Cellular Goods (LON: CBX) is going to a lot of effort to make us all aware that its skin creams and so on are now being sold through the Sephora platform in the UK. There's reasonable reason for them to do so as well. Cellular's announcement a week back that they would go on sale there boosted the share price by 166%. Clearly this is material news therefore. Which is what brings us Wednesday's announcement that the CBX products actually now are on sale at Sephora. That's put the share price up another 8%. Not bad for a press release.
As to what the excitement is - Sephora is one of the places all the cool kids go to get their make up, skin creams and so on. Sure, it's possible to be a bit cynical about this but the young do have impressive spending power in aggregate and they're not afraid to use it either. Cellular Goods makes cannabidiol infused products aimed directly at this market. Gaining access to distribution through Sephora could indeed be a big deal. CBD might be thought of as rather last year's thing - so many companies have tried it and few have succeeded - but who knows what products might go viral among the youth of today?
Cellular Goods share price from London Stock Exchange
Thus this: “Further to the announcement of 10 May 2023, Cellular Goods is pleased to announce that it has commenced selling its 'Look Better' (skincare) range and selected products from its 'Gift Better' (gifting) line on Sephora.co.uk. Ten products in total are available, ranging in price from £32 to £99 each.”
It is important to note something though. This is not sales to Sephora. It is not stocking in the physical retail stores. This is gaining a placing on the website. This is akin to announcing that you're to start selling something on Amazon. Well, given that Sephora is more selective than that perhaps more than that. But it's not sales to Sephora at all.
Which does give us our next tell here. One option is to round up the teenage girls in the circles of wider acquaintance as see what they're saying about these products. We might also be modestly cynical here. CBX is very keen on telling us that materials are going on sale. If sales are good we can be very certain that we'll be told that too. If sales are so-so or even disappointing then perhaps we won't be told that. So, an absence of press releases about how well sales are going should be taken as a negative signal.
For, as we keep repeating, this is not news of sales, certainly not of sales to Sephora. It's availability through the Sephora website and we'll still have to see what demand is like.
