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‘No point in lipstick’: Japan’s cosmetics sales drop as face masks become obligatory

  • Make-up sales fell during Japan’s state of emergency, with lipstick dropping about 30 per cent and testers being removed from stores
  • Cosmetics companies expect sales to rebound when the crisis is over – although the trend for bright colours may change

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Lipstick sales in Japan have fallen as more people stayed at home, avoiding going to work or socialising, and wearing face masks became mandatory. Photo: Handout
In recent months, face masks have been hard to find in Japanese stores, but there’s one product that is not selling well: lipstick.
As face mask usage became obligatory, and as more people started working from home and stopped venturing out under Japan’s coronavirus state of emergency, cosmetics stores have been left with a glut of lipsticks.

“I’ve stopped wearing lipstick completely because whenever I go out we have to wear a mask and no-one can see, so there is no point,” said Takako Tomura, a 40-year-old housewife from Yokohama.

“Also, I have learned that it is difficult to get cosmetics out of the material used in face masks,” she said.

Shoppers wearing face masks walk through a mall in Nagoya, central Japan. Photo: Kyodo
Shoppers wearing face masks walk through a mall in Nagoya, central Japan. Photo: Kyodo

However, she has noticed she is using more lip balm than she used to.

Some stores in Japan have removed lipstick testers from their displays out of concern that the coronavirus might be spread between different consumers trying out the products.

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