Versed CEO talks product innovation strategy ahead of first retail pop-up

Inside Versed’s new pop-up in New York City, you’ll see skincare-themed merch like an I ♥️ Retinol sweatshirt, a new iteration of its viral croissant headband merchandised alongside actual bakery items, and shelves adorned with the pale-pink packaging of its retinol line, including its latest launch, a retinol body butter.

The new product is the result of a revved-up innovation rate that began when beauty industry vet Kerry Sullivan joined as its CEO in early 2023, she told Retail Brew. Before Versed, Sullivan was CMO of Dollar Shave Club for just under two years, and prior to that spent over 17 years at Johnson & Johnson, most recently as the vice president of marketing and general manager for Neutrogena.

“One thing that I was lucky to pull from Neutrogena is just an understanding of how a brand evolves strategically and how much growth headroom there is for smaller brands,” Sullivan said. “That growth appetite from being on a bigger brand I can bring to smaller brands to allow it to move faster.”

Skin in the game: The newest product for Versed, founded by Merit Beauty founder and Who What Wear co-founder Katherine Power in 2018, is Press Restart Advanced Retinol Body Butter, sold at Target for $19.99. To support the launch, the brand hosted its first retail pop-up, Press Restart Cafe, for three days this month in New York City.

The brand’s first foray into retinol came in the form of its Gentle Retinol Serum in 2019, followed by a body lotion and eye cream. The collection has continued to grow sales, with its lotion up 26% YoY in 2023 on its DTC site and 850% on Amazon. (One Versed retinol product is sold every minute, the company estimated.)

Its Body Butter, developed over ~18 months, aims to build on that success. It’s the latest product created with the help of its over 85,000 community members. “We don’t make anything without input from our community,” Sullivan said. They not only give feedback on products—but also aid a bit in their retail strategy, she added. Its first retail partnership with Target in 2019 came from community member insight about where they expected to see the brand.

Target is the brand’s “strongest strategic partner,” and where it sees the largest basket sizes, which is why it launched the body butter as a Target-exclusive product, Sullivan said. The pop-up also features stacks of “retinol magazines,” explaining the products and offering a 15% off one-week-only discount for Versed products at the retailer. That means success of the pop-up can be measured not only from its own sales and the social media impact from the many influencers and shoppers who visit the space, but also the sales made at Target using the discount.

Well-versed: Leveraging Sullivan’s skincare expertise, Versed has boosted its product development, creating offerings that can “go toe to toe with products that cost three times the price.”

“One of the things we're so proud of is being inspired by prestige and specialty and esthetician trends, dermatologist trends, and then finding ways to bring those and give access to those to the masses to the many,” she said.

Most products are under $20. Sullivan said Versed keeps prices down by investing in the formula, not the packaging, which uses up to 50% post-consumer recycled plastic. “[The packaging] is not going on your skin,” she said. “It’s componentry we use again and again.”

As Sullivan looks ahead to new product innovations, she said the skincare industry—and dermatologists—are seeing a notable uptick in the last five years of younger millennial women dealing with sensitive skin, a result of the ill-informed skincare routines of yore featuring microbeads and harsh acids. “It’s our mission but also our obligation as skincare brands to bring a solution to that.”

But that doesn’t necessarily mean filling up women’s medicine cabinets with a whole host of new products—it could mean updating its most popular ones (like its Day Dissolve cleansing balm, sold in bulk at Costco) when new tech is available, or curating a new regimens for consumers with its existing products.

“As a beauty executive, that principle I always tell the team is newness can complement existing products,” Sullivan said. “There’s so much more to tell and do with our heroes. That’s the best way to reach as many people as possible because that’s where the loyalty is.”