The beauty industry has a promotions problem. What began as a handful of annual sales events has ballooned into a near-perpetual cycle of discounting that stretches from January’s post-holiday clearances through Black Friday and into the December gift-buying rush. The latest inflection point is Amazon’s Prime Day, which in 2026 has expanded into a week-long event that draws participation from virtually every mass and prestige beauty brand.
The data supports the anxiety. According to a recent survey by market research firm Circana, 54 percent of beauty shoppers say they will wait for a sale before making a discretionary purchase, up from 38 percent in 2023. The rise of deal-aggregator apps and browser extensions that automatically apply coupons has accelerated the behavior, turning price comparison into a frictionless habit.
Some brands are pushing back. A handful of prestige labels have begun limiting their participation in third-party sales events, betting that scarcity and exclusivity will protect their price positioning. Others are experimenting with loyalty-based discounting — offering promotions only to existing customers rather than broadcasting them to the entire market — as a way to reward retention without training the broader consumer base to expect markdowns.
The concern among brand executives is no longer hypothetical. Multiple industry sources report that consumers are learning to wait for discounts rather than buying at full price, compressing margins and forcing brands to compete on price rather than product innovation. A beauty brand president told BoF that the annual calendar now contains ‘at least eight major discount windows,’ each of which conditions the consumer to expect a deal.
