World’s largest beauty store ‘Sephora’ comes to Korea

Sephora, the world’s biggest cosmetics retailer, is opening its first store in South Korea on Thursday at Parnas Mall on Teheran-ro in southern Seoul. This store will be the first of the 14 stores that the beauty giant is planning to open in the country by 2022, which is expected to intensify the competition in the market with Chicor of Shinsegae and Olive Young of CJ.

Sephora said Wednesday that it will open the second store in December at Lotte Young Plaza on Namdaemun-ro in downtown Seoul and the third in January 2020 at Hyundai U-PLEX in Seodaemun-gu. The first store will feature a total of 99 brands ranging from affordable to luxury. “Our stores will be a platform to introduce various beauty brands to Korean customers and to find while exporting great Korean brands to the world,” Sephora Korea CEO Kim Dong-ju said.

The beauty conglomerate owned by LVMH Group, the world's leading luxury goods company, has about 2,600 stores across the globe. Opening its first store in Seoul has been considered for the past two to three years since the rapid growth of the Korean cosmetics market grabbed the company’s attention. According to market research firm Euromonitor International, Korea’s beauty and personal care market is worth 14.8 trillion won, which makes it the world’s 9th largest, the market size of health and beauty stores grew by an annual average 32.8 percent from 2013 to 2018.


hcshin@donga.com