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NEW Rx

Limited models new concept on storied NYC drugstore

BY FRAN LEFORT

Retailers usually pursue only the newest concepts, but Limited Brands is taking the opposite approach: The company is opening a cosmetics store named and modeled after the oldest apothecary shop in America.

Limited bought the right to use the C.O. Bigelow name from the 166-year-old Bigelow store in New York City’s Greenwich Village and slapped it on a test store at Easton Town Center, in Columbus, Ohio.

Bigelow, which has operated on Manhattan’s Avenue of the Americas since 1838, is steeped in tradition and boasts that its customers have included Thomas Edison (he reportedly once used a Bigelow remedy to soothe a finger burned by his own light bulb creation), Eleanor Roosevelt and Mark Twain. The store’s minimalist packaging and knowledgeable staff have made the place a hot spot for celebrities through the years. And all this put Bigelow on Columbus-based Limited’s radar screen when the conglomerate was exploring ideas to expand its beauty business.

“When we started the evolution of Bed Bath & Beyond about four years ago, one of the things we looked at was making it the 21st-century apothecary,” said Anthony Hebron, the company’s vice president of communications. “The Bigelow name has a lot of equity in the whole feel-good arena. And we want to take that name and pair it up with modern-day products.”

A lot’s in a name
Limited hired Bigelow’s president, Ira Ginsberg, the 42-year-old pharmacist whose family has owned the store since 1939, to help develop a new product for sale in Limited’s chains, which include Bath & Body Works, Henri Bendel and Victoria’s Secret. In the process, the executives became so enamored of Bigelow, with its rich history as a neighborhood pharmacy, that the company decided the brand was a must-have for future growth and bought exclusive naming rights to open additional Bigelow stores. (The original New York City store will remain under Ginsberg’s control.)

Hebron wouldn’t disclose how much Limited paid for the rights, but he does say that the company also bought the Ginsberg’s expertise in product development and related services. “From our standpoint, we don’t have to go out and do research to identify a name and go out and test it,” he said.

The deal suits Bigelow too, Ginsberg says.

“Limited wasn’t the first company to come along,” he said. “We’d had multiple conversations with all kinds of people who’d approached us (to buy Bigelow), but for whatever reason it was just never the right fit.”

Part of the attraction for Ginsberg was the people behind the Limited name. “They are a combination of the most brilliant people in retailing, as well as in beauty. It’s a dream team.”

In October Limited opened that first Bigelow offshoot in an 8,000-square-foot former Bath & Body Works at Easton Town Center. Easton, a 1.5 million-square-foot, 200-tenant, mixed-use project, has long been a draw for concept and prototype stores; about 20 have opened since 1999. (Limited co-developed the mixed-use center with New Urbanist development firm Steiner & Associates.)

“It was kind of a no-brainer,” said Beau Arnason, COO and asset manager of Columbus-based Steiner. “Any landlord would want a new concept store from such a strong tenant.”

Limited’s Bath & Body Works stores carry about 80 percent Bath & Body goods and about 20 percent third-party products, but the new Bigelow stocks mainly upscale third-party brands: Acqua Di Parma, L’Artisan Parfumeur, Frédéric Fekkai. It also offers four private spa rooms for facials, manicures, pedicures and massages. Products range from the extravagant ($150 for a fine fragrance) to the basic ($10 for a massaging tool.)

The target audience is likely to be older than the Bath & Body Works customers, and also more sophisticated and willing to pay more for the right product.

“She reads the magazines, and she knows what a good product is and what a good price for that product is,” Hebron added.

Retailers have expended much energy in recent years with natural, “holistic” approaches to beauty, skin and health care. But far from being a new phenomenon, this is actually very old-fashioned, Ginsberg points out, something that he says was decimated when drugstore chains and big-box retailers replaced family-owned businesses.

“The apothecary experience has been taken away,” he said. “Even people younger than me were dragged in to see the pharmacist, and there are certain things people don’t want taken away. Look at the experiential nature of gourmet food stores.”

The beauty of it
People’s renewed interest in natural approaches to beauty makes this a good move for Limited, one that is likely to succeed, says Wendy Liebmann, a retail strategist at WSL Strategic Retail in New York City. Liebmann also says she can’t recall any other major company getting the rights to expand a retail concept without actually buying the retailer itself. But this is part of a pattern of bold, original thinking on Limited’s part in developing new business and brands, she says, citing the Victoria’s Secret and Express stores and the 2002 venture with Intimate Beauty Corp./Shiseido that led to the opening at Easton of Aura Science, a prestige beauty store.

Liebmann further speculates that Limited will build on the experience it gained through Aura Science, which it rapidly expanded to nine stores before shutting it down just over a year ago. (Aura Science products are still sold in Limited’s other stores.)

“With Aura Science, they moved relatively quickly, and they learned that that wasn’t the right thing to do,” Liebmann said. “I suspect they’ll be more cautious.”

Indeed, the analyst seems to be reading the company’s e-mail.

“We’re still at the cautious optimistic stage,” Hebron said referring to the new store. There is no timetable for expansion, he adds. “The awareness is definitely there,” he said, “and we’re happy that we’re seeing and hearing people come in and purchase things and talk about the store.”

But if Limited does start expanding Bigelow, Arnason says Steiner would put the concept at the top of its wish list for seven other centers that have either opened or are under way in Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio and Wisconsin. “We love the store, and it seems to be extremely successful from our customers’ standpoint,” Arnason said.

The timing is good, given consumers’ heightened interest in therapeutic approaches to health and beauty, Liebmann says. “I think they’ve got a concept that could be very compelling,” she said. “Certainly, beauty shoppers have been interested for some time about more than paint and paper.” Bigelow, she says, offers an “old-world apothecary expertise.”