Ch. 5 - Developing a Global Vision

Sephora didn't just throw their product out there for the world to see and then hope something works.  They actually hired professionals to help them with their global vision.  Interested in the masterminds behind the Sephora international business strategy?  If so, click here.

Sephora opened a huge store in Malaysia complete with a unique architectural design, and stunning visual product lay-out inside.  The soft opening for their first store was on May 7th, 2011.  This represents only one small facet of Sephora's global presence.

Founded in 1969 in Limoges, France, in 1997 Sephora joined the world’s first Luxury Brand, Louis Vuitton (LVMH). At present, the Sephora brand name is featured  in 21 countries with more than 800 stores and boasts annual sales of more than 20 billion euros. Starting from April 2005, Sephora positioned themselves to enter the Chinese market.

As of now, they are in:  Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Shenyang, Hangzhou, Suzhou and Ningbo and 8 other cities opening 23 retail stores, and SEPHORA CHINA’S online store.

Including the Chinese market, today, Sephora's international website features  11 different countries and provinces:

Not shown above but mentioned earlier, Malaysia is so new there isn't a link for it yet on Sephora's international website.  Sephora's soft opening in Malaysia was just months ago.  Where will Sephora open up next?  We'd like to know that too.  :-)

Sephora also uses the web to extend its global reach.  As you will notice, not all of the countries they have pages for on Facebook were included in what we round in earlier research.  So it is hard to say even all of the countries their global presence is included in.  Here is a small sampling of countries featured on social networking sites:

1. Sephora - Facebook Page for Malaysia
2. Sephora - Facebook Page for Singapore
3. Sephora - Facebook Page for Japan
4. Sephora - Main Fan Page