Katia Beauchamp
Birchbox recently opened up its first retail store in New York City. The beauty e-commerce startup is known for its subscription service, where customers pay $10 per month to receive a box of product samples. The company has attracted more than 800,000 users since launching in 2010, but only around 30 percent of those subscriptions translate into full-product online sales from Birchbox.com. Its new store is an attempt to figure out why
Over the last few months, New York-based startup Birchbox has taken over the retail realm. In a little over three years, the subscription commerce beauty brand has grown to 800,000 subscribers, has 250 employees and has worked with 800 brands, amounting to $96 million in annual sales — not to mention its recent venture funding acquisition and plans to open a brick-and-mortar location this summer in SoHo. Birchbox Co-Founder Hayley Barna sat down with Retail Online Integration at last week's Women in Retail Leadership Summit to discuss how she and co-founder Katia Beauchamp came up with the business model, what their vision is for the future of Birchbox, and share her thoughts on expanding to other retail channels.