As consumer spending fell by 7.5% in March and reports of steeper declines are expected for April, Sephora is trying to make shopping for beauty easier.
Today, Sephora.com announced it is partnering with buy-now-pay-later company Klarna, allowing
Sephora North America customers payment flexibility for all of the 290-plus brands it carries. Orders can now be split into four equal payments, with no interest. Because the goal is to attract and retain Gen-Z and young millennial shoppers, there will be no lower limit (or upper) for average orders, said Kim Stromberg, Sephora vp and gm of e-commerce.
“We had been monitoring the market and were aware that many Gen-Z and young millennial customers don’t own credit cards and only use debit cards. It’s critical for our Sephora.com strategy to make checkout easy and as seamless as possible, now more than ever,” said Stromberg. She said the Klarna partnership fits the company’s evolving range of payment options such as adding Apple Pay in 2014, Paypal in 2016 and introducing the Sephora Credit Card last year.
The company’s Klarna play comes soon after launching free shipping on Sephora.com, due to coronavirus. Through stores remained closed, Sephora has seen e-commerce sales increase by 30% since mid-March. Internationally, Sephora Germany and Sephora Sweden have partnerships with Klarna, but Stromberg said that this partnership was designed with U.S. and Canadian customers in mind. Klarna has 12 million U.S. customers and 85 million customers globally, and works with 3,700 retailers in the U.S. and 200,000 worldwide.
Source: Glossy