Rituals is a Dutch beauty and home fragrance brand known for its premium personal care and lifestyle products inspired by Asian wellness rituals.
Rituals Cosmetics is the privately held Dutch lifestyle and personal care brand founded in 2000 in Amsterdam by Raymond Cloosterman, who continues to serve as CEO and majority shareholder across the company’s complete history. The brand built its position at the intersection of personal care and “transform-the-everyday-into-meaningful-moments” lifestyle philosophy, integrating Eastern-influenced ritual concepts with European premium body care, home fragrance, and personal care formulations.
Cloosterman developed the original concept during his time at Unilever, where his observation that meaningful brand differentiation in personal care required experiential storytelling beyond functional product claims drove the founding hypothesis for Rituals. The product range covers body care (shower gels, body creams, scrubs), home fragrance (scented candles, fragrance sticks, mini parfums d’intérieur), shaving and grooming, skin care, hair care, makeup, and gift sets, with seasonal collection releases and a continuous program of new product introduction. Group revenue reached approximately €2.0 billion in 2023, with continued double-digit growth into 2024 driven by international expansion and category extension. The Rituals Foundation supports community development programs in source-ingredient regions and operates wellness-focused community projects. The signature collection lines including The Ritual of Sakura, The Ritual of Karma, The Ritual of Ayurveda, The Ritual of Hammam, and The Ritual of Mehr each anchor distinct product universes with linked body care, home fragrance, and gift product. Rituals suspended Russian operations in 2022.
Rituals operates more than 1,200 standalone stores across more than 35 countries, with the strongest concentrations in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, France, Spain, Italy, the United Kingdom, Sweden, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, and Mexico. The format combines a signature dark-wood-and-textured-stone store design with integrated product-discovery counters, gift-wrapping stations, and the brand’s hammam-influenced retail aesthetic. For mall operators, Rituals is a Class A specialty personal-care and gift tenant typically taking 100 to 200 square meters, fitting the personal-care and gift cluster alongside Lush, L’Occitane, Bath & Body Works, and similar premium specialty beauty brands. The brand operates at higher sales-per-square-foot productivity than most mall-based personal-care competitors, supporting the higher rent envelope landlords can negotiate.
