Podcast Summary: The Barefaced Podcast – "Canadian Beauty: Why Is No One Talking About Its Potential?"

Episode Information

• Title: Canadian Beauty: Why Is No One Talking About Its Potential?
• Host: Eli Twelve Tree
• Release Date: August 13, 2025
• Description: A deep dive into the Canadian beauty industry, exploring its market dynamics, challenges, and global standing.

1. Introduction and Context

Eli Twelve Tree reintroduces the podcast after a 12-week hiatus, attributing the break to personal commitments and work on a new project called Unfiltered. Unfiltered aims to bridge beauty consumers with genuine reviews tailored to their specific needs, leveraging a comprehensive database enriched with demographic insights.

Eli Twelve Tree [00:00]: “Unfiltered is a software tool that we are developing to connect beauty consumers to real reviews from people that actually look and live like them.”

Eli announces that this episode marks the beginning of Season Two, focusing on the Canadian beauty market—a region previously underexplored in global beauty conversations.

2. Unfiltered Project Overview

Unfiltered is designed to aggregate extensive beauty reviews from platforms like Reddit, ensuring consumers access context-rich feedback based on various demographics such as age, skin type, ethnicity, and more. This dual-facing platform also offers brands access to demographic-rich insights to foster personalized product offerings.

Eli Twelve Tree [00:00]: “We're building this mega database... to help brands start to personalize their offering as the current beauty model just simply doesn't work.”

3. Understanding the Canadian Beauty Market

Eli expresses surprising difficulty in finding substantial information on the Canadian beauty industry, despite Canada being the 10th largest economy globally (as of 2024). He underscores Canada’s significant yet understated contribution to the global beauty market, particularly its role in fueling the U.S. beauty industry.

Eli Twelve Tree [06:47]: “Canadian beauty trends for the most part are extensions of American ones.”

4. Challenges in the Canadian Beauty Retail Landscape

Geographical Vastness and Population Distribution: Canada's immense land area juxtaposed with a relatively sparse population poses logistical challenges for retail expansion. Unlike Australia's concentrated urban centers, Canadian cities like Toronto and Montreal are sprawling and car-dependent, complicating in-person retail growth.

Language Barriers: Quebec's predominantly French-speaking population necessitates translations for all marketing materials, packaging, and e-commerce platforms, increasing operational costs for brands.

Eli Twelve Tree [06:49]: “Quebec is the most populous province... over 50% of people in the city of Montreal speak only French.”

Dominance of American Retailers: Large-scale American beauty retailers overshadow local brands due to their financial prowess and ability to navigate Canada's challenging retail landscape. Even successful entrants like Nordstrom have struggled, with Nordstrom closing its Canadian stores in 2023.

Eli Twelve Tree [from transcript]: “Even successful American beauty retailers have not been able to get past many of these hurdles.”

Limited Presence of Specialty Retailers: With the absence of robust local specialty retailers, high-end beauty consumers are relegated to department stores, which in Canada are struggling themselves. Hudson's Bay, the oldest department store in North America, recently entered liquidation, underscoring the volatility of the Canadian retail market.

Eli Twelve Tree [from transcript]: “Canada's largest department store chain is called Hudson's Bay... they are currently going through liquidation.”

5. Current Events Impacting Canadian Beauty

Tariff Implications: The imposition of a 35% tariff by the U.S. on non-CUSMA (Canada, United States, Mexico Agreement) compliant beauty products has severely impacted Canadian exporters. This move undermines Canada's efforts to position itself as a hub for cosmetic manufacturing by increasing export costs and complicating supply chains.

Eli Twelve Tree [26:05]: “This tariff nightmare has undone all the work of the Cosmetics Alliance in Canada...”

Regulatory Shifts: Cosmetics Alliance Canada introduced the Self Care Framework in 2022 to streamline regulations and promote innovation. However, ongoing tariff issues with the U.S. have negated these regulatory improvements, making Canada one of the least favorable destinations for exporting beauty products.

Darren Prasnik [from transcript]: “The goal was to streamline the process of getting approval to go to market, to create a better environment for innovation.”

Industry Response: In reaction to tariffs, Canadian beauty brands have mobilized into collectives like the Shop Canadian Indie Beauty Collective, aiming to promote domestic products and support each other amidst increasing financial pressures.

Marco Sang [26:47]: “We are a Canadian business... but we manufacture most of our products in Korea.”

6. The Global Position of Canadian Beauty Brands

Despite Canada being the third-largest source of beauty imports into the U.S., Canadian beauty brands lack significant global recognition. Brands like MAC Cosmetics and Deciem's The Ordinary have made substantial global impacts but remain largely unidentified as Canadian.

Infrastructure and Investment Shortfalls: Eli highlights that Canada's beauty industry lacks the necessary infrastructure, export mechanisms, venture capital, and media platforms to amplify its national beauty identity, limiting the global reach of its brands.

Marco Sang [34:48]: “Canada hasn't had the same culture, export mechanisms, venture capital, or media platforms to amplify a national beauty identity.”

Consumer Perception and Brand Identity: Without strong Made in Canada branding and support, Canadian beauty brands struggle to differentiate themselves and communicate their unique value propositions effectively on the global stage.

Sam [31:17]: “There is so much great stuff happening in this market, but the layers and layers of complexity is making it practically impossible for them to prosper.”

Notable Brands:

• MAC Cosmetics: Renowned globally but perceived as an American brand due to long-term ownership by Estée Lauder.
• Deciem (The Ordinary): Actively promotes its Canadian roots but lacks broader recognition.

7. Conclusion and Future Outlook

Eli concludes by emphasizing the untapped potential and resilient community within the Canadian beauty sector. The challenges faced by Canadian beauty brands present opportunities for platforms like Unfiltered to support and amplify consumer voices, fostering a stronger, more connected beauty community in Canada.

Eli Twelve Tree [38:43]: “This market is a crazy one. As a consumer, I feel like I can relate to a lot of the pain points... there's a real untapped opportunity here.”

He expresses optimism about diving deeper into the Canadian market and leveraging the newly developed Unfiltered platform to uncover and support emerging Canadian beauty brands.

Key Takeaways

• Market Potential: Canada holds significant untapped potential in the global beauty industry, being a major contributor to the U.S. market yet remaining underrepresented in global beauty narratives.

• Operational Challenges: Geographic vastness, language barriers, and the dominance of American retailers make it difficult for Canadian beauty brands to establish and scale their presence domestically and internationally.

• Regulatory and Tariff Hurdles: Recent tariff increases by the U.S. have severely impacted Canadian beauty exporters, negating previous regulatory advancements aimed at fostering innovation and manufacturing within Canada.

• Community and Innovation: Despite challenges, Canadian beauty consumers and small brands demonstrate resilience and unity, presenting opportunities for platforms like Unfiltered to facilitate growth and recognition.

Notable Quotes

• Eli Twelve Tree [00:00]: “Unfiltered is a software tool that we are developing to connect beauty consumers to real reviews from people that actually look and live like them.”

• Sam [06:47]: “Are not particularly unique.”

• Marco Sang [34:48]: “Canada hasn't had the same culture, export mechanisms, venture capital, or media platforms to amplify a national beauty identity.”

• Eli Twelve Tree [38:43]: “This market is a crazy one... there's a real untapped opportunity here.”

Additional Resources: For a comprehensive breakdown of Canadian beauty exports and more detailed insights, visit barefaced.substack.com.

Join the Conversation: Subscribe to Unfiltered at unfiltered.bareface.com and follow the podcast for more in-depth analyses and discussions on the beauty industry.