Extensive SWOT Analysis of Clinique – Amongst The Trusted Beauty Brands In The World

Quick Stats on Clinique

Founder	Evelyn Lauder
Year Founded	1968
Origin	New York City
No. of Employees	1,106
Company Type	Private
Market Cap	N/A
Annual Revenue	N/A
Net Income/ Profit	N/A

 

Products of Clinique

Clinique has become one of the best skincare brands and sells a variety of high-quality products such as

• Skincare
• Cosmetics-Toiletries 
• Fragrances

Competition of Clinique

Clinique has competitors from all around the world and some of the top competitors are: 

• Shiseido
• Clarins 
• Revlon 
• L’Occitane 
• Neutrogena 

Since we have now got to know a lot about the company, let’s get into the much-awaited SWOT analysis of Clinique. 

SWOT Analysis of Clinique

SWOT analysis is known as analysing the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of a company. It helps to understand the competitive position of the company and guides you to conduct strategic planning accordingly. You can understand the internal and external factors of the company through this particular method. 

It is created to give someone a realistic image of a company. It also gives a  data-driven and very fact-based look at the company. 

To better understand the SWOT analysis of Clinique, refer to the infographic below:

Now first let’s begin with the strengths of the company from the SWOT analysis of Clinique.

Strengths of Clinique

The strengths of a company are what make it different from the rest and give it an upper hand. It is what helps the brand gain success. Given below are the strengths of Clinique:

• Product Innovation: Clinique has always managed to continue coming up with new and improved products of the best quality and has pleased its customers each time. 
• High Customer Satisfaction: Through what is called its customer relationship management, Clinique has a great number of extremely satisfied customers and is ready to equally satisfy the future customers as well. 
• Great Social Media Management: On different social media platforms, this brand has a very strong online presence and thus has been able to reach many individuals worldwide and attract people with its campaigns and social media management. 

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• Strong Geographical Presence: Clinique has a very good geographical presence and is sold in almost 107 countries all over the world. This shows that the brand provides easy accessibility and has a wide target market.
• Diversified Workforce: Clinique has always believed in having a diverse and very inclusive workforce that enables the employees to create innovative products and understand consumers and their constantly changing needs.

Weaknesses of Clinique

The factors that prevent a company from working at its true potential and are the specific areas that the company could do better in. Some of the weaknesses of Clinique are: 

• Little Success Outside Core Business: Although in its industry Clinique is one of the best brands, it has had trouble moving towards other product segments. 
• High Attrition Rate: When compared to its other competitors, this brand has a higher attrition rate and ends up spending more on the training of the employees. 
• Research and Development: Although Clinique does spend a good amount on research and development, it still can be noticed that it spends less compared to the other players in the industry. 
• Extremely Centralised Decision-making: The decisions are highly centralised as whatever decisions are being made by the teams are required to be approved by particular officials, which reduces efficiency in all operations by causing them to be more time consuming than expected. 
• Poor Cash Flow Management: When it comes to cash flows, Clinique has very poor financial planning and thus causing them to face situations with less than required cash flow which ultimately leads to them having to borrow unnecessarily. 

Opportunities for Clinique

The opportunities are also known as the favourable external factors and are the areas where a company can take advantage of and become better amongst its competitors. 

• Increase Customer Base from Online Channels: Over the years the Clinique has put in a great amount of money for online platforms and that has led to new and better sales channels for the company. In the coming year, the company can understand the customer needs better and serve them accordingly. 
• New Technology: The new technology enables the company to come up with differentiated pricing strategies that will help them maintain its current and very loyal consumers. It will also assist them in attracting new ones.
• Good Market Knowledge: Since the Clinique has been in the industry for so long and has been one of the leading brands, it has great market knowledge which it can use to understand the ever-changing consumer tastes and needs and act on accordingly to gain success in the market. 
• Men’s Segment: Clinique is a brand meant for women, and with the fastest growing men’s care segment there are great opportunities and a lot more to explore with skincare products for men as it will open a new market for Clinique.
• High-End Products: It should also start focusing on the demands and wants of the consumer as it has already mastered their needs. A brand like Clinique released its Clinique luxe range which are premium products for the consumers. Introducing products like this will increase the brand value of Clinique.

Threats to Clinique

These are what can cause harm to any organisation and need to be dealt with smartly to avoid any problems for the company. The threats for Clinique are:

• Expensive Testing Process: It is known to all that this company’s products are allergy tested 100% fragrance-free. They do not use any animals for any kind of testing and encourage people not to. Thus it results in expensive testing processes for the company.
• Many Products in the Market: With so many Clinique product variants and an equal number of rival brand variants, product differentiation becomes difficult, and customers become immune to differentiation, becoming overwhelmed by choice instead. 
• Competition from Other Brands: New skincare and cosmetics brands are also creating products with newer competitive innovation and technology for retail stores which is increasing the competition of Clinique.

SWOT analysis of Clinique helps get a good understanding of the companies current strengths and weaknesses and work on them accordingly. It also helps form a good strategy for the future based on the opportunities to grab and threats to stay aware of. 

This ends our extensive SWOT analysis of Clinique. Let us conclude our learning below.