Part
01
of one
Part
01
Please provide me with global revenue for the following brands: Proactiv, Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex.
Hello! Thank you for your request to provide you with global revenue for Proactiv, Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex. I understand that Wonder's first response did not provide enough stats, numbers, or data points for your needs. To fully satisfy your request, I am going to give you as many resources as possible in order to verify revenue. I will fully explain any discrepancies to the best of my ability, and will suggest a reasonable, supportive assumption for these discrepancies if possible. In the event that at least three citations cannot be found to support a quoted revenue figure, I will clearly explain and justify the lack of data. I will also include all sources both in the brief and on the spreadsheet you provided.
METHODOLOGY
To research the revenues for Proactiv, Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex, I first looked at the sources provided in Wonder's initial analysis. Then, I set out to confirm these numbers with at least two other sources. I searched trusted sources such as Owler, Hoovers, Bloomberg, Manta, Forbes, Yahoo! Finance, annual reports (if available), and other finance-related websites to attempt to determine the revenues of these four companies. I also used several different search strings in an attempt to uncover third-party sources that referenced revenues or sales for the four companies. Where there is any discrepancy among sources, I made logical and reasonable assumptions as to why those discrepancies exist.
LIMITATIONS
Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex are all subsidiaries of other companies. In Oxy's case, it is the subsidiary of a subsidiary. This makes it extremely difficult to pinpoint actual revenue for these niche companies. Parent company annual reports, if available, generally do not break their revenues down by product, and unfortunately, this was the case for these three companies. For Clearasil, I was able to find third party sources that allowed me to triangulate an estimated revenue, although its accuracy is somewhat suspect given the widely different revenues reported by these third parties. Still, I believe you can get a fairly reliable idea of Clearasil's annual revenue with these sources.
Oxy's revenue has been reported by Owler, which is generally a reliable source for revenue estimates. The only reference to Oxy in its parent company's financial reports is to say sales of the product are slow. As such, I am unable to independently verify Owler's reported revenue for Oxy.
Stridex was the most difficult company to research. Owler does not have a reported revenue for Stridex or for its parent company, Blistex. After an exhaustive search for financial records, media mentions, and reliable revenue report sites, the only record of any kind of sales for Stridex was a niche market summary for 2010. Although I am giving you the information from this summary in the brief, I am not listing a revenue at all for Stridex on your spreadsheet, because I do not feel it is current enough to rely on.
RESULTS
I have completed rows 2-5, columns B and C on your spreadsheet by providing the as much information a possible on the global revenues for Proactiv, Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex in column B and the sources I used in my research in column C.
PROACTIV
Two out of the three sources I used to determine Proactiv's annual global revenue set the skin care line's sales at $1 billion in 2015. The only source that gives a different number is Owler, which sets the revenue at $1.3 billion. I made the assumption that the difference between the two numbers is that Owler is current, whereas the other two sources (Yahoo! Finance and Forbes) are citing 2015 numbers. The Yahoo! Finance article states that Proactiv's revenue was $900 million in 2014. I used a growth rate calculator to determine the CAGR from 2014 to 2015 was 11.11%. I then calculated what 11% CAGR would be in 2016 ($1.11 billion) and what 11% would be from that 2016 estimate to now. This number would be $1.233 billion. Given the fact that the growth rate from year to year is likely to be slightly different from exactly 11%, I feel confident the Owler revenue is most likely the closest to Proactiv's actual current global revenue. Therefore, I input $1.3 billion as Proactiv's revenue in column B on your spreadsheet.
CLEARASIL
The two sources I found for Clearasil offer two extremely different annual revenues. For 2015, Statista sets Clearasil's revenue at $40.6 million. However, Owler offers a current revenue of $280,600.00. I searched for more recent media mentions of Clearasil revenue or sales, but unfortunately, the company that owns Clearasil (Reckitt Benckiser) does not break down sales by product line in its annual report. I did find a July 2016 article that showed Reckitt Benckiser's hygiene product line lost 3% from the previous July. In Reckitt Benckiser's annual report, it says that Clearasil is one of its hygiene product lines. So, I can say with some confidence that Clearasil likely lost revenue between 2015 and 2017. I cannot find any free reports that discuss how much the product lost or that indicate revenue for this time frame. Using the growth rate calculator, I discovered that if Clearasil's revenue dropped from $40.6 million to $280,600.00 over two years, it would be a CAGR of -91.69%. Since I cannot find a source that supports this kind of drop in revenue, I suggest taking the number from 2015 and the Owler number and averaging them. This would give you a revenue of $20.4 million. This is the number I am putting on the spreadsheet in column B for Clearasil. Please note that this is not a verified number, but without Reckitt Benckiser reporting Clearasil's sales, it is the closest I can get.
OXY
Oxy is manufactured by Mentholatum, which, in turn, is owned by Rohto Pharmaceuticals. The only financial information I could find regarding Oxy independently of its parent companies is on Owler which lists a revenue of $272,700. I am unable to verify this revenue, as neither Mentholatum nor Rohto disclose the individual revenues of their products. I believe you could get this information by paying for a market report, but no numbers, other than the one reported on Owler, are available for free. Rohto's most recent quarterly report says, "Overall sales stagnated due to the foreign currency exchange impact of the strong yen as well as falling sales of the core lip cream products and slower sales of 'Oxy,' which continued to face fierce competition." This is the only mention of the product in Rohto's quarterly report. I also looked up Rohto's previous quarterly report, which also says sales of Oxy are slower. So, while I cannot provide a confirmed revenue number, I can say Oxy's revenue numbers continue to decline. Mentholatum, the manufacturer of Oxy, does not publish an annual report. For these reasons, I listed the Owler revenue in column B of your spreadsheet for Oxy.
STRIDEX
As mentioned in Wonder's first answer, Stridex is a private company owned by Blistex, Inc. Blistex does not publish an annual report and there is no free information that provides a current revenue for either company. As with Oxy and Clearasil, there appears to be a market report for acne skin care products available, but it is behind a paywall. I was able to find a source that set Stridex sales at $5.6 million, but this was for 2010. I do not feel confident in putting that number on your spreadsheet, however, so it continues to list Stridex's revenue as "Not Available."
CONCLUSION
Revenues for private companies are notoriously difficult to pinpoint. This was certainly the case for Proactiv, Clearasil, Oxy, and Stridex. After exhausting a variety of search strings, scouring parent company financial reports (where available), and utilizing reliable third-party revenue reporting sites, I have determined that of the four companies for which you requested revenues only Proactiv's revenue is verifiably accurate. Even so, I have completed rows 2-5, columns B and C for these four companies with as much information as I was able to find.
Thank you for using Wonder! Please let us know if we can help you with anything else.