The cosmetics distributor Sephora dreams of crossing 20 billion euros in sales (AFP/Archives/Sameer Al-DOUMY)
The cosmetics distributor Sephora, which reopens its “flagship” on the Champs-Elysées on Friday after several months of work, now dreams of crossing 20 billion euros in sales, as did Louis Vuitton, another flagship brand of the LVMH group, its CEO Guillaume Motte told journalists.
Sephora, present in 35 countries, employs 46,000 people (including 39,000 in stores) and achieved a turnover of 12 billion euros in 2022, according to sector specialists, making it LVMH’s second brand behind Louis Vuitton (20 billion euros). It only made 2 billion euros in sales in 2011.
“My dream is 20 billion. We have the capacity at Sephora, in the geographies in which we operate, to reach 20 billion. I don’t know how to give a time horizon, but it’s a good number and a good ambition”, indicated the CEO of Sephora Guillaume Motte, during an interview with two media including AFP.
To do this, the brand intends to “continue to gain market share” in countries where the store chain is already established, starting with the United States and China. Sephora plans to open around a hundred stores around the world in 2024.
In the United States, “the largest beauty market in the world”, according to Mr. Motte, the group has 700 stores to which are added a thousand boutiques in partnership with the Kohl’s distribution chain. “We open 50 stores per year in North America and I think we can still do that for the next 5 to 10 years at least,” said the CEO of Sephora.
“The second priority zone is China”, where Sephora currently has “only” 350 stores, almost as many as in France. However, “we have the capacity to open many stores in China, we are only present in 90 cities. Some of our competitors are already in 150, 190 cities,” underlines Mr. Motte. In his eyes, “China, which has as many stores as France, is inconsistent… It remains a territory of enormous conquest.”
– 10,000 visitors per day –
However, China is experiencing an economic slowdown and the post-Covid recovery has not been as rapid as hoped. “My job is to build multi-year growth and (…) to support the teams to navigate an uncertain environment,” explains Mr. Motte, CEO of Sephora since January 2023.
A Sephoara store in New York, August 9, 2021 (AFP/Archives/Kena Betancur)
“We were all a little too optimistic when Covid came out (in China) and we had almost forgotten that it took us a long time to emerge from Covid in Europe and the United States.” Today, China’s recovery “is slow but it remains a country with incredible potential”, according to him. And “for beauty, there is an appetite that is unimaginable”.
The European market “is also very dynamic”, notes the CEO, citing “England, in the top 5 global markets”, where Sephora has been back for only a year. “That’s why (…) I don’t really want to go (conquer) many other (new) countries, I believe that we still have a lot of market share to gain where we are already operating,” he insists.
In France, the event is the reopening this Friday of the Champs-Elysées store, completely renovated over 1,200 square meters. This “flagship” is the first European store and second worldwide (behind Dubai and ahead of New York) of the group, which has 3,000 stores worldwide (including 300 in France).
Before its closure for work in May, it welcomed 10,000 visitors per day on average, “a quarter” of whom came from abroad, according to Mr. Motte.
Sephora, LVMH brand sponsor of the Paris Olympic Games, will be a partner of the flame journey next summer and was keen to have its main store in France ready in time for the July-August 2024 Olympic Games, in order to welcome the numerous tourists expected on one of the main tourist arteries of the French capital.
However, Guillaume Motte is “not sure that at the time of the Olympics we will have more people” than at Christmas: at that time, the gauge is, “I imagine, 50% above 10,000 visitors per day.
© 2023 AFP
Did you like this article ? Share it with your friends using the buttons below.
