Pure Beauty

A ‘new chapter’ for Feelunique: Sephora completes acquisition of online British beauty retailer

By Becky Bargh | Published: 29-Sep-2021

Takeover deal values pure-play beauty e-tailer at £132m, and is tipped to make sales of £100m this year

LVMH-owned French retailer Sephora has completed the acquisition of British e-tailer Feelunique.

The takeover, announced in July, is thought to have valued the pure-play online beauty seller at £132m.

“We are delighted to welcome Feelunique teams within the Sephora family,” said Mark Brok, President and CEO of the retail giant.

“Feelunique is known for their unparalleled customer experience, deep e-commerce expertise and knowledge of the UK consumer.

“We look forward to learning from each other and writing a new chapter together.”

Since its creation in 2005 by tech entrepreneurs Aaron Chatterly and Richard Schiessl, Feelunique has become one the UK’s go-to online retailers for prestige beauty, competing with the likes of The Hut Group’s Cult Beauty and Lookfantastic sites, as well as Beauty Bay.

To date, the platform has more than 1.3 million active users with some 35,000 cosmetic and fragrance products from more than 800 brands, including Chanel, Gucci, Huda Beauty and Pat McGrath Labs.

In its latest financial report, Feelunique is forecast to make sales of £100m this year, following a turbulent 2020, which saw the company make a loss of £5m.

Its CEO Sarah Miles added: “Sephora is an iconic retailer in the prestige beauty space in Europe.

“We are looking forward to working together and leveraging our respective strengths to drive the prestige beauty segment in the UK.”

The takeover marks a major investment in the UK digital beauty market for Sephora, one of the world’s largest bricks-and-mortar retailers, boasting 2,600 stores across 35 countries.

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