International Trade

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International Trade

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Personal Care Products Trade By the Numbers

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Trade Snapshot 2025

  • $37.4 billion U.S. personal care products trade (exports + imports)
  • $15.8 billion in U.S. exports
  • $21.7 billion in U.S. imports
  • $5.9 billion trade deficit, nearly 30x larger than a decade ago

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Long Term Trade Growth (2015–2025)

  • U.S. exports grew 29% over the past decade (2.4% average annual growth) 
  • U.S. imports grew 75% over the past decade (5.2% average annual growth) 
  • The trade deficit widened from $0.2 billion to $5.9 billion 

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Key Trading Partners

  • 41.6% of U.S. exports go to Canada, Mexico, and China 
  • Canada accounts for more than one quarter of all U.S. personal care exports 
  • Europe supplies over $11 billion in U.S. personal care imports, led by:  
    • France ($3.9 billion) 
    • Ireland ($2.5 billion) 
    • Italy ($2.0 billion) 

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What the U.S. Trades

Top Export Categories 

  • Skincare and cosmetics: $5.8 billion (37%) 
  • Fragrances and aromas: $5.7 billion (36%) 
  • Haircare products: $1.6 billion (10%) 

Top Import Categories 

  • Fragrances and aromas: $9.2 billion (42%) 
  • Skincare and cosmetics: $7.1 billion (33%) 
  • Haircare products: $2.3 billion (11%) 

Supporting Global Trade to Strengthen the U.S. Cosmetics and Personal Care Industry

International trade is essential to the strength, resilience, and global competitiveness of the U.S. cosmetics and personal care products industry. PCPC represents an industry that relies on highly integrated global supply chains to source specialized ingredients, advanced packaging, and innovative technologies that are not available domestically or at scale. These global networks enable U.S. companies to manufacture, innovate, and export high-quality products that meet the daily needs of consumers at home and around the world. 

The cosmetics and personal care products sector is a powerful engine of the U.S. economy—supporting millions of jobs, driving scientific innovation, and contributing hundreds of billions of dollars in economic output. Ensuring open, fair, and predictable trade is critical to sustaining this leadership. 

Global Supply Chains Are Foundational to U.S. Cosmetics and Personal Care Manufacturing

Cosmetics and personal care products depend on thousands of specialized inputs, many of which are geographically specific or require highly technical manufacturing capabilities. Based on PCPC analysis, more than 40 percent of ingredients used in cosmetics sold in the United States cannot be sourced domestically or at scale. These include botanical extracts, minerals and clays, essential oils, specialty chemicals, and advanced polymers that are integral to product safety, performance, and consumer acceptance. 

Packaging presents similar challenges. U.S. capacity is extremely limited for cosmetic-grade glass, high-precision dispensing systems, aerosol components, and aesthetically complex packaging. As a result, PCPC member companies rely on trusted suppliers in North America, Europe, and Asia for critical packaging inputs such as bottles, pumps, applicators, and closures. 

Rather than displacing U.S. manufacturing, access to global inputs strengthens domestic production by allowing companies to concentrate higher-value activities—such as formulation, advanced manufacturing, research and development, and quality assurance—within the United States. 

Trade Enables Export Growth and Consumer Access


The United States is one of the world’s leading exporters of cosmetics and personal care products. Major export destinations include Canada, the European Union, China, Japan, Mexico, and fast-growing markets across Asia and Latin America. Export growth supports U.S. jobs, small and medium-sized businesses, and continued investment in innovation.

At the same time, consumers benefit from trade through access to safe, effective, and innovative products that reflect global scientific advances and ingredient availability. Predictable trade frameworks—such as the United States–Mexico–Canada Agreement (USMCA)—are especially critical to maintaining integrated North American supply chains and positioning the United States as a competitive production and export platform.

Addressing Non-Tariff Barriers in Global Markets

While tariffs on cosmetics are generally low, non-tariff barriers have become the primary obstacle to trade for U.S. cosmetics and personal care companies. PCPC works closely with the U.S. government and partners around to globe to address regulatory measures abroad that are unnecessarily burdensome, duplicative, or discriminatory, including: 

  • Mandatory animal testing requirements that conflict with global commitments to non-animal safety methods 
  • Duplicative ingredient approval processes that ignore existing international safety assessments 
  • Misaligned or hazard-based regulatory regimes that fail to consider real-world exposure and risk 
  • Restrictive labeling, claims, and documentation requirements that increase costs and delay market access 
  • Unclear, inconsistent, or rapidly changing regulations that undermine investment planning and innovation 

These barriers disproportionately affect small and mid-sized enterprises, limit market access, and weaken the global competitiveness of U.S. products without improving consumer safety. 

