Beautiful Payless

One of the keys to building a mega-brand is to continually innovate and extend your product offerings (logically) for your consumers. Jessica DiPietro from my agency discovered one mega-brand who's now extending into new territory.

Jessica, what's your experience? Jim


On Monday Payless Shoe Source announced their plans to launch a beauty line under the names "Zoe & Zac" and "Unforgettable Moments" to be sold in 1,500 stores starting in September.

My gut reaction to seeing this news? Now everyone and their mother thinks they can create a beauty line!

Fashion designers such as Calvin Klein and Donna Karan have been in the beauty industry for years. Tarina Tarantino, made famous by her amazing hair accessories, just launched Tarina Tarantino in Sephora. Kat Von D, a tattoo artist made famous on her LA Ink tv series, launched a line. It seems everyone is jumping on the beauty bandwagon trying to cash in on the $25 billion beauty industry.

Despite the “me too” syndrome that is so frequent in beauty, the more I thought about it the more I realized what a smart, strategic move this could be for the large shoes/accessories retailer. Payless has a loyal customer base that trusts their brand name and product lines. The brand has a built-in consumer base that could easily embrace a line extension into beauty. If the products look good, feel good, and wear well, this could potentially add millions to the Payless brand.

Plus, with today’s economic situation, more and more consumers are trading down from their prestige products. We know that prestige consumers are now looking to masstige brands (prestige brands sold in mass retail outlets) as a way to balance their personal budgets.

Could masstige consumers trade down to the level of a Payless brand? Absolutely. It’s just the right time for a quality brand at truly affordable prices to capitalize on their success and open themselves up to new consumers. Not only could Payless gain consumers from the beauty launch but the exposure could bring new consumers to their shoes and accessories as well. My guess is that the beauty brands will expand quickly to the rest of the 3,000 Payless doors.

Personally, I’m looking forward to seeing and testing the products when they launch in September. After all, we beauty junkies need to try everything. You never what product could become your next must-have in the makeup bag.

- Jessica Goldberg DiPietro, EVP at Lippe Taylor Brand Communications