Sephora has been a leader in prestige omni-retail with the purpose of creating an inviting beauty ... [+]
Today, Sephora will close its stores for two hours, dedicating the time to training on racial profiling and education on Sephora’s national study on racial bias in retail. Corporate employees will also participate in Conscious Leadership training. The retailer, which sells multi-branded beauty products in 490 stores across the Americas, has been recognized as an industry leader in terms of its diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts. The current national study on racial bias in retail has been in development since November 2019, well before it became popular to highlight such actions. Retailers need to move beyond diversity and towards racial equity. Sephora is leading a movement with its DEI culture and has promised to help other retailers better understand retail racism.
Sephora invites clients to touch and try 25,000 products from 400 carefully curated brands.
Since its debut in North America over 20 years ago, Sephora has been a leader in prestige omni-retail with the purpose of creating an inviting beauty shopping experience and inspiring fearlessness in the community. With the goal of delivering unbiased shopping support and a personalized experience, Sephora invites clients to touch and try 25,000 products from 400 carefully curated brands. Deborah Yeh, CMO of Sephora, reminds us that the business model Sephora started years ago involved creating access in an open-sell environment. The beauty shopping experience in the prestige stores prior to Sephora launching in the U.S. was locked cases with access granted only by beauty sales associates. Yeh states, “The ethos of the brand has always been access for everyone in an inclusive environment.”
Sephora continually strives to combat racial bias
Sephora has been actively creating various initiatives to combat racial bias and to foster equality and inclusion in retail, as demonstrated by the recent commissioning of a first-of-its-kind national study on racial bias in retail settings. The company has hired external advisors to help with development and actions centered around DEI including April Reign, Sephora Equity Advisor, who is an internationally recognized speaker on issues related to diversity and inclusion, and Dr. Cassi Pittman Claytor, Sephora Equity Partner with a Harvard Ph.D. in Sociology and Social Policy.
According to an interview conducted with Dr. Claytor, who has published research examining Black consumers’ experiences of retail racism, there were multiple objectives in creating the study centered on racial bias in the retail industry. Understanding and analyzing racial bias in the context of both customers and employees was a key objective. The study included 1600 employee respondents and 3000 consumer respondents. Various segments across the retail landscape were scrutinized, including beauty. The primary goal was to be able to provide retailers with data that can be systematically analyzed.
Qualitative and quantitive data informs Sephora on the way forward
The use of data analytics allows for understanding where a retailer may fall within a spectrum and provides benchmarking opportunities for retailers to improve. “There is a pervasive problem across retail and other industries with Black customers continuously having negative experiences,” states Claytor, “But this does not only impact the customers who are shopping; employees of color also face negative experiences from customers.” The only way to address this behavior beyond quick fixes is to fully understand the data, both qualitative and quantitative, and create KPIs to measure the movement of racial bias and inclusivity.
Fenty Beauty by Rihanna was created with a promise of inclusion for all women.
An initial quick fix that a retailer may make would be changing how all customers are greeted by making use of flexible scripts that give all customers a feeling of being welcomed. Longer-term actions may be more difficult to implement but Sephora is leading the way. An early finding from the national study on racial bias in retail found that customers wanted to see more minority-owned businesses in the stores. Sephora was already showcasing minority-owned businesses in the stores, however, it announced on June 10 that going forward at least 15% of its products will be from Black-owned brands. Currently, Sephora has 36 persons-of-color-owned prestige brands, including 7 Black-owned brands, and it admits that it is only the beginning and not enough.
The shopper journey reveals friction points impacting negative experiences
Claytor discussed the importance of understanding the shopping journey and the internal or external contributors that impact a negative experience. “There are various touch points across the journey where racial bias occurs; the most impacted area comes from the in-store experience,” states Claytor. Companies can make formal policies and informal practices to alter the negative experiences. Yeh said, “We must be mindful that shopping for beauty products is incredibly personal and the service model must recognize the personal nature of the shopping experience.”
