Direct-to-consumer beauty startup Glossier targets Europe

By Lucy Whitehouse

- Last updated on GMT

Direct-to-consumer beauty startup Glossier targets Europe
Glossier is a US beauty startup that operates a direct-to-consumer distribution model: it is now making strides into the European market.

He company has reportedly already raised USD 34.4 million in funding to back its international expansion, which will see it enter Canada this month, followed by the UK later this year and France in 2018. It is also eyeing other countries further down the line.

It has already established an office in Montreal, and is set to open one in London in the coming months.

The company was launched three years previously, and in its most recent funding it raised USD 24 million at Series B, led by Institutional Venture Partners, towards the end of last year.

‘Ripe for disruption’: beauty

The company’s founder, former Vogue employee Emily Weiss, has spoken of Glossier’s longheld ambition to be a global player, and to bring much needed disruption to the beauty industry.

Ever since Day 1, we’ve dreamt of making Glossier a global beauty movement that celebrates real girls in real life,​” she wrote in a blog post that confirmed the company’s expansion plan.

In May of this year, Weiss also spoke at an industry event, Disrupt NY: “Beauty is not traditionally a VC kind of business. But it’s a quarter-of-a-trillion dollar market globally, and ripe for disruption. The data speaks for itself. . . But you also wouldn’t believe how excited people get when you put a bag of products on the table, men and women.​”

According to a report in Tech Crunch, the startup is keen to manage its ambitious expansion plans, as its business model relies on the idea that it is a responsive, authentic beauty brand voice.

“Glossier’s goal is to respond to customer inquiries within 12 hours of their first email, so it also needed to create a customer service team that can work across time zones,​” the report notes​.

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