According to Sephora Global Chairman and CEO Guillaume Motte, despite the challenging market conditions, retailers can create their own growth and increase market size if they deliver the retail experience customers are looking for.
Published on Sep 16,2025 at 5:27 PM | Updated on Dec 16,2025 at 11:39 AM

Speaking at the opening keynote of NRF 2025: Retail’s Big Show Europe yesterday, he stated that Sephora’s success, which has seen it triple sales over the past decade and double sales post-covid, has been built on focusing on product, experience, convenience, community and its people.

“The figure we always track is market share, ensuring that we are growing faster than the market. The numbers are the consequences, we focus on sharing our passion and vision,” he said.

When he joined Sephora as CEO, he highlighted that his first priority was to clearly identify Sephora’s purpose and its “north star,” with inclusivity at the heart of that vision.

“At Sephora we curate the offer because we have a view on beauty and one out of two products we sell can only be bought at Sephora. We don’t have buyers, we have merchants – people who choose the brands that will resonate with our customers,” Motte said.

“We believe in stores. We’ve always believed in stores. Listen to Gen Z, they want to go to stores. They want an exciting retail experience,” he added.

Motte estimated that around a third of Sephora’s business is online but said that an omnichannel focus meant that he did not worry about how transactions such as click and collect were defined but rather that the transaction was seamless for the customers, citing his store network as “3,400 warehouses located near where people live”.