Finding success at retail and keeping a coveted spot on a premium shelf is a journey of its own. Notably, for the reason that pandemic, the frequency of brands coming to market and launching in-store has escalated enormously, especially with hair care, Black, Indigenous and other people of color-owned brands, and clean beauty brands picking up momentum. Latest categories have also popped up, because of the evolving consumer journey that features social media usage and the consumption of more content that pertains to specific needs like textured hair and clean beauty. Sexual wellness and menopause are also now not taboo — a conversation that has led to more products from the categories showing up on shelves.

The rise actually speaks to a hunger from consumers with prestige beauty cited because the only industry across The NPD Group general merchandise retail categories with positive year-over-year unit sales in 2022. Prestige beauty industry sales revenue grew 15 percent, in accordance with NPD to exceed $27 billion last yr. And while prestige was actually a growth engine in the wonder space, beauty product sales at mass merchants accounted for nearly all of sales across most beauty categories last yr, amassing $30 billion in annual retail sales within the U.S., in accordance with the corporate.

While the evolution of beauty retail is a positive one, with all of this newness, for brands seeking to launch at retail in 2023, it means facing the very real challenge of standing out in a larger-than-ever sea of fantastic brands. It’s a challenge that even retailers make note of, often referring brands to hunt the assistance of Beauty Barrage, the strategic sales partner that delivers full sales management for beauty brands.

Sonia Summers, founder and chief executive officer at Beauty Barrage, who has a status within the industry for the corporate’s impressive track record for successfully helping brands grow at retail, works with brands to launch at retail with a plan in place, offering the very best practices, strategy and access to her greater than 300 beauty ambassadors.

“It’s worthwhile to have a method to bring a brand to life in-store,” said Summers. Beauty Barrage builds out unique strategies for every client understanding the challenge of costs in ways in which brands typically don’t yet understand, including resources to coach each store location and mobilizing support in-store across the country. Constructing a method that features a sensible budget for retail while setting realistic goals is something Summers advises all brands to take time to know when launching in stores.

“Sometimes it might take as much as five months to see the shift in sales,” said Summers. “Also, if you’ve got no experience in retail you must definitely seek the advice of with respected experts. Mistakes are costly.”

Each brand also has its own set of goals, which the team at Beauty Barrage helps to construct on by starting with a full understanding. Once launching at retail, Beauty Barrage’s team stays agile, knowing easy methods to adjust as strategy and goals evolve. Lots of the company’s brand partners have been clients for greater than 4 years.

“Our focus is at all times to know the brand partner’s goals after which we construct the strategy from there,” said Summers. “As an example, do we wish to teach the shop for the primary few months, engage with customers, merchandise – all the above? What number of store locations are they in? The excellent news is that we have now a lot data that we can assist select markets in your category based on retailers.”

A standard challenge for all brands at retail is ensuring consumers are receiving education on the products. For clinical brands, said Summers, this might mean translating studies that prove the science of a complement so that individuals feel comfortable taking them. While digitally a brand would send consumers the knowledge through email, it’s far different from providing that education in-store. Brands have to be prepared for this. FDA clearances will even have to be communicated in stores, she said, and the messaging must be navigated accurately.

Ultimately, providing the buyer with the much-needed information requires ongoing education with the retailer and representatives in stores who can speak to the brand’s products and efficacy. Working with Beauty Barrage, brands can provide ongoing education to consumers through beauty brand ambassadors. These ambassadors represent brands in stores, helping consumers navigate brands with key insights that in addition they pass on to the retailer’s employees.

Once a method is in place, Beauty Barrage’s well-oiled business model can mobilize a whole lot of name ambassadors to execute in-store while providing critical data in real time.

Still, the information is at all times tied in with the human touch and without gifting away the corporate’s full recipe for fulfillment, Summers said that Beauty Barrage’s secret sauce is its people.

“My executive team is super strategic and brings years of corporate retail buying and field management experience,” said Summers. “We understand what drives retail and we’re very stealth at pivoting strategies when essential.”

For Makeup Revolution, Retail Means Never Resting on Your Laurels  

The brand discusses its work with Beauty Barrage and the importance of representation in stores.  

In 2023, Makeup Revolution struck a partnership with Beauty Barrage to overcome the world of masstige beauty with its concept that high-quality cosmetics needs to be available to everyone. Competing with brands that held heritage residency on the shelves of Ulta, Goal, Walgreens and Walmart provided challenges in an area where consumer favor often shines on loyalty and what they know.  

In conversation, Sara Stainford, president of Makeup Revolution told Fairchild Studio it’s becoming tougher than ever to compete with other brands which have had a long-standing presence out there and have a foundation of name recognition with consumers that sometimes span a long time. A technique many young brands, including Makeup Revolution, have tackled brand  is thru social media.  

“Having a powerful social presence is important for fulfillment in retail,” said Stainford. “Consumers are being guided by TikTok trends and people brands are seeing huge growth. Nevertheless, you can not rest in your laurels once you’ve got a viral product.”  

Expanding a fast viral moment into an enduring connection is a sticking point many brands face and Stainford said that when Makeup Revolution began its relationship with Beauty Barrage its goal was to extend brand awareness and sales in all categories, not only viral products. “You have got to maintain the momentum going by continually capturing the interest of the TikTok generation.” 

