Walmart becomes latest chain to get fancy with in-store beauty experts

Walmart customers may find something new the next time they're looking for makeup and skin care products: in-store advisors offering personalized tips and recommendations.

- By ANNE D’INNOCENZIO

JULIO CORTEZ Associated Press PRIYANKA Patil, a fashion team lead at Walmart, helps Linda Flippin find some makeup in Texas.

The massive retail chain is breaking out of its no-frills service model by staffing its beauty aisles with trained specialists who can suggest foundation shades to match a shopper’s skin tone or know about a moisturizer trending on TikTok.

The roles were filled at 22 stores in Arkansas and Texas in recent months, and Walmart expects to have them in more than 400 of its 4,600 namesake U.S. stores by year-end.

The addition of “beauty experts” comes as Walmart, rival Target, specialty chains like Sephora and department stores all are vying for a bigger slice of the $129-billion U.S. beauty and personal care market, including by offering customized advice and playful, interactive spaces to encourage consumers to shop in person as well as online.

A year ago, Walmart set up areas in 40 stores where customers could sample makeup and speak with beauty advisors. The pilot “beauty bar” concept is now in hundreds of stores, according to Vinima Shekhar, vice president of beauty merchandising for Walmart’s U.S. division. As part of plans to remodel 650 locations by the end of the year, the company is moving beauty departments to the front of stores and installing displays to showcase products getting attention on social media.

“We're not trying to be an Ulta or Sephora,” Shekhar told the Associated Press. “We have the breadth of assortment that no one else has. We have convenience that no one else has. What we also then want to do is layer on a level of service for both our associates and our customers: ‘Here’s what trending. Here's what's new.’”