Boots’ heavy weight
The first specificity is the considerable weight of mass market with the importance of Boots drugstore network. With more than 2,500 outlets throughout the United Kingdom, and a beauty-related turnover of 2.17 billion pounds sterling (i.e. 35 % of the health and beauty activity) [1] , Boots compels brands to offer endless discounts, thus making the market increasingly harder to access for newcomers.
Boots also distributes premium brands in a few “more selective” stores. The distributor’s sales have even been strongly stimulated by this segment, in particular thanks to exclusive brands such as Smashbox. Lastly, they also offer a very wide variety of products under their own brands, which largely contributes to their success: their No7 line is the best-seller on the British market.
Debenhams gets on the web
As for the selective market, Debenhams remains the leader of the health and beauty segment. The department store chain is growing more and more ingenious to retain its consumers. Its strategy is to be present everywhere, all the time, and with new launches, both to adapt to the current culture of instantaneity and meet consumers’ changing needs.
Debenhams is now very present on the web, in particular with a dynamic e-store, and they launched their own beauty blog three years ago to guide women consumers when buying their cosmetic products. “On the year it was created, the blog counted more than 70 million pages seen, and there are 350 million today… The idea with this editorial content is to provide readers with information on all product tests and all elements which may facilitate the act of purchase”, explains Sarah Sian, Beauty Editor of the British chain. Thanks to her educational software (videos, articles, etc.), Sarah invites women consumers to get familiar with products and thus avoids any deterrent to purchasing (fear of asking questions, of showing one’s skin defects to a shop assistant, etc.). The blog is linked with the store, which resorts to numerous sampling campaigns and, of course, accepts the Debenhams loyalty card.
This strategy seems to be quite effective, since Debenhams online purchases increased by 46.2 % to represent 13.2 % of 2013 total sales (only 9.3 % in 2012).
British women consumers globally seek and appreciate interactivity with brands. They like learning and searching for information themselves, and they look for efficacy promises beyond aestheticism. “Women are seeking more and more powerful products, and long-lasting, multifunctional ones represent the main trends”, underlines Sarah Sian. Therefore they prefer eye shadows that last longer, even though they are more expensive, and moisturizers which exhibit several properties such as BB or CC creams. Demand is also quite high for organic or natural products. “Hence the success of the bareMinerals brand”, explains Sarah Sian.
Teleshopping
All in all, the market is relatively dense and largely dominated by French and American groups’ brands (Procter & Gamble, L’Oréal, Chanel, LVMH, Estée Lauder, Coty, etc.). Newcomers often manage to emerge by using alternative distributors such as Space N.K. and/or very high-end networks. Others try to create a more direct and close relationship with consumers and are able to rely on the sales power of specialized TV channels in particular.
Sarah Cross, one of the founders of young brand Code-Beautiful, aimed to “create attachment to the brand and ensure consumers’ loyalty from the start”. Given the overabundance of the beauty product offer, many women value recommendations and advice. Code-Beautiful has thus chosen to be distributed in beauty salons, on QVC, the teleshopping leader channel, and through a network of exclusive distributors as well. The brand also strongly invested in social networks to try and create a personal bond with its customers.
