German cosmetics giant Beiersdorf announced on Monday, August 3, a downgrade to its full-year outlook, following a slower-than-expected recovery of its flagship Nivea brand. The company said it will now accelerate its turnaround efforts for the iconic label.

In the first half of the year, Beiersdorf’s Derma business, comprising the Eucerin and Aquaphor brands, once again outperformed, delivering 7.8% organic sales growth, driven by innovation and expansion into new market segments. In contrast, Nivea continued to face challenges, with sales declining 6.8%.

Beiersdorf now projects to post “a low-single-digit organic sales decline” in 2026, compared with its previous forecast of “flat to slightly growing organic sales.”

The group attributed the revision to a persistently challenging global skincare market, as well as the impact of the Middle East crisis on consumer confidence, spending patterns, and production costs.

In response, Beiersdorf is accelerating Nivea’s turnaround plan, with a focus on restoring growth, particularly through stronger local market penetration. More broadly, the group plans to increase investments in “consumer-facing activities” over the next 18 months.

“The first half of 2026 showed both the strength of our portfolio and where we need to improve. Our Derma brands continued their multi-year outperformance and La Prairie returned to growth in the second quarter. Nivea continued to face challenges, despite the positive signals from the rebalancing measures that we started last year. We now take even more decisive action to return Nivea to growth with an 18-month turnaround plan focused on strengthening the brand’s competitiveness across categories, markets and consumer segments. To support this plan, we will increase consumer-facing investments into the brand,” said Vincent Warnery, CEO of Beiersdorf.

However, the group warned that these investments, combined with persistently rising manufacturing costs, are expected to “weigh on profitability in 2026.”

Second-quarter results underscored these challenges, with organic sales in the Consumer business declining 3.3%, contributing to a 2.3% drop at group level.

Despite these headwinds, Beiersdorf reiterated its ambition to return to growth by 2027 and achieve improved profitability from 2028 onward.