Walmart is expanding in-store help for shoppers looking for makeup and skincare, adding trained beauty experts to advise customers on products and, in some cases, shade matching, the company said. The retailer is starting the program in a limited set of stores and is rolling it out more broadly, as it competes for a bigger share of the U.S. beauty market that increasingly draws shoppers through social-media-friendly products and in-person experiences.
The company’s approach breaks from what it describes as a no-frills service model by staffing beauty aisles with specialists who can suggest options that fit a shopper’s skin tone and recommend items that are trending, according to the Associated Press. Walmart said the roles have been filled at 22 stores in Arkansas and Texas in recent months, and that it expects to place beauty experts in more than 400 of its 4,600 U.S. stores by the end of the year.
The move is part of a broader push to remake the shopping experience in-store. Walmart said it is remodeling 650 locations by the end of the year and that, as part of those plans, it is moving beauty departments to the front of stores and installing displays to spotlight products getting attention on social media. In addition, Walmart has been building the “beauty bar” concept, where customers can sample makeup and speak with beauty advisors, and said the pilot expanded from 40 stores a year ago to “hundreds of stores,” according to Vinima Shekhar, vice president of beauty merchandising for Walmart’s U.S. division.
Shekhar said Walmart is not trying to imitate specialty beauty chains, telling the Associated Press, “We’re not trying to be an Ulta or Sephora.” She said Walmart’s “breadth of assortment” and convenience are advantages, and that it wants to “layer on a level of service for both our associates and our customers: ‘Here’s what trending. Here’s what’s new.’” Walmart’s framing centers on the idea that shoppers still value in-person guidance that cannot be easily replicated by e-commerce alone.
Retailers with physical stores have long employed staff to assist with cosmetics purchases and testing, including at department stores and specialty beauty chains. Pharmacy chains CVS and Walgreens, for example, added beauty experts to some locations in the last decade, and the Walmart initiative aligns with that trend of using human help to differentiate physical shopping from online platforms and AI-based chat tools.
Walmart said it is also refreshing its beauty assortment, adding more premium brands over the past year, including La Roche Posay, Nude by Nature and FHI Heat hair tools. Some of those products cost close to $40 for a 1.7-ounce sunscreen, the Associated Press reported, citing examples mentioned in the story. Walmart linked that expansion to a wider effort to upgrade its merchandise and store ambiance as it seeks to attract higher-income shoppers, with Shekhar saying customers who buy higher-end items are looking for inspiration when they shop.
Walmart’s plans place its beauty experts in a role designed around guidance rather than full in-store transformations. Walmart said the advisers do not apply products to shoppers or do makeovers, unlike some workers at department stores and beauty specialty chains. The company said it provides online tools to help advisers understand top-selling brands and how a store’s performance compares with sales generated in other Walmart locations.
Walmart said beauty advisers go through a day of training at a company academy and receive ongoing instruction on products, seasonal trends and how to work with customers. Whitney Hunt, a vice president of Walmart’s U.S. operations, said Walmart also provides tools to support advisers in answering questions and aligning recommendations with what sells across the retailer’s system.
The Associated Press included an example of the program’s rollout through Helena Bacon, 21, a University of Arkansas junior studying biology. Bacon said the training she received last fall made her feel “more empowered” to help customers and that before the training she had worked in a broader pharmacy, health and personal care area and occasionally assisted shoppers in beauty. Bacon said she now understands product ingredients, can identify lipstick shades that flatter different customers, and is “on top of TikTok trends.”
Bacon said her job has become more focused since joining the beauty expert role. “I was kind of everywhere before,” she said. “But now that I’m just in my section, if someone does come up to me and asks for a recommendation for something, … I could go over with them into that section and say, ‘This what I know is good for the problem you’re trying to fix.’” The program, as described by Walmart, suggests the company is betting that shoppers will pay for time and guidance from trained employees even as the retail industry experiments with automation and online personalization.
In the same report, the Associated Press said Target has been planning a similar push to expand upscale beauty offerings and staff with enhanced product expertise this fall in 600 stores, including by introducing a “Target Beauty Studio” department. The story also said other mass-market retailers have been experimenting with in-store experiences such as concierge-style setups, while tracking demand for beauty expertise online through job-posting trends reported by Indeed’s research arm, which found that online postings for beauty expert roles remained fairly stable from February 2020 to this month compared with declines in other job categories.
The Associated Press reporting framed Walmart’s beauty expert expansion as one more step in the broader race for attention in physical stores, as companies try to make in-person shopping feel more personal while preserving the convenience and price advantages that draw customers to big-box retailers.