Specialty brands partner with big box retail to boost foot traffic—and sales
It’s a retail conundrum: Foot traffic in malls is decreasing, and brick and mortar stores are losing ground to ecommerce – yet shoppers still want to visit stores to touch and try out products before buying.
To capture more sales and remain relevant to shoppers, big box stores are thinking out of the box and partnering with popular name-brand product manufacturers.
Bringing Apple to you at Target
Target recently announced it will double the size of Apple’s footprint in 17 locations, expanding offerings in stores and online. In addition, Target team members will receive specialized training from Apple.
The retail behemoth has also partnered with Ulta Beauty to open 1,000-square-foot beauty shops, which will be staffed with Target employees who have been trained by the beauty retailer.
Notably, Ulta also provides customers with many services such as in-store hair salons, which drive considerable foot traffic: Salon customers reportedly make twice as many trips to an Ulta Beauty store as those who do not use those services.
And Target isn’t the only big box store looking to pretty itself up: Kohl’s will open 200 “Sephora at Kohl’s” locations this fall, with at least 850 locations planned by 2023. The cosmetics retailer will launch on Kohl’s website in 2022, offering more than 100 beauty brands, some of which are exclusive to Sephora.
Products across price points
The beauty segment is notable because America’s department store makeup counters have historically been the place to purchase upper-end cosmetics.
The American beauty counter is iconic.
However, they’ve gradually been losing popularity as shoppers prefer to visit specialized retailers – such as Ulta and Sephora – which can provide a more extensive variety of products at different price points.
However, by collaborating with those same cosmetics retailers as well as be increasing their in-store footprint, department stores could win back many of those customers.
Department stores are using the popularity of brands such as Apple, Sephora and Ulta to lure customers back into their stores.
Once inside, the customers can be tempted to continue shopping for other products.
In a way, department stores function like mini-malls: From motor oil to bikinis to wrapping paper, these stores have it all.
The tough part today is getting the shoppers to come into the store.
The addition of top brand names will help provide the visibility needed to get shoppers in the automatic door.