Advocating for Risk Based, Harmonized Regulation

PCPC supports science based, risk based, and internationally harmonized regulations that protect consumers while facilitating trade. Priorities include international regulatory reliance, acceptance of trusted foreign safety assessments, elimination of duplicative requirements, protection of confidential business information and intellectual property, and reasonable transition periods for regulatory changes. These efforts help reduce trade friction and ensure U.S. companies can compete globally on a level playing field. 

PCPC’s Trade Policy Advocacy

PCPC engages actively with U.S. policymakers, trade agencies, and international partners to ensure that the cosmetics and personal care products industry’s perspectives are reflected in trade negotiations, enforcement actions, and regulatory dialogues. This includes participation in trade investigations, submission of formal comments, bilateral and multilateral advocacy, and ongoing collaboration with regulators worldwide. 

Our goal is clear: 
To support an open, fair, and predictable global trading system that enables innovation, strengthens U.S. manufacturing, and ensures consumers everywhere have access to safe, high-quality cosmetic and personal care products.

The EU–U.S. Cosmetics & Personal Care Industry Relationship

  • Deeply Integrated Transatlantic Market 
    The EU and the United States are the two largest cosmetics and personal care markets in the world and serve as each other’s top export destinations, reflecting a highly interconnected and mutually dependent industry.  
  • Significant Two-way Trade 
    Total EU–U.S. trade in cosmetics and personal care products reached approximately $14.6 billion in 2025, underscoring the scale and strategic importance of the transatlantic relationship. U.S. exports to the European Union totaled about $3.6 billion, while imports from EU suppliers reached roughly $11.0 billion, reflecting the EU’s central role in both demand for U.S. products and supply of high value personal care imports. 
  • Strong EU Presence in the U.S. Market 
    EU cosmetics companies maintain extensive manufacturing, distribution, marketing, and business operations across the United States, supporting both the U.S. market and exports back to the EU and globally.  
  • Intracompany Trade Is Common 
    Many cosmetics and personal care products move through intra‑company trade, reflecting integrated supply chains and shared manufacturing and distribution strategies between EU and U.S. companies.  
  • Economic and Employment Benefits on Both Sides 
    The success of EU–U.S. trade supports jobs, manufacturing investment, innovation, and small businesses in both economies.  

Public Comments, Statements, and Trade Fact Sheets

FAQs

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The Code, by strengthening practices already in place for many companies, and incorporating new practices, goes beyond the minimum requirements of the law and highlights the proactive and responsible approach to product safety and quality supported by cosmetics companies. PCPC’s Board of Directors unanimously approved the development of the Consumer Commitment Code in 2007 to provide consumers, regulators and other interested parties with a clear outline of the specific commitments by cosmetics companies in providing consumers with safe, high quality products.

he industry adopted this Code in the course of its continued commitment to the best safety and quality practices. As we developed the core elements of our industry’s Code, we engaged with consumers, policymakers, and experts in our industry to carefully consider their views. The safety and quality of our products is a top priority for cosmetics and personal care companies, and that priority is reflected in our industry’s long history of marketing safe and high-quality products. The Code provides an even greater degree of assurance of safety for consumers and transparency for government regulators. The Code does this by strengthening the safety practices many cosmetics companies have followed for decades and incorporating new practices such as the Safety Information Summary Program.

It is the industry’s responsibility to ensure that products and ingredients are safe before they are marketed. To that end, PCPC has supported a broad range of programs–many in cooperation with FDA–to ensure safety.Cosmetics safety is regulated by the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, and FDA’s Office of Cosmetics and Colors enforces the law and establishes safety standards for cosmetics. In the unlikely event that an unsafe product reaches the market, the law gives FDA the authority to ban or restrict ingredients, to seek product recalls, to seize unsafe or misbranded products, to mandate warning labels, and to prosecute violators.

PCPC member companies that manufacture or market cosmetics products or ingredients are strongly encouraged to adhere to the Code.

a) A company should use only ingredients that are substantiated for safety, either by findings of the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR) Expert Panel and/or by data and information and that this information is available for inspection by FDA upon request;

b) A company should provide FDA with the information on manufacturing establishments and ingredient usage called for by the Voluntary Cosmetic Reporting Program;

c) A company should immediately inform the FDA of any serious and unexpected adverse experience from the use of a product marketed in the U. S.; and

d) A company should maintain a Safety Information Summary related to product and ingredient safety that is available for inspection by FDA under specified circumstances.

