Macy’s acts on beauty ‘Impulse’


NEW YORK — Macy’s is complementing its traditional beauty counters with an open-sell space of niche beauty brands, dubbed Impulse Beauty.


By October, the open-sell concept had made its way into more than 50 Macy’s stores across the country, including the Herald Square location in New York. An additional 50 Macy’s stores will debut the concept in 2011.


Looking to better compete with such specialty beauty retailers as Sephora and Ulta, Impulse Beauty enables customers to shop beauty brands on their own and seek help from beauty advisers if needed.


The 1,000-sq.-ft. space showcases such boutique beauty brands as Bare Escentuals, Benefit, Laura Geller, Philosophy, Stila, Smashbox, Urban Decay and Too Faced. Impulse Beauty also features such skin care lines as Bliss, Clarisonic and Dr. Brandt, as well as hair care products from T-3 and Lea Journo.