Yeh, who has a great amount of energy and passion for the current work being done to further racial equality and inclusion in the retail landscape, admitted that trying to take on a topic as big as racism in retail may feel like a daunting task, however, the national study is providing a meaningful way to build actions. “We must understand the concept of the customer shopping journey and be mindful that consumers can become stuck or disadvantaged at various stages of that journey.” There may be policies or principals in a retail setting that are intended to create an open or inclusive environment that actually may not do so when they are deployed. Yeh said, “We must continually challenge ourselves to understand the space of the journey and make improvements in measurable and meaningful ways.”
Sephora’s goal is to systematically address the issue of racial bias across all stores, but the task serves as a broader commitment from the beauty retailer who is up to the challenge and it will even go so far as to share results from the national study to further advance social justice across all retailers. In response to a request to comment on this commitment, Sephora stated, “We know that this is a retail industry-wide issue and it’s equally as important to share the results with other retailers. We are proud that REI has joined us in supporting this research and driving the same changes to combat systemic racism in retail.”
Sephora was a leader in DEI initiatives before it was popular
Sephora’s DEI work goes beyond just this moment in time. The national study on racial bias in retail is at the core of the most recent initiatives, but the company has been recognized for its continued efforts over time. In November of last year, Sephora was recognized with a “Leader in Diversity” award in Europe, ranking #3 in the category of retail (out of 80) and #33 across 700 companies. Diversity Leaders is an inaugural ranking of the extent to which 700 companies out of 10,000 surveyed across 10 European countries offer a diverse and inclusive workplace including gender balance, openness to all forms of sexual orientation, disability, as well as an ethnic and social mix that reflects wider society.
Sephora's "We Believe In Something Beautiful" brand campaign and company pledge accompanied by a ... [+]
In May 2019, Sephora launched the We Belong to Something Beautiful? brand campaign and company pledge which included a manifesto centered on the idea that all people have a human desire to be included. Yeh stated last year when the campaign was introduced, “Sephora believes we have a role to play in building a more connected beauty community where everyone can belong.” A year ago the company also closed all of its U.S. stores, distribution centers and corporate headquarters to host an internal workshop on inclusivity.
Additionally, Sephora has been twice recognized by Forbes as one of America’s Best Employers in 2018 and 2019. Most recently, Sephora scored 100% on the Human Rights Campaign’s Corporate Quality Index 2019, the national benchmarking tool on corporate policies and practices pertinent to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer employees. In January of this year, Sephora was recognized as one of America’s Best Employers For Diversity.
The findings of the study are informing Sephora on ways to implement and pilot various policies and procedures to improve in-store experiences and overall business practices, and Reign continues to say that Sephora is planning to encourage the entire retail industry to address bias in retail. “A common challenge for a complex issue like racial bias is making sure that all the right voices are in the room to provide more diverse perspectives,” according to Reign. She continues by noting that having a group of thought-leaders that are well-versed in DEI issues and can speak to diverse cultural perspectives aides in developing plans that are both detailed and wide-reaching.
Reaching outside its own leadership circle, Sephora hired experts in the field of social policy
Sephora understood at the onset that its core competencies were outside the field of social policy which is why external advisors were asked to partner in the research. Reign states, “The group of Equity Advisors are quite diverse and are able to speak to the intersectionality of people of color and their experiences.” Further complexities come from the regional cultures of respective stores and from each store having a somewhat unique personality even with common initiatives and values.
Sephora responded that in over two months of full store closures, sales on Sephora.com were up 70% over last year, in April and May. Sephora.com saw 80,000 new customers each week totaling more than 1 million to-date. The company is highly successful in customer engagement through social media channels with 20 million Instagram followers, 2.3 million Twitter followers, over 19 million Facebook followers, 1.28 million YouTube subscribers and 10 million monthly Pinterest views. The Beauty Insider loyalty program has more than 25 million current members.
Sephora plans to share more data findings from the national survey with all retailers in an effort to help the movement towards racial justice in retail. The many ways that Sephora supports DEI initiatives from both a consumer and employee perspective will keep the company at the forefront of these important issues. Yeh said that having the right product in the right place at the right price is fundamental and should be considered table stakes. Today’s consumers and employees want to understand the company value and what the company stands for, therefore, transparency is very important to the staff and the customer.
