Retail Brew delivers the latest retail industry news and insights surrounding marketing, DTC, and e-commerce to keep leaders and decision-makers up to date.

Retail Brew

Erin Cabrey

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How Murad innovates its skincare for TikTok

Leaning into TikTok before-and-afters has lifted Murad’s sales at Sephora and Ulta

How this over 30-year-old skin care brand changed its innovation strategy for the TikTok age

Clean beauty products on a table with plants, leaves, and flowers

Clean and vegan beauty reformulation backlash

Glossier is the latest brand to face backlash with its Balm Dotcom reformulation

More and more beauty brands are reformulating to be clean and vegan, but consumers aren’t always happy about it

Katishi Maake

Outline of US map with skincare products 

Men’s personal care brands carve their space in a growing market

Dr. Squatch released a new line of hand and body lotions last week, expanding the company’s product portfolio geared toward men.

Beauty

Sephora and Vogue publisher Condé Nast are looking to cash in on the power of influencers, both unveiling new creator-led marketplaces to compete with affiliate marketing leaders like LTK and ShopMy.

Speaking at the Fast Company Innovation Festival on Tuesday, Sephora President and CEO Artemis Patrick announced the launch of My Sephora storefront, which allows creators and influencers to curate their own shoppable Sephora.com storefront. Patrick said the retailer was inspired to create the platform after receiving 14,000 applications this past year for its content creation program, Sephora Squad, which can only accept 50 annually. The platform, currently in alpha, is set to debut next month, she said.

Condé Nast’s new offering, Vette, also announced this week, allows influencers to operate their own online storefronts filled with products they picked. The platform will use “AI-powered merchandising and marketing tools,” the company said in a statement, which includes recommendations for inventory creators can add to their storefronts, 

. Vette, set to launch in early 2026, will use a revenue share model with creators and brands.

The new platforms are both efforts to get in on the nearly $16 billion 

—used by 40 million monthly shoppers and bringing in $5 billion in annual consumer sales, according to the company—and ShopMy, which scored $77.5 million in funding this year led by investors that previously backed Shopify and Rent the Runway.

Both Condé Nast and Sephora emphasized their new platforms differ from those affiliate marketing competitors because consumers can check out through the platforms themselves, rather than being redirected to the brands’ or retailers’ sites. Patrick said My Sephora is integrated into the retailer’s site on the app, desktop, or mobile devices, creating a “seamless experience,” while Vogue Business reported customers can shop and check out directly via Vette. The platforms more closely align with Amazon’s Storefront, which allows shoppers to convert sales directly though Amazon.

Lisa Aiken, Vogue’s executive fashion director and Condé Nast’s SVP of commerce, said in a statement that Vette will serve as a destination “where influence, distribution, and community come together in one place,” while Condé Nast CEO Roger Lynch said it “sets a new standard for what the future of commerce can be.”

Condé Nast Vette creator commerce storefront

Sephora, Condé Nast announce new creator-led storefronts

The storefronts, which let consumers checkout directly on the platforms themselves, will compete with LTK and ShopMy as well as Amazon Storefront. 

Jeena Sharma

While many retailers are hiking prices to cope with tariffs and the end of de minimis, Apothékary is taking a contrarian route: thinking about lowering prices.

Shizu Okusa, founder and CEO of the Japanese-inspired wellness brand, told Retail Brew that she’s more concerned with “consumer perception and sentiment/fragility” than with passing costs along.

“We’re, frankly, absorbing a lot of the price impact that’s happening in our supply chain,” she said. “We’re not actually planning to raise any prices, but we are changing how we merchandise.”

 $20 million in revenue by November 2024 and was on track to hit $35 million by early 2025, has leaned on bundling as its primary response to rising costs. When tariffs first hit, acquisition costs jumped 30% “overnight,” according to Okusa.

“It was pretty dramatic, and we actually ended up pulling back our marketing spend by 40% in July and August,” she said.

With a “new year, back-to-school” consumer mindset in September, Apothékary pivoted again, eliminating free shipping for orders under $99 as the brand was losing money every time someone bought a single product, Okusa said. The new threshold pushed shoppers toward buying at least three items, boosting average order value (AOV) without raising per-product prices.

“Customers weren’t net-paying more per product; they were actually paying less per product, because they were getting savings as a [result of buying more], but we were saving on both shipping costs and [being] able to pass that value downstream,” she said.

