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September 29, 2025 14 mins

Welcome to Five Things Friday APAC Edition (yes, on a Monday this time!). In this episode, we unpack the big signals shaping retail and consumer markets across the region and beyond.

Here’s what we cover:

  1. Shanghai Fashion Week SS26 – momentum, buying power, and why global buyers are watching China again.

  2. India’s luxury beauty boom – $800M today, $4B by 2035, and why retailers are planting seeds now.

  3. Recession Glam – consumers trading down but still splurging smartly in beauty and fashion.

  4. Retail realignment – how APAC and Europe may be drawing closer in strategy and trade.

  5. Australia’s retail optimism – Deloitte’s 2025 holiday report shows green shoots of growth.

🔗 References and further reading:

👉 Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe for weekly retail intelligence direct from the global frontlines.

#Retail #APAC #FiveThingsFriday #LuxuryRetail #Beauty #ShanghaiFashionWeek #India #Australia #Podcast


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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello everyone, and welcome to Five Things Friday AIPAC
Edition. Now this week we are coming to
you on a Monday, so don't panic if you've been waiting all
weekend for us, we are here. It's Monday for Five Things
Friday. Hello.

(00:23):
Hello it. Should be.
It was Bonjour. Bonjour.
Come on, Delibo. Jejama Bell Ali Monster Monster.
Unkilla Dutomat. Civil Play.
See, I was in, I didn't. I tied in French.
See, you know I tied in French and being in a grocer.
Oh, it's fantastic. It was brilliant.

(00:45):
I felt I was conversing with a a, a genuine French person.
I think my accent would be considered quite rugged in
Paris. I bring.
You your home now, right? Yes, I am.
Hi, I'm back in Sydney. You know, how does your
scheduling issues? Yeah.
So yeah, every week. So listen, why don't we jump
straight in and why don't we? Absolutely, if we're we're,

(01:06):
we're joking about Rs and NRF, Why don't you give us some
thoughts? How did it go?
Well, it was, it was really coolactually.
It was the first show and I suppose for me it's the first
European show I've been to. And I gotta say that as the
retail community around the world is pretty unique and quite
similar and quite global in its stinking.
But what was really cool was it,you know, this was a big show,

(01:29):
bigger than definitely bigger than AIPAC.
It was 480 exhibitors, like 25,000 square metres of Expo,
which is pretty big. Yeah.
You know, this, there was 200 international speakers, You
know, headline speaker was the CFI, sorry, the CEO, the global
CEO of Sephora. Yeah, which is pretty good.
But they had Sam's Club out of the US, you know, a whole bunch
of really cool speech. So yeah, for a first, she showed
the content was amazing and and great speakers.

(01:52):
I think you saw a session from the metro and the AI, It was
probably one of the best AI sessions you've ever seen, you
would say. Yeah.
To be honest, that was brilliant.
Metro fashion was phenomenal. Yeah, and so it's a really cool
content. And then and then things like
exhibit A big ideas. Obviously we have them in Asia
Pacific and in New York, but they had 60 sessions and they
were all amazing. So you know, for a first time

(02:14):
show is like pretty cool. So I came away really excited
because, you know, coming to a show out of market, out of my
territory and, and experiencing it, you know, it was, it was
fantastic and saw a few familiarfaces floating around.
But it you can really see for Asia Pacific, there's a
separation. You'll see a lot of people from
Asia Pacific going to the US, but far less going from Asia

(02:35):
Pacific to Europe. Got you.
And I think probably what we'll probably find in our this
current economic times that Asiaand Europe might find themselves
becoming a bit more closely aligned, so to speak.
Well, yeah, I think when, yeah, I can definitely see the
groundwork for that. Yeah.
And we saw Emmanuel Macron in Asia recently and there's been

(02:56):
other European leaders down here.
So I think that there's going to, I think you know, if you're,
if you're thinking about retail and heartland traditional retail
luxury brands, those with some classic retail brands, you know,
you might consider going headingup to up to Paris in, in
September next year because I think, you know, it was, it was

(03:17):
a really cool experience. I had a great time and I'll be
definitely going back next year.I think.
OK, cool. So yeah, so, yeah.
So it was a stand out show for me.
So and I had a good, we had a really good time, yeah.
OK, I, I had a mixed time. So I'm going to be honest, I
love you. I love the impact show.
It was, it was a bit of everything, but there were,
there were some definite glimpses of gold and I and I

(03:38):
really did enjoy the thing. I thought the Expo space was
phenomenal. I did think they had a good
expertise. The innovation hubs were really
great and some of the keynotes were phenomenal.
So I'm going to go straight in with my 3:00 and then we can
finish actually 2-3. It's the same one, but
ultimately there's three marketswithin the region and there's
like one consumer reset and a lot of decisions on the table

