The Ugly Side of Big Beauty

Are nail polish and perfume the new crude oil? Will we soon be looking for ways to live without our favorite cosmetics because the cost is just too high? Not if the Germans have anything to do with it.

German authorities are cracking down on major beauty companies like LVMH Perfumes and Cosmetics, Chanel, Coty, Shiseido, Estee Lauder, and YSL for alleged price gouging. Apparently, the brands formed a cartel which met every quarter to fix prices on their products and so ensure that the market would be shared more or less equally among all of them. What's wrong with that? Well, it means that innocent consumers like us are being fleeced at the cosmetics counter.

And they would have gotten away with it if it hadn't been for those pesky, resourceful Germans. And now Germany's Federal Cartel Office is fining each company between $400,000 and $3.3 million, depending on precisely how naughty they were. Justice is a beautiful thing.

Do you feel you pay too much for big-name brands?