SEPHORA announced a one of a kind program starting in 2016 that will foster early-stage beauty businesses founded by female entrepreneurs. This new program, SEPHORA Accelerate is part of the company’s larger social impact called SEPHORA STANDS. A new social strategy built on philanthropy, aligned social engagements and shared value. It was created to inspire confidence and fearlessness among women.
Statistics show that 85% of venture capital funded start-ups are lead exclusively by men. Female entrepreneurs do not have the same access to funding, connections, or business instruction as male entrepreneurs. Sadly, even in the beauty industry, where most customers are women, female founders are still underrepresented. So, SEPHORA saw the need for creating a program designed to support female entrepreneurs. “SEPHORA is uniquely positioned to support and inspire women as they achieve their goals, and from the beginning, it’s been among the top requests from both our clients and our employees,” said Calvin McDonald, President and CEO of SEPHORA AMERICAS. Therefore, SEPHORA Accelerate program is designed to not only build a community of innovative female founders, but aim to create an approach that catalyzes growth and infuses social impact into each brand’s work.
Candidates that qualify are invited to apply for one of up to 10 all-expenses paid spots in the year-long program. Each potential candidate must meet a specific criteria, including being a founder or co-founder of their own beauty business, being committed to building social impact into the company’s DNA, and fitting within two broad categories: leading a company that creates a cosmetic product, or a company that creates technology or provides services related to beauty or that could be relevant to the beauty industry.
The program set to take place at SEPHORA’s Headquarters in San Francisco, where each candidate will participate in bootcamps that will teach skills necessary to run and build their businesses. They will also received Mentorship, Design Support, and Grants & Funding. By 2020, SEPHORA Accelerate hopes to have supported more than 50 women-led beauty businesses with a social impact through bootcamps, mentorship, and small loans. The first set of SEPHORA Accelerate program participants will be announced in March 2016.
SEPHORA also aims to inspire confidence in 100,000 women by 2020 through additional classes, scheduled to start throughout 2016. Such as Classes for Confidence, starting in April, 2016. Find out more about SEPHORA Accelerate and other programs coming this year at www.sephora.com/sephora-stands
This is simply amazing! Kudos to Sephora! I aspire to be one of the 50 women by 2020 to benefit from this amazing program!