She added that since offering products in value sets and mini trios, the retailer has seen elevated interest from new customers on TikTok Shop first launched in August, with 90% of its new customers coming through the platform.

Okusa said she believes tariffs played a big role in pushing a lot of brands onto TikTok as “people were all trying to find ways to make money themselves, and becoming TikTok creators, so you saw this large shift of consumers spending more time on TikTok.”

But while bundling has proved invaluable for Apothékary, gifting is another incentive that has gone hand in hand for the brand in helping retain and acquire new customers.

“When you check out on our website…there’s various sorts of incentives to get a higher AOV, and the higher the AOV you actually unlock, you get free shipping,” Okusa said, adding that the second thing it unlocks is a free spoon.

“The free spoon is $10 in the customer’s mind, but for us, it costs us 50 cents, so we’re able to give that value to the customer,” she said, explaining that it accounts for $10 of an increase in the AOV that made up for the increase in tariff costs.

“We may actually end up being more profitable based on all the things that we’re doing,” Okusa said.

Wellness retailer Apothékary is lowering prices

Shizu Okusa, founder and CEO, told Retail Brew that bundling and offering free gifts have proven to be invaluable strategies for the brand amid a challenging trade climate.

As tariffs heat up, wellness retailer Apothékary is lowering prices

 and two years into its turnaround effort led by president and CEO Richard Dickson, Gap Inc. is charting more paths for growth.

The retail group, owner of Gap, Old Navy, Athleta, and Banana Republic, announced this week it’s expanding into beauty and accessories. The beauty effort will start at its Old Navy stores this fall, adding a curated beauty and personal care section to 150 stores, with select stores operating shop-in-shops staffed by beauty associates. It plans to scale further with Old Navy and other portfolio brands in 2026.

Speaking at the Goldman Sachs Annual Global Retailing Conference today, Dickson said beauty is “one of the fastest growing and most resilient categories in the US,” noting the high-margin business, along with accessories, will serve as a “traffic driver” and help the company “go after attracting a new generation” of younger shoppers.

Old Navy and Gap stores previously featured a limited beauty selection, with third-party brands like e.l.f. Cosmetics sold at Old Navy and an in-house fragrance line at Gap. It’s also offered accessories, but Dickson said the company hasn’t previously “gone after it with intent.” The 

, largely priced below $25, will include skincare, makeup, hair, and nail products, per the Wall Street Journal. As part of its accessories push, Old Navy this week debuted its 

, spearheaded by Gap Inc. Creative Director Zac Posen.

The expansion decision came after “a lot of rigor and research,” including insights from thousands of consumers about launching products under its own brand, Dickson said, noting beauty represents a “significant growth opportunity” for Gap Inc. While consumers remain cautious, the beauty category continues to grow, with 

 2% and 4%, respectively, in the first half of the year. Also speaking at the Goldman Sachs conference, Ulta Beauty CEO Kecia Steelman said the beauty retailer “hasn’t seen much change” in consumer behavior, noting “beauty isn’t recession proof, but I would say it’s recession resistant.”

, Dickson has been leading Gap’s turnaround focusing on growing cultural relevance particularly in the activewear, kids and baby, and denim categories. The latter grabbed headlines with a viral ad starring girl group Katseye, which Dickson said has garnered 8 billion impressions since launching two weeks ago.

The outside of an Old Navy store in a strip mall

Beauty, accessories will help brand in ‘attracting a new generation’

With momentum from its latest viral denim ad and successful turnaround efforts, the retail group is eyeing further growth. 

Gap CEO: Beauty, accessories will help brand in ‘attracting a new generation’

US beauty sales across mass and prestige hit $50.6 billion in the first half of 2025, and the two segments are “

” as consumers opt for premiumized mass products and lower-priced prestige ones, according to Circana.

Prestige sales rose 2% to $16 billion, while mass jumped 4% to $34.6 billion in the first six months of the year. Both channels were buoyed by the continued success of fragrance and hair products.

The mass market’s biggest H1 success was fragrance, with sales soaring 17%. Prestige scents saw a 6% increase, with sales picking up in Q2, and new product launches accounting for a third of total dollar gains. Value-seeking prestige shoppers opted for mini and travel sizes, with units up 15%.

