%). In makeup, the top three brands were Maybelline (13.1%), L’Oréal Paris (9.4%), and e.l.f. (7.4%). The top-three performing fragrance brands were Lattafa (12.4%), Versace (8.1%), and Sol de Janeiro (6.9%).

Skincare reigned supreme, with eight of the top ten Beauty & Personal Care products being skincare products. Powered by 450,000 weekly TikTok views of #eosvanillacashmere, and amplifying the sweet smell trend (65% of shoppers say they prefer gourmand scents), eos Shea Better Body Lotion Vanilla Cashmere ranked as the #1 Beauty & Personal Care product overall, despite not making the ranking last year.

In the Skincare category, Medicube’s Zero Pore Pads 2.0 held strong at #3, riding the viral wave of #skincareroutine, which captured 1.6 billion TikTok views, with Medicube as the fan favorite, according to the Market Defense report. K-beauty continues its tsunami with #KoreanSkincare, dominating TikTok with 1.9 billion views year to date (YTD).

Discerning skincare shoppers are looking for at-home alternatives to in-office treatments. Searches for “stem cell serum” are up 345%, and searches for “microneedling serum” have surged 508%—leaving white space for brands to ride the results-driven wave and invest in terms shoppers are actually searching. Shoppers are also buzzing for bee venom products, with Amazon searches for “bee venom cream wrinkles” up 256%, and “Botox bee venom” up 288%.

The top-selling haircare products showed shoppers are looking for problem solvers. Amazon searches for “gray hair products” are up 253% YoY, while “gray hair coverage” has jumped 123%, and “hair growth” still pulls in 1.4M searches a month. Nizoral’s dandruff solution snagged the #1 spot, with the rest of the top 10 addressing hair growth, gray coverage, and DIY color. Nutrafol continues its blaze of glory: their Women’s Balance Hair Growth Supplements was the #2 seller, and is also the #1 selling Hair Care product YTD by share of sales.

The top five haircare keywords in search visibility were “shampoo,” “hair ties,” “dry shampoo,” “shampoo and conditioner set,” and “hair clips.” Kitsch’s Satin Scrunchies also debuted in the top 10, gaining traction as Amazon searches for “hair ties” continue to exceed one million per month.

Thanks to Gen Z mirroring the TikTok trend, texture is reigning men, and it has become a haircare priority, with L3’s Texturizing Powder making its debut in the Top 10. The category has exploded on TikTok, with a +897% YoY jump and an average of 11 million weekly views. Hashtags like #formen and #glowuptips are each clocking 1.1 million weekly TikTok views.

Eyes and lips dominated the top-10-selling makeup products, with three mascaras making the top 10, despite the “No  MascaraLook” trend rising 92%. YoY on TikTok, lashes still lead with more than 1.2 million Amazon searches a month for “Mascara”. Makeup wipes are also having a moment, grabbing two slots in the top 10, with “makeup wipes” searches up 812% on Amazon.  The two remaining top selling Makeup spots went to Lip Stains  The lip stain category off-Amazon has seen an 85% YoY surge, fueled by a 16 million surge in TikTok views, with peel-off versions up 130%. #SacheuBeauty alone has 52 million views. And, the most-searched branded term proved makeup has no age limit: “Laura Geller makeup for older women” rode the viral #MakeupForOlderWomen (203,000 weekly TikTok views) trend to the top.

When it came to fragrance winners, Gen Z and Gen Alpha-favorite fragrance brand Sol de Janeiros Cheirosa 62 Hair & Body Fragrance Mist retook the top spot (they were also #1 in July’s Prime Day). Arabian fragrances continued to enchant, claiming four of the top 10, and Bodycology’s Whipped Vanilla Body Mist made its mark in the booming Body Spray category, which is up 50% YoY.

BellaVita, whose Luxury Honey Oud Eau de Parfum was the #6 selling fragrance, has also gained steam on TikTok as the #4 top-selling fragrance YTD on the app, with Lattafa and Rasasi Hawas also ranking in TikTok’s top 10. Two of the top 10 fragrances this Prime Event were for men, c aligning with the off-Amazon trend. #menscologne is trending with 60,000+ TikTok posts, and 37% of the audience is 18-24.

“Growth comes from focus,” said Karlsven. “Top fragrance brands are winning by rallying product lines around a single hero SKU: investing in ads, content, and search to keep it discoverable year-round, while expanding with flankers, body products, and seasonal editions.”