Thesis Statement and Sources:
Thesis Statement: Through increased price and targeted advertising, NARS, a cosmetic subsidiary company of Shiseido has established an older generation of consumers which ultimately limits their connection through ecommerce.
Sources:
- Brown, Rachel The Ultimate Brand Experience (2014.)
The article, “The Ultimate Brand Experience” is about how ecommerce is rising but brick and mortar is still thriving. Brick and mortar stores grabs shoppers attention and draws them into the stores. Tourists are also shopping while they are visiting in stores. Brick and mortar stores hold more value than e commerce because they have something that e commerce doesn’t which is human connection. This article is useful for my thesis because it discusses consumer preferences which I am focusing on with the cosmetic company NARS.
- Milton, Tina, L’Oreal forecasts return to double-digit growth in TR (2014.)
This article focuses on how sales change depending on location of the retail store. Travel-retail ended up having double in sales. The reason for them being so successful is because they are in large cities in the states which is a high traffic area. Milton concludes that the brands will continue doing sales in travel airports. This is useful for my research because it is educational on brick-and-mortar stores sales and how they are doing better in some areas of the states rather than ecommerce, using an example of tourists shopping for a momentum of the city. Although I am focusing on the brand NARS and this article is about L’Oreal, I find this to be very beneficial to back up my thesis statement because it will allow me to have a comparison of other like brands.
- Mediaweek, Fashion/beauty books don’t like what they see in the mirror these days as core ad categories like cosmetics, retail and jewelry put the brakes on spending in the second quarter (2008.)
This article focuses on changes of cosmetic companies when they are featured in magazines. Luxury magazines such as Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar did better in the first half of the four years they did this experience. This is a well produced experiment done to see what advertising does to sales. Advertising and sales is important in retail which is why I could use this information in my research. The sales for companies change, especially in cosmetics, based on the type of consumer that is purchasing your product. In the case of my thesis, NARS tends to have older consumers because of the increased price, which alters where they see the products as they usually prefer brick and mortar shopping.
- Andrea Pozzi, The effect of Internet Distribution on brick and mortar. (2013.)
Ecommerce offers convenience that brick and mortar does not. When evaluating the difference between brick and mortar stores vs. ecommerce is what the consumer values and prefers. Different consumers prefer different experiences when they are shopping. The young generations prefer convenience and quick where as the older generations typically like the experience of walking into a store and speaking to sales people. This raises the biggest question in my research topic, what are the differences and similarities, pro’s and con’s, of ecommerce vs. brick and mortar. I will also research this further in how preferences of these types of shopping affect companies such as NARS.
- Chesters, Laura, In the knicker time: bras, pants, blusher and lip gloss are helping some retailers ride out the recession (2009)
This article speaks about how the recessions cause a pause in people buying high priced items. However, most people buy smaller items such as makeup and undergarments. This has caused an increase in sales for makeup and specifically lipstick. The reasoning for this is because the prices are low. Of course this is for low priced brands such as drugstore. One reason why makeup sells easily is because for the most part it is inexpensive and is conveniently in most drug stores. This is a contrast between drugstore and high end. Drugstore being brands such as L’Oreal, Maybelline, NYX and High End being brand such as NARS, Too Faced, Dior, Hourglass, brands that are featured in Sephora. This relates directly to my thesis in the sense of cost and how that changes the audience that the brand receives.
- Anonymous “NARS Launches ‘Runway, Real Way, NARS Way’.” PR Newswire, (Mar 15, 2010.)
This source will be beneficial for my thesis statement because it speaks about the brand and the level of impact they have. NARS did a large project in 2010 that I was not aware of called ‘Runway, Real Way, NARS Way’ in which they created 3 videos to show consumers how to get the “NARS look” directly off of the runway. The article also goes into full detail of the steps and products used in the videos.
