[Photo provided to China Daily]

L'Oreal-owned cosmetics giant shifts focus to Alibaba e-commerce platform to try and broaden its consumer base and reach young, tech-savvy shoppers

Giorgio Armani Beauty launched its flagship store on Alibaba's Tmall shopping platform on Dec 25 last year, as part of the brand's ongoing efforts to tap into China's fast-growing demand for high-end beauty products.

The beauty brand owned by cosmetics giant L'Oreal held a three-week warm-up event on Tmall ahead of its official release on Jan 16, where it offered their limited edition product lines. Chinese customers can find the full range of products online, including Lip Maestro, one of Armani Beauty's most popular lipstick lines.

This is the fifth Tmall store with Giorgio Armani DNA after Armani Jeans, Armani Exchange and Emporio Armani and its watch outlet set up their online stores.

In order to keep their brand fresh, many luxury brands started to realize the importance of a strong e-commerce presence in China as early as 2010. Emporio Armani launched its e-commerce website, the first of its kind by a major luxury international group in China at that year. Likewise, Giorgio Armani Beauty is shifting its focus to the country's largest e-commerce platform. On the first day of its Tmall launch, it registered a total sales of 17 million yuan ($2.64 million).

Tmall has 500 million active users, and young consumers account for about 60 percent of this total. For luxury brands like Armani, this is exactly the kind of customer base they want to develop.

The luxury cosmetics brand also introduced its 2018 spring-summer collection at a launch event in Beijing on Jan 12. Yann Andrea, brand general manager from Giorgio Armani Beauty attended the event and explained their recent move.

"The brand today has been growing extremely fast in China in recent years and certain sectors are outperforming the market, especially makeup - but also skin care and fragrances. It's really the moment to accelerate things even more through e-commerce. The brand is solid enough to make the jump and really succeed in e-commerce. That's our strategy," he says.