Even with a built digital presence, engaging the buyer in-store remains to be nuanced. Consumers have to be guided to a brand, provided background, ingredient information and infrequently tutorials and this isn’t provided with no strategy. “We had seen some organic support for the brand but not as much as we might have liked,” said Stainford. “Store associates naturally gravitate towards brands they’re conversant in and use themselves.”  

Identifying a necessity for support in-store, Beauty Barrage’s team of Beauty Ambassadors underwent a program specifically designed to teach them on all the things Makeup Revolution has to supply. They tested the brand, asked questions and learned about hero products that buyers already love. This education was added to what they already know in regards to the retailers and the relationships they’ve fostered there.  

“We work together to cultivate ways to spice up brand awareness, create excitement and unforgettable experiences in stores that ultimately lead to sales,” said Sonia Summers, founder and chief executive officer of Beauty Barrage. “With our team of highly trained and passionate beauty ambassadors representing the brand with first-class service and expertise our partnership with Revolution will only proceed to strengthen and flourish.” 

Having the Beauty Ambassadors in store, educating store associates and selling to customers has given Makeup Revolution an enormous advantage, exec told Fairchild Studio. It’s a bonus that until Beauty Barrage, she thought was only given to prestige brands. “It’s not the usual,” she said.  

Since coming along with Beauty Barrage, Makeup Revolution cites not only a rise in sales on days when Beauty Ambassadors are present but in addition coming from the shop associates who had learned in regards to the brand from Beauty Barrage’s presence.  

In keeping with Summers, the connection between Beauty Barrage and Makeup Revolution is a real partnership where each teams are open to experimenting and alter. “Beauty Barrage is Makeup Revolution’s biggest advocate,” said Summers. “We now have a real interest in helping the brand achieve success and see continued growth. This unwavering commitment to the brand’s success has established a relationship based on trust and collaboration.”  

Across the board in beauty retail Summers said, everyone seems to be facing the identical challenges: brands seeking to cut through the noise at retail and supply consumers with the knowledge they need for a successful shopping journey. 

How Kerastase Brings the Skilled’s Luxury to Sephora Consumers  

Guillaume Duez of Kerastase shares insights into its amplification in-store through Beauty Barrage’s experience with consumer education.  

Often when a beauty brand enters a retailer’s stores it isn’t without its own story, its own DNA, its own relationship with the buyer and while the mixing right into a retailer’s brand is an incredible opportunity to grow, so as thrive a brand must be prepared to make its own message heard.  

As a luxury skilled brand, Kerastase has built a powerful education heritage, one which connects with today’s highly conscious consumer. Utilized by professionals in a few of the very best salons within the U.S., consumers are sometimes introduced to the brand by use, finding expert opinions from trusted stylists for any hair needs. Placing the product on a retailers’ shelves, nevertheless, put the brand in a unique environment, one where store associates weren’t at all times conversant in Kerastase offerings.

To amplify its education to consumers, Kerastase formed a collaborative partnership with Beauty Barrage. Starting as a test with a small scope, the brand grew at scale inside Sephora with increased sales. Now, the brand works with Beauty Barrage for service in any respect Kerastase Sephora doors.

Here, Guillaume Duez, general manager of Kerastase USA at Kerastase, speaks to Fairchild Studio in regards to the opportunities seen for the brand at retail, Kerastase’s work with Beauty Barrage and growth at Sephora.

Fairchild Studio: What were the opportunities that you just saw when launching Kerastase at retail?
Guillaume Duez: As knowledgeable brand, anchored in offering customized hair regimens and solutions to any hair need, like we do in the best salons of the country, we knew that education was critical. We also needed the retail expertise that Beauty Barrage has delivered to the table.

The brand has a powerful education heritage and we were searching for a partner to assist us effectively train the Sephora Beauty Advisors and supply sales support for the shoppers in step with our values and DNA. Beauty Barrage got here highly beneficial, and we knew that they had built-in relationships.

Fairchild Studio: With this partnership, why were you specifically targeting Sephora?
G.D.: When considering our partnership with Sephora, our goal was to achieve a latest clientele and introduce them to our universe, our range and hero products. Sephora was the plain alternative because the prestige beauty retailer, which has a history of name and awareness constructing and in addition allowed us state-of-the-art execution for our brand through elevated merchandising and education.

Fairchild Studio: How did Beauty Barrage help overcome obstacles at retail?
G.D.: Beauty Barrage was capable of offer a sturdy retail strategy that included their education team, events, merchandising and sales support – and the flexibility for our brand to have visibility to the standard of the visits in-store through reporting.

Relationships in-store matter! From the connection with the shop associate to the connection with the client, having a presence in-store is vital to constructing your retail footprint, and in addition maintaining a state-of-the-art execution for our luxury brand.

Fairchild Studio: What would you say is the very best evidence that this partnership is working?
G.D.: The apparent indicator is our sales and the positive feedback from the Stores team! Since we have now partnered with Beauty Barrage, we have now exceeded sales expectations and our in-store presence has been elevated.

Kerastase recently expanded into all Sephora doors if this is a sign of the success they’re seeing. Beauty Barrage now’s their exclusive sales team for retail support.

Fairchild Studio: What’s next for Kerastase? Any latest goals?
G.D.: Our Goal is to maintain introducing more consumers to our amazing brand and products and promote our unique salon services too. Our focus will proceed to be growing our awareness with Sephora and at all times be on the forefront of innovation with exciting latest products, ingredients and interesting content along the best way. At Kerastase, our motto is “You Dare, We Care.”