Prestige hair got a 6% bump, with unit sales also rising. Mass hair product sales rose 4%, though unit sales were flat. Prestige saw growth for all segments, including shampoos and conditioners and styling products.

Makeup sales in prestige inched up 1%, though units sold were flat. Mass makeup sales also slightly dipped as dollar and unit sales dropped. Lip products were a strong sales driver among both channels, serving as the only makeup segment with sales growth in mass. Prestige lip liner and mascara both experienced sales bumps.

Mass skin care sales (+4%) outperformed prestige (-1%). Masstige skin care products secured double-digit growth. A drop in facial skin care sales at brick-and-mortar stores drove prestige skin care’s struggles, though prestige body care was a bright spot.

Larissa Jensen, global beauty industry advisor at Circana, said the H1 results show consumers are “focused on efficacy and elevated value,” and that “adaptability and strategic agility are essential for success in 2025.”

 L’Oréal reported in July that it, too, saw the strongest growth from fragrance and hair care in H1, with its prestige and mass segments notching growth. This week,

Estée Lauder said it gained share within prestige beauty in fiscal 2025 in the US, thanks to The Ordinary, Clinique, and its eponymous brand, though it reported a “modest loss” in Q4. Fragrance was its only category that didn’t see net sales declines. And E.l.f. this month 

 two straight quarters of slowing sales. Ulta Beauty is set to announce its second-quarter earnings next week.

Premium and mass beauty are ‘converging’ as consumers seek value

Both segments saw sales lifts in H1 as fragrance and hair remain beauty standouts.

 in their partnership earlier this year, Target and Ulta Beauty are officially pulling the plug on their shop-in-shop deal.

The two retailers announced today they’ve “mutually agreed” to end the partnership when their current agreement expires in August 2026, but will continue operating online and in stores until then.

Rick Gomez, Target’s EVP and chief commercial officer, said in a statement that the retailer is “proud of our shared success” with Ulta, and that it “remains committed to offering the beauty experience consumers have come to expect from Target.”

The partnership’s end comes after Ulta’s president and CEO, Kecia Steelman, said at a conference in April that the two would “

” the shop-in-shops’ expansion, looking to “leverage the learnings” and create “even greater value” for the partnership.

Weeks before that announcement, Target employees had taken to Reddit to share red flags with the tie-up—pointing to shoplifting, understaffing, foot traffic cannibalization, and an underwhelming customer experience. Following today’s news, Redditors in r/Ulta and r/Target, many claiming to be former and current employees, echoed similar sentiments. One poster who said they’d worked at a shop-in-shop for three years said they were “not surprised at all” the partnership was ending.

Target has opened 610 Ulta shop-in-shops since the partnership was announced in 2021 as a way to grow Ulta’s reach and expand Target’s merchandise into prestige cosmetics.

Target has been focused on growing its beauty assortment beyond its Ulta shops, launching 2,000 products and 50 new brands in February. It also added beauty items to its front-of-store Bullseye’s Playground this summer, Gomez said in May.

But the partnership’s end appears to be yet another blow to Target, which has seen 

 of foot traffic declines since backtracking on DEI efforts in January. Ulta, meanwhile, has seen a sales boost since initiating its 

Target and Ulta officially end shop-in-shop partnership

The announcement comes after cracks in the partnership—including claims of issues with shoplifting and understaffing—emerged in the spring. 

 spotlight Retail Brew’s readers. Want to be featured in an upcoming edition? Click 

Anncy Rowe is chief commercial officer at skin and hair care company Rodan + Fields.

How would you describe your job to someone who doesn’t work in retail? 

As chief commercial officer at Rodan + Fields—a clinically driven luxury skin care brand—my focus is on delivering a cohesive, elevated brand experience across every consumer touchpoint, from digital to in store, with a clear goal: to drive growth. Achieving that requires deep cross-functional collaboration across creative, digital, social, sales, and consumer insights. My role is to ensure that the way we define the brand internally is fully aligned with how our customers experience it externally. And when there’s a disconnect, it’s my job to identify it and close the gap—deliberately, strategically, and consistently.

One thing we can’t guess about your job from your LinkedIn profile? 

Although Rodan + Fields is a well-established, multimillion-dollar brand, the energy within the organization is distinctly entrepreneurial—faster-paced and more agile than many might expect. We’re in the midst of a strategic transformation, which means we’re continuously testing, learning, and evolving. That spirit of innovation is something I find especially energizing.

