Japan first: The new age of in-store beauty advice

High-end venue​

Shiseido’s brands are proving a formidable force in Ginza Six, the luxury shopping complex located in the Ginza area of Tokyo. Clé de Peau Beauté launched its new immersive concept store earlier this year, ​and now Shiseido has updated its physical store in Ginza Six to attract modern and digital-focused consumers.  

Through its mission to unleash the inner beauty of consumers through “Japanese aesthetics and science technology”​, the renovation comes a few months after the brand opened its first directly managed shop in April 2017.

Digital counselling mirror​

The brand's latest innovative concept involves a new counselling counter installation. The new feature includes a digital counselling mirror which boasts a touch-panel system to enable a beauty consultant to provide personalised, in-depth counseling.

When a shopper touches the mirror’s surface, it activates a multitude of data, ranging from product information, application instructions and skin check results. Consumers can then access this data out of the store, in their home by reading the QR code supplied, with a smartphone.

Following the Ginza Six store upgrade, which took place on 28th July 2017, Shiseido will now continue to roll-out its renovation project across its global in-store counters. It hopes to have completed this across all its stores by 2020.

Target appeal​

By offering “personalised counselling”​ and “trial opportunities”​, Shiseido hopes to directly target its core demographic of women in their 20s.

Along with the digital counselling mirror, the Ginza Six store now also features a digital testing device that allows consumers to try before they buy, along with accessing digital content to offer a complete sensory experience.

Based on the concept of a social counter that provides both functionality and easy accessibility to product touching and testing, Shiseido hopes to maximise the in-store all-round beauty experience.

In a global survey, carried out by Shiseido in June 2016, the respondents, which were largely millennials in their 20s, revealed that it is “not only products, but purchase experience", “a consultant [that provides] appropriate advice” and “a store [that] offers trial opportunit[ies],”​ that encourages them to visit the counter.

The “Contemporary Ichigo Ichié”, ​which translates as a once-in-a-lifetime experience, is marketed as an evolution of the social counter. 

The new in-store process​

As consumers approach the mirror, a three-stage process begins to offer comprehensive and customised cosmetics counselling that enables consumers to actively participate in the digital beauty system.

• Stage 1: Standard 3D product images detailing their textures are relayed. Once a new customer approaches these images change to appeal to their curiosity.
• Step 2: A digital testing device is located at the front of the store to showcase Shiseido's variety of products. A promotion movie displays these and shows the individual product information including characteristics and application instructions of an item the consumer has picked up.
• Step 3: The digital counselling mirror provides an array of product information, application instructions, and skin check results, that can then be accessed at home.