Beauty, Personal Care & Wellness

The Beauty Care M&A market recorded 28 transactions in Q1’18. While transaction volume was strong, including a 12% increase over the first quarter of last year, there was a lack of notable high-profile deals in Q1. According to Intrepid, the fairly ho-hum start to the year is more of a hangover from a stellar Q4’17, which saw a host of prominent strategic M&A transactions all closing or announcing before year end. Intrepid remains highly optimistic on 2018 given strong M&A fundamentals particularly in the beauty care sector, broad acquirer interest and our backlog of deals.

Q1’18 Beauty Care M&A highlights include:

• Deal volume increased 12% from Q1’17 but declined 7% off a record Q4’17;
• Procter & Gamble continued to climb back into the M&A game with its second acquisition in three months, following almost 10 years of no activity;
• Edgewell Personal Care continued to build out its men’s beauty and personal care portfolio with the acquisition of Jack Black;
• Private equity was active with deals from MidOcean Partners, Swander Pace Capital and Encore Consumer Capital; and
• Venture capital remains attracted to the beauty care sector with a long list of new investments.