About Sephora - Value Proposition and Positioning

Sephora is a leading chain of cosmetics stores that carries over 250 brands. Their target customers are fashion-conscious women who have active lifestyles and are seeking for a unique look.

Sephora has a very distinctive brand image. They strictly use only the colors black, white and red throughout their stores and website designs. Customers automatically think of their black and white striped visuals with tints of red when they think ‘Sephora.’ These colors deliver a clean yet exciting brand image that goes along well with their products which includes high-end luxury cosmetics. When seeing the images and visuals of Sephora, Sephora’s customers know that they are in good hands and that they will be delivered promising service and the best merchandise.

Sephora also carries affordable products including their private label, other than high-end luxury cosmetics. The more affordable brands they carry include Clinique, Buxom, Stila, and Lorac. Their private label brand is named “Sephora Collection.” This is why they also try to portray a very approachable friendly brand image to their customers. They do this by having super friendly sales associates and providing amazing customer service. The Sephora Beauty Insider program, which is their rewards program, offers customers coupons, discounts, and points for frequent buyers. Every Beauty Insider receives a birthday gift, special offers and personalized product offerings.

Two major competitors for Sephora would be Ulta and L'Oréal.

Compared to Sephora, Ulta carries lower priced brands. They do have an outstanding membership program approachable to anyone. However, Ulta’s brand perception to customers is not as established as Sephora’s. Their stores and e-commerce are comparably smaller and less functional. Ulta.com and Sephora.com both delivers great control to customers by providing a great search engine and dividing categories of merchandise in detail. However, Sephora.com has a better design for easier navigation. Sephora.com also has better accessibility and digitalization with more detailed product information and more clarity in product photos. Most of the brands that Ultra carry are unpopular brands compared to the brands that Sephora carries.

L'Oréal, in the other hand, is a well-established brand with various product offerings. However, Sephora provides better customer service and a better reward program. L'Oréal does not give access to most of their coupons and offers to members whom are not on the top half of their customer pyramid. Sephora gives out 3 samples per order through their e-commerce, even to customers who are not a member. Lorealparisusa.com and Sephora.com both provides great accessibility with detailed information on products; Lorealparisusa.com does seem to provide more and better information compared to Sephora.com on some products. However, Lorealparisusa.com does not give enough control for shoppers as Sephora.com does. Lorealparisusa.com is fancier with lots of website design features, but is more difficult to navigate and to search for products.

In the end, more customers shop at Sephora.com than Ulta or L'Oréal because of Sephora’s better product offerings, better customer service, and their well-established e-commerce.

SEPHORA.COM