(04:02):
for for the industry as a whole.And what I'm going to try and do
is connect Shanghai faction weekSS 26I's beauty and the luxury
surge that we've been talking about, which basically is 3 PL
build out into India, what analysts are calling them the
recession glam, which more recession because it's all doom

(04:25):
and gloom in the UK when we're doing this in the UK.
And then you can think of like the next 3 minutes as an
operational briefing on what to track, what to place bets on.
Obviously, it's not financial advice.
So please do not make any financial decisions based on
what what we're saying and which.
Just call my broker. The Shanghai SP 6 is a buying

(04:49):
market with momentum. It's running from the 9th and
6th to so from the 9th to the 16th of October 100 plus show.
It's a trade show like Omni timeshow mode returning
international debuts on the calendar by a participate
participation and it's reportedly back to pre pandemic.
So you'll see Adidas love Adidasstaging headline show the

(05:12):
Shanghai's creating centre airing running its generation
awards. Obviously caring is the luxury
group and Harrods back with its forum and it and it's not just
sort of look looking at the culture, it's looking at an
efficient sales engine that sortof has a tighter collections,
hero items and a schedule that'sI think probably on on to be one

(05:37):
of the best globally for for global buyers basically.
And vogue business has a whole bunch of take takes it further.
So I'll put vogue businesses link in the show notes and you
can go off to do with that. And So what you what do you do
with that? In my mind, you treat the
Shanghai event as an building week, not just a PR week.

(05:59):
So when you're looking into China specifically for growth,
you're looking at the capsules that are being released by these
designers to get an idea of whatthe demand signals are.
And that should sort of look at sell through, help you look at
sell through return rates and reorder velocity because you're
now getting a sense of what is coming into fashion basically.

(06:22):
So, so that's that's the thing on Shanghai, actually, I'm not
sharing it, but let's see. All right, there we go.
Moving on to and I will beautifully transition this one.
So the next one, India, the nextluxury beauty growth engine,
Globie beauty groups are doubling down on India.
The luxury beauty segment is about $800 million today.

(06:44):
It's projected to reach 4 billion by in the next 10 years.
And that's a low base luxuries, roughly 4% of India's 21 billion
dollars beauty and personal caremarket far Southeast Asia.
Oh, far below is A and north. So the runaway remains long and

(07:06):
you'll look to see more brands, more intensity coming into the
region and expanding distribution through likes of
Nika and modern Trade testing more premium cities and going
into more premium regions withinthe the country.
And Reuters has a whole piece onthis.
So is that the Reuters? Yes, that is the Reuters

(07:27):
fantastic. And and So what how to think
about that? Why is that important?
There's a three tier price ladder with real product
distance between the tiers. And so when you anchor claims in
efficacy and you show that the reviews are not just ads and
this we're talking about sort ofsocial marketing.
And if you run channels, you plan your inventory and you look

(07:48):
at your fixtures around festivals and wedding cycles
that actually are massive moments for beauty, it becomes
a, you know, the growth engine of the future.
So I think for a lot of retailers, it's the tracking.
How do we and how are they goinginto the in the into the region,
but basically planting the seedsof tomorrow because it's

(08:09):
exponential growth for. The So we are we seeing all the
main international players, Yeah.
Or we are we seeing? Yeah.
Absolutely. So I think in the in the article
it talks about which what I didn't want to do is just
rewrite what is in the article, but basically it says, you know,
from Japan to France, L'Oreal, basically everyone's moving in

(08:29):
there. And that's where I got the
numbers from in terms of the biggrowth, but pretty much all of
the major beauty players are moving into the region or as I
was saying, laying the seeds or the foundation for future
growth. And I think that's the, you
know, sometimes people get the balance wrong of how, how
quickly do we move into a market.
And, and for me and for us, we always talk about building a

(08:52):
community. So how do you build community
via, you know, at, at the same time as building a business?
And I think that's only achievedthrough going into a market,
slowly getting your socials running and getting the
community engaged with the brandand then expanding because then
you're creating FOMO. And yeah, and we're saying,
we're saying that in Southeast Asia with people like shopping

(09:14):
and Lazada, you know where wheresome of these guys particularly
beauty in other categories whichare similar coming in via online
marketplace strategy where they're sort of renting other
people's sort of warehousing andlast mile delivery services and
free PL services. Yeah.
And and entering a market gentlygetting their product on the
ground, getting their product into consumer hands and then

