American boho-loving label Free People has announced plans to launch into the beauty world. The global retailer will introduce a beauty and wellness category into both its e-commerce offering and bricks and mortar stores in coming months.
An array of health-focused brands will form a part of the Free People beauty sector – currently more than 20 have been confirmed for the initial launch that include RMS, Love & Sage, Fountain, Pai Skincare, and The Beauty Chef. Products range in category from skincare to hair care with prices from $US6 to $US150. The offering has just debuted online, with its stores to follow in October.
Behind the strategy is senior beauty merchant and Shen Beauty founder Jessica Richards. She says the concept is tailored to Free People consumers – young, active professional women with a passion for wellbeing. “Urban and Anthropologie have done incredibly well with beauty. Everyone is launching beauty, but I don’t think anyone has done it with a natural, organic and wellness focus. Not that everything will be natural and organic, but it will be heavily that way, and nothing will be tested on animals. Free People has the opportunity to do beauty very differently with the wellness aspect,” she comments.
A Free People-branded beauty line remains a possibility but Richards comments that brand integrity would be key: “It would be really creating our own formulations under the Free People brand. I’m not going to go to some lab and say do six lipsticks in the same formula everybody else has.”
