Estee Lauder has released earnings for the first fiscal quarter of 2026, confirming that the strategies of the new CEO, Stephane de La Faverie, are taking hold.
The New York beauty brand delivered a profit of US$47 million or 13 cents per share, marking a massive turnaround from a loss of US$156 million or 43 cents the same time last year.
Adjusted earnings per share surpassed Wall Street expectations of 18 cents, coming in at 32 cents per share.
The company also reported a net sales increase of 4% to US$3.5 billion.
The strong results come after the beauty giant said it would lay off around 7,000 workers following a slump in sales in key Chinese and Korean markets.
This comes as the company regains market share in China across all categories and experiences its third consecutive quarter of share gains in skin care, makeup, and fragrance in the U.S.
“We had a strong start to fiscal 2026 as we execute on our Beauty Reimagined strategy—returning to organic sales growth, gaining prestige beauty share in a few key strategic areas of focus, and improving profitability,” de La Faverie said.
“Encouragingly, we are building momentum across the organisation from the significant operational changes we have executed to date to be faster and more agile,”
The company’s largest contributor was skin care, which grew by 3% to $1.58 billion.
Its second top-line contributor, makeup, fell by 1% to $1.03 billion.
Hair care fell by 7% to US$129 million while fragrance soared by 14% to $721 million.
