Le Printemps’ new beauty store unveiled in Paris
In a beauty world that is in constant flux, Le Printemps’ new store
features a combination of established brands and emerging small labels,
as it seeks to appeal to an increasingly large and volatile clientèle.
The first novelty is that beauty at Le Printemps is changing location,
moving to the department store’s boulevard Haussmann branch’s third
building – already home to childrenswear and home decoration – opposite
the Citadium store. With its two entrances on rue du Havre and rue
Caumartin, the beauty store now extends along rue de Provence, having
left the ground floor of the building which faces directly on to the
busy boulevard Haussmann. “The Saint-Lazare rail station being so close,
80 million people will walk by Le Printemps’ new beauty store each
year,” said Charlotte Tasset, in charge of the women’s, beauty, lingerie
and children’s categories at Le Printemps. And it is chiefly this local
clientèle, living and/or working in the neighbourhood, which the
department store is keen to attract. The charm offensive starts on the
ground floor with Beautysta, a section which is visible from the street
and offers a range of impulse products and directional brands such as
Egyptian Magic, Bastide, Human + Kind and Merci Handy, with average
prices of about €15, to stimulate quick, impulse purchases.
The ground floor also hosts the make-up section and 24 retail corners
for labels such as Louboutin and Urban Decay. “Make-up is a dynamic
sector. In the UK, it represents two thirds of the business. It is only
in France that fragrance dominates,” said Charlotte Tasset. Most brands
have gone to great lengths in creating the setting for such a crucial
category, as for example Giorgio Armani with its bespoke red showcase. On
the first floor, fragrance takes over. Scents steal the scene across
the 1,000 m2 retail area, with some twenty boutiques by, among others,
Guerlain, Cire Trudon, introducing its first fragrances, Comme des
Garçons and Le Labo. First launched by Le Printemps in 2007, the Scent
Room continues with its mission, presenting and supporting more intimate
labels such as Juliette has a Gun, Héloïse de V or Parle-moi de parfum,
while the ‘Incubateur’ (incubator) section gives visibility to emerging
fragrance houses. As Charlotte Tasset explained, “Le Printemps’ new
beauty store is structured so that brands can grow within it, gradually
taking over increasingly larger areas.” The observation is all the more
pertinent for the fragrance category, whose so-called ‘niche’ brands are
growing fast within a rather flat beauty market.
Finally, with 66 brands of which 43 are new (among them Sacha Juan,
Rituals and Balmain), the store’s lower ground floor is occupied by
skincare and beauty services, with the goal of providing beauty from
hair to toes. Gloss’Up will take care of nails and brow shaping, Nyx
Professional will offer on-the-spot make-up and Coiffirst will pamper
the customers’ hair, while Nuxe and Clarins feature their beauty
institute treatments, in 30-minute slots well suited to the store. As
for the retail side of skincare, the L’Officine section brings together
alternative skin and face care brands already known to aficionados, such
as Absolution, Aurélia Skincare, Ren, Tata Harper and Moroccanoil.
Within this lively part of the store there is also a catering area,
managed by German brand Detox Delight.With its new beauty store,
Le Printemps’ boulevard Haussmann branch has virtually applied the
final touch to a make-over which began two years ago in two of its three
buildings. The transformation will be complete by the end of 2018, with
the three floors dedicated to food at 64 boulevard Haussmann.
