Violet Grey CEO Sherif Guirgis and president Tracy Kline break down the retailer’s approach to growth in 2026.
Violet Grey is making a pivot to physical retail in 2026. The once digital-first beauty darling will open three US stores this year, plus a London shop-in-shop. Violet Grey will open in East Hampton in May, Dallas in late summer, and its Los Angeles Palisades Village outpost is set to reopen this summer, around the same time it will also open a shop-in-shop with British retailer Harvey Nichols on April 20.
It’s a major investment in physical retail for a retailer that, until last year, had only one physical location — and it’s one that the team hopes will drive growth following a rocky period. After launching the retailer in 2012 and opening an LA store two years later, founder Cassandra Grey built Violet Grey as an online-first retailer, known for its curated mix of rising independent beauty brands and trusted luxury products, with an editorial lens not seen anywhere else in beauty. In 2022, Violet Grey was acquired by Farfetch for $50 million , but the e-tailer closed its beauty business the following year amid financial struggles. In September 2024, Grey bought back the company for an undisclosed sum, alongside private equity investor Sherif Guirgis, who is now chair and CEO. “Violet Grey has an amazing following of loyalists, a cult status, and the highest level of credibility and curation,” Guirgis says. “I think that was true before the company sold to Farfetch, and I think that was still true under Farfetch, it wasn’t necessarily optimized.” When he and Grey bought the business back, they saw an opportunity to own the white space in the premium, highly curated experiential beauty market, the CEO says. The rationale for the next flock of US spaces is twofold: to offer existing customers expanded access to Violet Grey’s services and brand world, and to get in front of new consumers, who may well replenish via e-commerce once they know the brand. “It’s about being in more places, being exposed to more people, and really showing our points of differentiation,” Guirgis says. “I do think that, to some degree, it’s easier to spotlight that differentiation in a physical environment than it is digitally.” Since the 2024 acquisition, the team has been focused on the building blocks, he says: replatforming the website to Shopify and strengthening the team, including the appointment of group president Tracy Kline in June 2025. Violet Grey declined to share revenues at this stage, but said the business saw approximately 50% year-on-year growth in 2025, and is approaching 100% growth in 2026 to date. This is down to high consumer trust in Violet Grey’s curation, says Kline, who joined from Macy’s-owned cosmetics retailer Bluemercury. “The trust that this client has in our process for vetting brands and for bringing brands and products to our shelves is nothing I’ve ever seen,” she says. Return rates are low, and average order values are high, she adds. “We have an AOV that I didn’t even know existed in this industry.” When prodded, the pair decline to share the number, but Kline says it’s about four times the average luxury beauty AOV. Over the past year and a half, it’s been about “building up that track record”, Guirgis says, returning Violet Grey to a place of stability after its future was up in the air following the Farfetch sale, just one year post-acquisition. The team has ensured customers know that Violet Grey is here to stay and has established relationships with new and existing brands . The next phase is about growing Violet Grey — and the brands it stocks — without losing its luxury niche. The luxury playbook The Violet Grey on New York’s Madison Avenue is a blueprint for what’s to come, from the Hamptons to Dallas — and, down the line, across the world. Customers spend longer than average in-store, thanks to the brand’s focus on education and one-to-one relationship-building, Guirgis says. “In the age of convenience, of Amazon and TikTok, we need to be delivering something in-person that gives people a reason to make that trip, go out of their way, and have a community in the place they want to hang out,” Guirgis says. “That’s what we’re doing in existing stores, and that’s what we’re going to do in the new stores: create that jewelbox community vibe.” The key is to scale, but to scale small, Kline says. “We’re being very purposeful and thoughtful about, not just where these stores are located, but the size of the stores,” she says. Both the existing Melrose Place and Madison Avenue outposts are roughly 1,000 square feet; none of the forthcoming spaces will surpass 1,200. “There’s a lot of seating, a lot of art — we’re not necessarily maximizing merchandising per square foot,” Guirgis says. “We’re thinking about creating an experience where a customer feels like they’re walking into their most glamorous friend’s apartment or walk-in vanity, and they’re learning and sitting down — they want to spend hours.” After seeing the success of makeup application services in the Melrose and Madison stores, this will be a focus for East Hampton, Kline says. It’s an evolution of the golden days of department store makeup counters. “You did it at the same counter with all the same brand, but now people cocktail,” she says. “You want the best of the best from different brands — and brands finally realize that, whether they admit it or not.” This will, in part, inform Violet Grey’s in-store event program. “Luxury is about access now,” Kline says. Violet Grey’s edge is this access, from product exclusives to the people and experiences the retailer can connect consumers with, whether that’s brand founders or the plastic surgeons and aestheticians that serve on Violet Grey’s committee of professionals to help select the retailer’s product offering. Mapping Violet Grey In the US, the decision of where to open next is largely dictated by e-commerce orders. “We know where our customers are,” Guirgis says. The team also looks at existing stores in the area — not what he calls “likeminded beauty competitors”, but brands they expect to serve a similar customer base, whether it’s luxury fashion or food. Violet Grey’s new neighbors include Sant Ambroeus, The Row, Toteme, Dôen, Staud, Cult Gaia and Erewhon. “It’s somewhat obvious, when you look at where those places are in the US,” Guirgis says, nodding to Violet Grey’s select states so far: New York, California, Texas. “It’s a mixture of the most commercial markets that are the largest, and also places that are more ‘glamour markets’, where people are spending time when not in their home cities.” This doesn’t mean that Violet Grey stores will be located in the heaviest foot traffic locations, though. Guirgis wants clients to work for it a little. “It dictates how we think about putting a store in a space where the customer is a high-intent shopper coming in for experience — versus just trying to capitalize on walk-bys and find the biggest foot traffic.” In LA, this means Melrose Place over Rodeo Drive. In New York, it’s East 78th Street, just off Madison Avenue — versus on Madison itself. Those extra few steps make a difference, the CEO insists. International is a different strategic story, because Violet Grey has never shipped globally. There’s a different data set, though, that makes the team confident in the retailer’s UK potential: its British social media following. “We really do have a community there, despite never having even served the market,” Guirgis says. The entry strategy is two-pronged, made up of its own dot-com and a storefront in Harvey Nichols. “We think it’s a powerful way for us to make a splash and land in the market. But ultimately, the goal is for us to have our own standalone flagship there.” The physical retail offering will be key to differentiating Violet Grey as it enters international markets, Guirgis says. “The sort of value proposition of what we do in the US is that level of service, that level of curation, that experience, and the editorial piece of it,” he says. “That carries anywhere. A lot of the traditional retailers here, if they opened in international markets, I’m not sure they would be bringing something totally novel. We believe we are.” The physical stores have fed back into digital sales, Guirgis notes. He expects the same for Violet Grey’s international ambitions. “Since we’ve opened New York, we know that our e-commerce business has been positively impacted in New York. So we think it’ll just kind of create this flywheel of global awareness in a competitive market,” he says. Guirgis and Kline are confident that the approach will resonate globally. After London, they’re keen on select cities in Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. The goal is to end up in a place where Violet Grey has between 10 and 20 US doors, as well as a handful of international spaces — plus, a thriving e-commerce business in all markets where the retail is added. But don’t expect Violet Grey to offer worldwide shipping anytime soon. “We want to be really thoughtful about it and make sure that, if we’re coming into a market, we’re doing it in a way where we are an additive new presence and can storytell around it,” Guirgis says. “So not every place will have a physical presence — but maybe we’ll have a nexus of people in that market who spend time in a location where we do have a physical presence.”
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