(09:36):
coming in and delivering an Omnichannel experience through
partners. But that's that's we're seeing
that happen in the region now really in Southeast Asia, Yeah.
I think just sort of stick sticking with the three PLS and
laying the track for for growth.There was a CB report this year
that cited India is the most preferred expansion market for
the region and three PLS with nearly 70% of planning to expand

(10:00):
in the next two years. So that's 40 to 50% logistics
real estate leasing between 20 to 124 and over 30% in the first
half of 2025. Most plan to stay asset light
via multi tenanted facilities and ramping up the warehouse
management systems, automation and cold chain which basically

(10:21):
means faster scale up, build better last mile engagement and
improve service levels for categories like cosmetics and so
I'm. Sorry, I think quick commerce is
quick commerce must be driving alot of that though, because,
because there must be, you know,in those high densities, tier
one cities, Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad, you know, I reckon

(10:41):
there's going to be some pretty crazy delivery mechanisms.
Yeah, and and multi, multi just multi location and brand
location sharing because you know, not every, you know with
the diversity of what's going onin quick commerce India, I don't
think you could actually do havethat many black sites in terms
of distribution centres to actually make it work without

(11:02):
having to share and and and and on sell your capacity if you if
you've got some. Yeah, I've got one more, but
because of time, let's go. So Myron's recession glam.
I'll put this in the beauty noteso we may cover it off next
time. And let's close with your final
one. I think, yeah, so one's mine's
quite exciting. I want to bring it back to
Australia because I haven't talked about Australia for a
long time because I feel very conscious being Australia that

(11:24):
we always talk about ourselves. So now I am and I'm going to
celebrate that. So to yesterday, I think, or
today, a Deloitte report came out from the team at Deloitte.
There's a great retail team at Deloitte.
You haven't come across them in Australia.
And the thing that came back from these guys was they've just
done their holiday retail reportfor 2025 S holiday meeting from
Black Friday through to Boxing Day.

(11:46):
And the thing they found, which we know is counter to Europe and
to the US is that optimism is really starting to return to
Australia. Now obviously we're the lucky
country. So we have, we are optimistic
bunch. We are glass half full bunch.
But Australians plan, according to Deloitte, Australians are
playing, it's been 14 to 15 morepercent this season than last

(12:07):
season, so about $11140 per person.
And most retailers in Australia expect sales growth from last
season compared with only 51% in2024.
So there's there's optimism on both sides of the both sides of
the fence that consumers are feeling more positive and
retailers are feeling more positive.
And what's really interesting is, is that retailers expect to
generate half their holiday revenue from we have a thing

(12:29):
called click Frenzy, which is a retail festival like Friday and
Cyber Monday in in Australia. But then Christmas and Boxing
Day are expected to deliver the other half with the most with
most sales on those two days alone, which is pretty cool.
And where did where is this growth coming from?
Well, it's coming from 18 to 24 year old saying they're going to
spend more. And it's coming from blue collar
workers who are back employed and, and leading the charge at

(12:52):
the checkout. So that's pretty cool.
You know, the one last thing of note that's really important is
that more than 1/3 of consumers in Australia or Australian
consumers, they said they're going to switch brand for a
better deal, IE looking for value rising from, you know,
it's, it's 42 of those under 35.So there's some real green
shoots on. It's not saying that the the

(13:12):
market's going to turn on its head and have a huge trading
period, but there's a little bitof posit little bit of
positivity out there. And I think in the content, in
the context of the global socio economic uncertainty with war
and with and and trade and all that type of stuff, to have
these queen shoots in Australia is quite was quite a positive
thing. Because I think that, you know,
it's not so the case in other marketer in the world.

(13:34):
And you were saying it'd be a little bit before with with the
UK. It's not so bad at the moment,
yes, which is so long. I think, I think it's nice, it's
nice to have, it's nice to go into a season with some positive
narrative around it. So thank you for that Reef.
We're going to take a break for two weeks.
Oh, actually, forget that. No, no, not net.

(13:54):
We'll take, we'll take quick off.
Yeah, but we'll be back the following week.
But we'll do once again, we'll do the Friday on Monday because
like I get back on leave on the Thursday.
So we'll do it on the table. We'll do it every recording on
the Friday. But you might actually people
might only see someone. I said don't sit at your
computer all weekend waiting, OK?
We promise it's coming, but don't wait for us.
I know you do. I know lots of you.

(14:15):
Just sit there and wait for it to come in on a Friday.
It may not happen, OK? It depends on Alex's editing
skills. That's fantastic Reef, my
friend, have a wonderful couple of Yeah a week, whatever and
we'll. Speak.
Take care mate. Bye.
See ya.
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