Buzzy scalp care brand Jupiter is stepping out of the DTC world and into luxury retail.
On Monday, Jupiter entered Bergdorf Goodman through the retailer’s new Men’s Self-Care Shop, which opened in early October. Jupiter launched in June 2020 with six products, including a shampoo and conditioner, a hair mask, hair serum and a scalp brush. Prices range from $15 to $29. Its brand proposition centers on improved ingredient formulations that soothe the scalp and hair and offers a fuller regimen than traditional 2-in-1 shampoo and conditioners. The Men’s Self-Care Shop is located on the main floor of Bergdorf Goodman’s New York location and addresses categories like sleep, hair care, nutrition, and post-workout products, among others. Jupiter earned approximately $2 million in its first 12-months in business, said Robbie Salter, Jupiter co-founder and co-CEO.
“With the Men’s Self-Care Shop, the Bergdorf Goodman beauty team and I wanted to create a helpful, intuitive shopping experience by organizing products by category to best address each customer’s individual needs and interests,” said Bruce Pask, men’s fashion director at Bergdorf Goodman and Neiman Marcus. “We noticed an increase in the introductions of life-enhancing products made specifically for men, so we felt that it was a great time to present an offering of our favorites to our discerning customer.”
Scalp and dandruff care is the busiest sub-category for hair care innovation. Briogeo, JVN Hair, Prose and Oribe are just a few brands with scalp and dandruff-oriented products. With the help of these brands and products, the global hair-care market is expected to grow at a growth rate of over 3% to $211 billion by 2025, according to Grand View Research.
The Men’s Self-Care Shop experience is also available online through Bergdorf Goodman’s e-commerce site. It features “Bruce’s Guide” with editorial pieces about men’s grooming tips. Other brands within the Men’s Self-Care Shop include 111 Skin, Augustinus Badar, Acqua di Parma and Theragun.
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Oddly, Jupiter’s customer demo is between 75% and 80% women; however, most dandruff and scalp care brands like Head & Shoulders or Selsun Blue market to men. Jupiter markets itself as gender-neutral. Salter added that Jupiter is trying to take a “calculated” approach to retail expansion, which focuses on finding retail partners that align with the same values as the brand. In this case, those values are around having a strong sense of purpose and product innovation, tempered with the element of aspiration.
“We still believe that our brand is a gender-neutral brand. There is still an unmet need on the men’s side, as well as there is a women’s side. But also, when Bergdorf calls, you pick up the phone,” said Ross Goodhart, Jupiter co-founder and co-CEO.
The calculated approach also extends to the creation of the brand. Goodhart said that a year before the launch of Jupiter, Goodhart and Salter created a fake brand called Headway to test and gather data on what potential customers were looking for in haircare. Funneling people to a website via paid ads, Goodhart and Salter tracked what products customers were clicking on and collected email addresses (though no visitor could checkout and pay for products). Jupiter currently has about 50,000 customers, Goodhart added.
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“What we learned early on and where we focused our business is that men or women get dandruff equally, but the existing products have only targeted men. There is an unmet and underserved demographic that [want] high-quality products,” he said.