What’s your favorite project you’ve worked on?

 I joined Rodan + Fields to help lead a transformation that hadn’t been done before—evolving a 15-year-old direct-selling powerhouse into a brand that thrives in modern retail. Launching in Ulta was a major milestone, but it was just the beginning. What’s made the experience so energizing is the chance to build everything from the ground up: sharpening our brand positioning, developing our first-ever advertising campaign, and crafting a retail launch strategy with no existing playbook. It’s been a series of bold firsts—and that’s exactly what excites me.

Which emerging retail trend are you most excited about right now, and why? 

What excites me most right now is the return of “experience” in retail—but with a fresh, elevated twist. While I’m all for the ease and scale of online shopping, there’s something powerful happening as retailers reimagine physical spaces not just as places to shop, but as moments of curated experience. From luxury pop-ups and immersive shop-in-shops to hyper-personalized services, the in-store experience is becoming more curated, more sensorial, and ultimately more memorable. What’s even more compelling is how brands are evolving in step—leaning into partnerships, co-creating experiences, and thinking beyond traditional retail to deliver something that feels both premium and personal.

My most-of-the-year go-to is a boring oat milk latte, but come Q4, my go-to is a peppermint mocha.

Worst piece of advice you’ve received? 

“Just put your head down, do good work, and your career will take care of itself.” It sounds nice in theory, but it simply doesn’t hold up. The reality is—you are the only one who can own your career. That means being proactive: building your network, finding sponsors, being vocal about your goals, and creating a roadmap to get there. I learned that lesson later than I wish I had, and I try to pass it on now whenever I can. And perhaps most importantly: Know when it’s time to pivot or move on. Staying too long out of comfort or inertia can stall growth just as much as not speaking up at all.

What was your favorite retail product when you were 15, and what’s your favorite retail product now?

 I am a music lover, so I have to say my Sony Discman was my soundtrack on the go when I was 15! My favorite product now—as you can tell, I am a self-proclaimed beauty junkie and I am obsessed with the Rodan + Fields Multi-Function Eye Cream. It’s my go-to eye cream for when my eyes need a wake-up call (which is most days, unfortunately).

Coworking with Anncy Rowe

She’s chief commercial officer at Rodan + Fields. 

As college students head to their campus bookstores this fall to shop for sweatshirts and snacks, they’ll also be greeted by a display of scents from Bath & Body Works.

The fragrance and body care retailer is launching at 600 college campuses, its first large-scale distribution expansion beyond its own stores. It’ll sell body and lip care, hand soap, hand sanitizers, candles, wallflower diffusers and bulbs in their own branded displays within the stores at schools like George Washington University, Georgia State University, University of Florida, Boston College, and Vanderbilt University.

The move “allows us to reach our Gen Z customers where they are and when they need us most,” its chief merchandising officer, Betsy Schumacher, said in a statement.

Scents that’ll be sold include Champagne Toast, Mahogany Teakwood, and Warm Vanilla Sugar, along with selections from Everyday Luxuries, its “prestige-inspired” fragrance line that’s 

the retailer gain favor with Gen Z, which it says is a “key demographic.” In Piper Sandler’s semi-annual Taking Stock With Teens survey, Bath & Body Works 

 the top 10 of female teens’ favorite beauty destinations for the first time in six years, usurping Target, and was ranked female teens’ No. 1 fragrance choice.

 former Nike executive Daniel Heaf as its new CEO in May, taking over for Gina Boswell. On his first earnings call in May, Heaf said he saw an opportunity for the retailer to grow by attracting younger consumers and men, and aimed to explore “new forms of distribution beyond our own channels strategically and thoughtfully” to bring in new shoppers. The company also considered Gen Z preferences for its new Gingham+ store design rolled out earlier this year, incorporating more areas to test products and using a neutral color palette.

Bath & Body Works’s success with teens comes as another teen and tween mall staple, Claire’s, 

 for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the second time after first filing in 2018. The company said in the filing that growing competition, lower foot traffic, and the impact of tariffs and inflation, contributed to its struggles. Claire’s, too, has tried to attract new audiences through scents, 

 a Gen Z and Gen Alpha-targeted fragrance and body care line last year.