No. The Code goes beyond existing law by recommending (1) the reporting of serious and unexpected adverse consumer experiences with cosmetics products, a current requirement for prescription medicines; (2) the maintenance of a Safety Information Summary on product and ingredient safety for products marketed in the US.; (3) that certain safety information be made available for inspection by the FDA; and (4) that companies participate in the FDA Voluntary Cosmetic Reporting Program (VCRP) for products marketed in the United States.

No. The Code is not intended to be, nor should it be, construed as legal advice. Companies have an independent obligation to ascertain that their marketing of cosmetics products or ingredients complies with all current laws and regulations.

We will not terminate PCPC membership for noncompliance. Rather than push companies outside this system by terminating their membership, we will work with them to encourage compliance. Industry leadership is committed to the Code, and we believe every company will understand it is in their interest to support it.

A company should maintain information about its formulas, product testing, and adverse consumer experiences with its cosmetics products for inspection by FDA officials under specified circumstances when FDA has a specific concern about the safety of that company’s product’s. Maintenance of a safety information summary will provide FDA with faster and easier access to this information, should a safety concern arise with a company’s product.If the FDA determines a product is unsafe, it has extensive authority to take corrective action, including seeking a recall, banning or restricting ingredients, seizing unsafe or misbranded products, inspecting manufacturing facilities and even prosecuting violators.

Companies that market their products in the United States should adhere to the principles of the Code. Companies that operate in the U.S. will be asked to maintain safety information summaries that will be available whenever requested by FDA officials.

  • CIR: The industry has, since 1976, supported the existence of an independent scientific body called the Cosmetic Ingredient Review (CIR) Expert Panel. CIR reviews the safety of cosmetics ingredients in a public process that prioritizes ingredients for review based on several factors, including how widely they are used and their potential to pose a risk to consumers. CIR’s Expert Panel is made up of world class scientific experts who meet the same conflict of interest standards as do members of FDA advisory committees. Representatives of the FDA, the Consumer Federation of America and the industry sit as liaison members of CIR’s Expert Panel. CIR’s ongoing review has evaluated thousands of ingredients, and its integrity and effectiveness have been praised by several FDA Commissioners over the four decades of its existence.
  • INCI: Recognizing the need for a uniform, internationally harmonized system for identifying cosmetics ingredients, the industry established the International Nomenclature Cosmetic Ingredient (INCI) program to create and assign specific ingredient names. Today, in the United States, and many countries around the world, INCI names are referenced by regulation for ingredient labeling cosmetics products. INCI names are developed by the International Nomenclature Committee and published in the International Cosmetic Ingredient Dictionary and Handbook. The first edition was published in 1976, and new editions are published every two years.
  • Quality, Safety and Microbiology Guidelines: The industry develops and publishes guidelines on a variety of topics. Among these are the Quality Assurance Guidelines, which provide approaches that cosmetics manufacturers can use for establishing their good manufacturing practices and quality assurance programs; the Safety Evaluation Guidelines, which provide manufacturers with guidance in the use of pre-clinical and clinical safety testing as a means to substantiate the safety of both ingredients and finished cosmetics products; and Microbiology Guidelines, which are intended to provide manufacturers with best practices in establishing and maintaining a microbiological quality program within their companies.
  • Cosmeticsinfo.org: CosmeticsInfo.org is an informational database containing science and safety information on cosmetics and personal care products – how they work, data to corroborate safety, and science behind commonly used ingredients. Developed and maintained by scientists and subject-matter experts, CosmeticsInfo.org is a trusted resource visited by millions of women, men, and families around the world each year. Importantly, the Website includes factual, publicly available scientific information on ingredients most commonly used in cosmetics and personal care products globally. PCPC and its member companies sponsor this website in an effort to provide consumers with easily accessible and understandable science and safety information about the products they trust and enjoy every day.
  • ICCR & ISO: ICCR is an international group of regulatory authorities from Brazil, Canada, the European Union, Japan, and the United States working together to promote regulatory alignment, in an effort to maximize consumer protection while minimizing barriers to trade. Likewise, the International Standards Organization (ISO) is an independent, non-governmental international organization with 164 national standards bodies as participating members. Through these members, ISO brings together experts to share knowledge and develop voluntary, consensus-based, market relevant International Standards that support innovation and provide solutions to global challenges.
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