One of Europe’s richest families searches for answers as they lose billions

The billionaire family controlling Puig Brands may weigh options – including buying its stock – to revive the Spanish beauty-products group’s sagging shares, its chief executive officer said.

Shares of Puig, owner of brands like Jean Paul Gaultier and make-up label Charlotte Tilbury, had tumbled more than 34 per cent since its splashy listing as Europe’s biggest IPO in 2024. They rose as much as 2 per cent in Madrid on Monday.

Puig chief Marc Puig says the company’s going to stick to doing what it does best – creating and selling fragrances – as it looks to revive its fortunes.Credit: Getty

“Over time we’ll consider whether or not it makes sense to make any moves to help investors who have invested in the stock achieve the value they believe it deserves,” Marc Puig said in an interview, referring to a possible family-led stock purchase or ways to increase the liquidity of its shares. “No moves are planned in the short term.”

The Puigs are among Europe’s wealthiest families. They own Exea Empresarial, which controls 74 per cent of Puig’s capital and 93 per cent of its voting rights. The family’s fortune has shrunk about 19 per cent from just before the shares began trading to $US9.7 billion ($14.9 billion), according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. The decline stemmed largely from the drop in the company’s stock.

Puig shares have tumbled like those of others in the industry, including L’Oreal and LVMH as they suffer from uncertainty over the effects of US President Donald Trump’s tariff wars and concerns about sluggish consumer demand. For Puig, the decline has come even though it has consistently met targets.

“I don’t feel like we’ve let anyone down,” Puig said. “We’ve delivered, we continue to grow.”

Most analysts have a “buy” recommendation on the stock. “So far everything they’ve promised has happened,” said Xavier Brun, head of equity at Trea Asset Management, which holds Puig shares.

On Wednesday, the company reiterated its forecast of 6 per cent to 8 per cent organic sales growth for the year, even after factoring in a 20 per cent US tariff on Europe-made products. Trump has threatened 30 per cent tariffs on products from the European Union. Puig said it expected little impact from the trade war in 2025 since most of the products are already in the US.

Analysts like Patrick Folan at Barclays said the company has been less forthcoming about the outlook beyond this year.

“It would be helpful for Puig to come to market and explain what the current moderation in category growth means for them, and clearly state why they could be OK compared to the wider market,” he said. “It’s important to evolve the messaging from the IPO, as the IPO expectations of market growth may no longer be realistic next year or in 2027.”

Puig owns some of the world’s most recognisable fashion and fragrance brands, including Jean Paul Gaultier.Credit: AP

Puig plans to provide guidance for next year once he has more clarity on subjects like tariffs and the dollar.

“It’ll be good to clarify these doubts to better measure consumer sentiment,” he said.

For now, the executive, who’s been at the helm for more than two decades, says the company’s going to stick to doing what it does best – creating and selling fragrances. It will also focus on its make-up and skincare products, whose growth stood out in the most recent quarter even as fragrance sales moderated.

That strategy of hunkering down and focusing on it core business has paid off for the company in the past. In the early 2000s, when Marc Puig took charge, the company faced financial difficulties and restructured the business to cut costs and allocate more resources toward building its perfume brands. Years later, that turnaround allowed it to stretch its fragrance portfolio.

Puig now holds three spots in the world’s top-10 fragrance label rankings after Jean Paul Gaultier, its fastest-growing brand, entered the list last year.

Puig’s focus on its prestige perfumes portfolio, which accounts for about 70 per cent of sales, and pipeline of products should sustain expansion and deliver better growth than its premium-beauty peers, Bloomberg Intelligence analysts Andrea Ferdinando Leggieri and Deborah Aitken wrote in a report on July 7.

For Puig, much of the work of concocting new perfumes happens inside the glass-walled chamber high up in its new tower in Barcelona, which was inaugurated by King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia of Spain last year.

Here, Gregorio Sola, a master perfumer, waxes lyrical about his trips around the world to find the finest ingredients: sandalwood oil from trees that have to grow for 30 to 40 years or a rare, signature rose.

Fragrances inspired by the bold smells of the 1980s and ’90s are making a comeback, Sola says. The growth of the market is being fuelled by young consumers’ appetite for unique and expressive fragrances. Puig tapped that market early when it started acquiring niche brands like L’Artisan Parfumeur and Byredo, which often have unconventional compositions and limited distribution.

Beginning over a century ago as a distributor of French perfumes, Puig made a major shift in the early 20th century to manufacture its own products like Spain’s first homegrown lipstick. In the ’60s and ’70s, it began partnering with fashion designers like Paco Rabanne to launch fragrances – doubling down later by acquiring entire fashion houses like Carolina Herrera and Nina Ricci.

“What we need to do is take risks, tell good stories, and make exceptional products,” he said. “I’d like to think we’re able to continue getting people excited about our products.”

Bloomberg

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