CVS Goes Glam: Chain Launches Beauty 360 Store

Buying makeup without trying it first? So last century.

By: Sherri Dalphonse

Taking a page out of Sephora’s playbook, CVS’s newest store in DC—which opened Monday at 1350 Connecticut Avenue, just south of Dupont Circle—is drugstore meets beauty boutique. Attached to a small, standard CVS is a glam store called Beauty 360, with shelf after shelf of high-end skincare, makeup, and fragrance.

Shoppers can try and buy lines such as Dr. Brandt, Freeze 24.7, Borba, StriVectin, Stendhal, Laura Geller, and Paula Dorf. Staffers will dispense advice and samples; shoppers who make a small purchase can also get free mini-services, including a hand massage, nail-polish change, makeup application, or mini-facial.

Why did CVS choose Washington as its first location for Beauty 360? Turns out Dupont Circle is one of the chain’s best markets for cosmetics.

But will Washingtonians go for the “body-sculpting” products by It Cosmetics—which has packaged age-old Hollywood secrets of how shadowing can make you look as if you have cleavage, defined abs, or whiter teeth?