NEW YORK — QVC is launching a beauty catalogue in September, just in time to highlight the season’s makeup and hair product trends to its best beauty customers.
The 32-page glossy will be mailed to 500,000 of the shopping network’s highest-spending beauty viewers this month for arrival Sept. 1 and will feature all of the 50-plus beauty brands it sells on TV, including products by Tarte, Mally, Stila, Scott Barnes, L’Occitane, Dr. Brandt, Philosophy, Yves Saint Laurent, Smashbox, DuWop, Lorac, Jonathan Product and Nick Chavez. The catalogue also features products by hairstylist newcomers Garren and Chaz Dean.
Allen Burke, QVC’s director of beauty merchandising, wouldn’t comment on how much he expects the catalogue to generate in sales, but industry sources estimate if only 20 percent of catalogue recipients make a purchase of about $20, QVC could rake in $2 million. Burke noted that the catalogue is only a test, and in true QVC fashion, would only resurface if its debut is a success.
In addition to bringing all of QVC’s beauty brands to one place, the fall beauty book also gives shoppers another outlet to buy makeup.
“Our belief is that she doesn’t have any one place she goes to buy beauty. Her lifestyle is such that she may buy it on TV, she may buy it on the Internet, she may buy it in a store or she may buy it from a catalogue. This format could fit their lifestyle.”
The catalogue took almost six months to put together, which was prepared by QVC’s beauty team and marketing department. Burke said the group looked to a plethora of beauty catalogues as inspiration but that only one really served as a vision.
“The best one that’s done in the industry is by Sephora. They do a marvelous job,” Burke said.
When putting together their catalogue Burke said QVC considered how a consumer thinks about beauty and what products would make the most sense to feature. “We wanted the book to be newsy and readable and on-trend and in line with the authority that we have become in the beauty industry. We want it viewed as competitive and interesting,” he said.
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The cover, photographed by Jonathan Pushnik, features a blond model with tousled hair, dark eyeliner, flushed cheeks and nude lips, key makeup trends that appeared on runways earlier this year. Cover lines highlight content, such as fall trends, and also remind consumers of QVC’s day of beauty on Sept. 17.
Burke is most proud of where QVC is as a beauty entity in the U.S. “I think there will be some people that will be kind of surprised by the brand representation in the catalogue,” Burke said.
The catalogue will only be available to QVC’s best beauty customers in the September mailing; however, Burke said, “If someone called our customer service area we could probably find a way to give it to them, but that’s not part of the design.”
Within its pages are a mix of fall colors, bestsellers and new items, which are indicated with a leaf.
Burke would not comment on QVC’s overall beauty business except to say it is “on fire.” A company spokesman, however, said beauty sales are up between 25 and 30 percent year-to-date.