Exclusivity for a hair care brand is obtained through a contract that reserves an area for you in return for purchase targets and for developing the brand in salons. The manufacturer grants it according to the territory's potential and your sales capacity, and in the European Union a regulation sets out what that contract may and may not restrict.
What Does the Manufacturer Ask in Return for Exclusivity?
Reserving an area for a single distributor means giving up developing it through other routes. In return, the manufacturer needs a guarantee that the brand will grow in that territory, and that guarantee has a name: development targets, a commitment to purchase and to establish the brand in salons, measured in annual volume.
At Yanguas Professional, exclusivity is negotiated case by case, depending on the size of the territory, the market potential and the distributor's commercial commitment. The scope changes with where you will work:
| Market | Usual scope | Basis of the agreement |
|---|---|---|
| Spain | Province, region or country | Purchase and development targets |
| International | A whole country or market | Contract with territory and targets |
Neither is granted for the asking. A distributor who arrives with a salon portfolio in one province has a case for that province; asking for the whole region while visiting only one city usually ends in targets that cannot be met.
The Five Points the Contract Settles
An exclusivity contract is built on a few decisions, but each one shapes years of work. They are the same ones the manufacturer goes through in the negotiation stage:
| Point | What is decided |
|---|---|
| Territory | The reserved area and its boundaries |
| Targets | Expected purchases and development |
| Product families | The lines with most potential in your area |
| Initial order | The volume the brand starts with |
| Commercial terms | Prices and launch support |
The choice of product families is the most underestimated. There is no need to start with the whole catalogue: colour, bleaching, technical products and styling can be added gradually, starting with the lines that best suit the salons in your area. A target calculated on two families is easier to defend than one calculated on four.
What Can an Exclusivity Contract Restrict in the EU?
Within the European Union these contracts are governed by Regulation (EU) 2022/720 on vertical agreements, which exempts them from the ban on restrictive agreements when neither the supplier nor the distributor exceeds a 30% share of its relevant market. It expires on 31 May 2034, and its Article 1 defines the exclusive system as follows:
A distribution system where the supplier allocates a territory or group of customers exclusively to itself or to a maximum of five buyers and restricts all its other buyers from actively selling into the exclusive territory or to the exclusive customer group.
The key lies in the difference between active sales and passive ones. An active sale means seeking out customers in an area through visits, emails, calls or targeted advertising; a passive sale means serving someone who contacts you on their own initiative. The regulation lets your area be protected from the first, not from the second:
| Clause | Treatment under the regulation |
|---|---|
| Other buyers' active sales into your area | Can be restricted |
| Your passive sales outside your area | Cannot be restricted |
| Fixed or minimum resale price | Excluded; a maximum or recommended price is allowed |
| Non-compete obligation | Exempt for up to five years |
In day-to-day terms: your contract can stop another distributor of the brand from going after salons in your province, but not stop a salon from elsewhere from calling you. And no one can set the price at which you resell, although they can recommend one. The ban on selling through marketplaces is a separate clause, which at Yanguas applies to all its distributors.
Outside the European Union the framework depends on each country's law, but the points negotiated are the same: territory, targets, range and terms.
What Should You Put in Writing Before Signing?
Exclusivity protects your work of building the brand only if its limits are clear. What avoids most disputes is defining the territory in writing, with provinces, towns or postcodes, rather than a vague reference to «the northern area».
Ask too how and how often the targets are reviewed, what happens if the market in your area changes and what becomes of the salons you already serve if the partnership ends. And if you start with two families, clarify whether the exclusivity covers the whole catalogue or only the lines you already carry, because the answer decides who may sell the rest in your area. None of those answers is standard: they depend on the agreement, and the contract should record them before they are needed.
💡 Tip before signing: ask for the territory annex to include a map or a closed list of towns. It is the first thing consulted when two distributors claim the same salon.
If your portfolio is in a single province today, propose Yanguas Professional's territorial exclusivity for that province and leave the expansion until the first year's targets have been met.
