À̹ÌÁö È®´ë LG Household & Health Care Ltd. has become top beauty house from South Korea and No.12 in global rank after overtaking long-time frontrunner Amorepacific for the first time.
LG Household ranked 12th in the list of the world¡¯s top 100 cosmetics company by U.S.-based fashion journal Women¡¯s Wear Daily (WWD), rising two notches from last year. Amorepacific came in 14th, Able C&C 88th and Clio 100th. French brand L¡¯Oreal ranked top.
The virus outbreak battered the global beauty companies last year. But LG Household weather the storm better, pulling off a 4.9 percent sales growth from a year ago to $4.05 billion in 2020 as its premium lineups such as Whoo, Sum and Ohui did well in the global market including China.
Celebrating the 20th anniversary of becoming a stand-alone beauty unit of LG Group, the company has been expanding its global presence beyond Asia to North America. At a recent meeting chaired by its vice chairman Cha Suk-yong, the company set sales target for the North American market at $470 million, up 12 percent from last year¡¯s $420 million.
À̹ÌÁö È®´ë LG Household & Health Care entered a growth take-off in 2005 when Cha took the helm. He has been urging employees to always prepare for unexpected crisis, and emphasizing that aggressive but well-planned merger and acquisition is the best way to build resilience.
Under the Cha¡¯s leadership, it has now grown to a 24.7 trillion won ($22 billion) market cap company, growing 124 times from 198.4 billion won in 2001 when it was spun off from LG Chem as a stand-alone entity. Operating profit soared to 1.22 trillion won and revenue to 7.84 trillion won in 2020 from 79.7 billion won and 801.2 billion won, respectively, in 2001.
By Kim Dae-gi, Lee Young-wook and Choi Mira
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