Newsflash: “niche” is the new cool.
Take Sephora for example: NARS, Josie Martin, Nudestix – all these non-mainstream brands that have captured the hearts of all beauty addicts.
Especially with the era of social media booming with millennials, mediums like Youtube and Instagram have shaped the way products are promoted and have served as go-to platforms for users to see ‘What’s Hot and What’s Not’. Consumers these days want to know what products look like real time through real people.
The above statement is of course a no brainer, but there’s a new shop in New York that has taken this concept as their entire business model. This store is appropriately called, #. Yes. It is called Hashtag (but really, it’s just the symbol).
Brands looking to make it big in beauty need only start with “an idea, an iPhone, and Instagram.”
At #, they only select brands to sell based on if they are trending on Instagram. Rather than choosing brands through metrics like market share, margins, etc., # wants to assess brands on the ‘human scale’. As such, the founder of #, Richard Parrot, wants to find “Instabrands”: “I open Instagram in the morning and fall down the rabbit hole….You click through ten different people and 20 different comments until you’re like ‘What is this brand?’ I’ve never even heard of them! That’s when we reach out.”
With # rolling out, it will be interesting to see if other retailers will adopt similar strategies. Regardless, this initiative just goes to show how today’s consumers are shifting, and how powerful social media really can be.
Read more here: http://www.cosmeticsdesign.com/Brand-Innovation/New-York-City-beauty-retailer-sells-only-makeup-discovered-on-Instagram