Two years after expanding into the country via its direct-to-consumer website, the mass makeup label Merit announced its entrance into Sephora UK on Thursday.
“Frankly, [customers] were asking us to have a physical presence,” Merit’s chief executive Philippe Pinatel said in an exclusive interview with The Business of Beauty. The brand was encouraged by beauty’s growth in the UK despite a turbulent economy, as well as strong sales from its existing DTC business.
Merit’s glossy combination of the ergonomic and cosmetic has “resonated very well” in the UK, added Pinatel, who pointed to the brand’s Flush and Bronze Balms as regional best-sellers. While their typical customer favours value and convenience, their aim is also to reach the makeup obsessives who congregate at the LVMH-owned retailer. (And their mums: The brand has timed the launch for its displays, including window animations, to be installed before Mother’s Day.)
Sephora, for its part, is “thrilled” about the partnership, said Sarah Boyd, the retailer’s UK managing director, “especially as our rapid growth in the market continues.
“Merit was founded by serial entrepreneur Katherine Power, who also founded the website WhoWhatWear and the skincare line Versed in 2019. It launched through a DTC website and subsequently in Sephora, its exclusive retail partner in North America. Choosing them again for the UK launch “was not a no-brainer,” said Pinatel, who joined from MAC Cosmetics and succeeded Power as CEO in February 2024. But the brand was convinced by the rapid growth Boyd mentioned — Sephora UK currently operates seven stores and plans to operate 20 by the end of 2027 — as well as the retailer’s potential to hook new customers on their minimalist makeup proposition.
Merit has mirrored that rapid growth. The brand informed The Business of Beauty that it exceeded its $100 million goal in profitable revenue for 2024, and also expanded its DTC business to Australia. But Pinatel insisted that North America and the UK are its priorities at the moment.
“For us, what’s important is we launched with an international retailer for the first time with Sephora in the UK,” he said. “We are not rushing.”
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