Tom Ford wants to reclaim its status as fashion’s hottest beauty brand.
This week, the Estée Lauder Companies-owned label is opening stores in Paris’ first arrondissement and New York’s Soho, its first standalone posts in the French capital and North America, The Business of Beauty can exclusively confirm.
Both stores — each clocking in under 550 square feet — will emphasise the experiential with plush seating, consultations, classes and “scent-styling services.” (The Paris location contains a private VIP suite.) The stores — Paris is next to Frédéric Malle, Dior and Agent Provocateur while New York’s Prince Street boutique shares the block with David Yurman, Ralph Lauren and fragrance line Penhaligon — highlight the brand’s premium offering, including its Private Blend Reserve collection (which runs $300 for a standard size 50 ml bottle) and signature scents, plus its makeup alongside curated accessories.
Doors will open for Paris on Sept. 8, and New York on Sept. 12.
It’s a crucial moment for Tom Ford Beauty: After Estée Lauder Companies, which has owned the beauty license since 2006, bought the brand in a $2.8 billion purchase, its beauty business has suffered slowing sales and simmering demand. In the second quarter of 2025, the parent company took a $773 million impairment on the brand, citing poor performance of fragrance, a category that is booming elsewhere in beauty.
At the same time, the conglomerate as a whole has faced challenges, with sales slumping in its tentpole China market and a dramatic CEO succession process playing out in the last year. Though Estée Lauder Companies’ share price is up more than 20 percent year-to-date, it reported a 12 percent drop in sales during the fourth quarter of 2025 and 8 percent for the full year, ended June 30. It’s operating in a tough market: The beauty industry, as a whole, is tempering, with annual growth set to slow to 5 percent over the next five years.
Still, in a promising sign to investors, Estée Lauder predicted a possible return to growth in the next fiscal year, with new leadership in place. Tom Ford is an important piece of the puzzle, as the company hopes to regain its place as a prestige beauty frontrunner.
At the start of his tenure earlier this year, new chief executive Stéphane de La Faverie laid his strategic focuses for the conglomerate: outside cost-cutting, he flagged greater investment in brand marketing. The new stores will be representative of just that, offering shoppers an avenue to experience Tom Ford Beauty in-person, and “signals a new chapter in modern beauty,” according to a statement by the brand.
Moving Forward
Tom Ford Beauty is no longer in its infancy when, fronted by its namesake fashion designer, its instantly-recognisable gold packaging and sex-fuelled campaigns made it a go-to splurge at the makeup counter.
Under ELC, the label has been trying to shake off recent stagnation by building a more robust innovation pipeline, and using buzzy trend-focused and celebrity marketing tactics aimed at re-crafting the brand’s identity for now. As well, Tom Ford Beauty has worked to meet shifting consumer preferences, most recently, with the drop of its skincare-infused foundation, featuring hyaluronic acid and SPF in August.
A month later, it tapped its first celebrity ambassador, actress Angelina Jolie, to front campaigns for its newly-launched Runway Lip Colour, and last week, actress Tilda Swinton became the face of its longtime fragrance, Black Orchid Reserve, which was first released when ELC’s license began. Haider Ackermann, appointed as the fashion label’s creative director a year ago, worked on the Swinton campaign and attended a party with the star during the Venice Film Festival.
The new stores also aim to capture attention, giving shoppers a place to be enveloped in person by Tom Ford Beauty: The brand has operated a standalone store in London’s Covent Garden since 2017, and over the past five years has opened boutiques in Saudi Arabia, Singapore and China.
Creating specialised beauty environments have been hallmarks for success stories like Chanel and Dior, and makes sense for the brand. Estée Lauder is broadly going bigger on in-person shopping, having announced last year a dedicated shopping centre for the conglomerate’s fragrance brands, “La Maison des Parfums,” set to open in Paris later this year.
It’s happening against the backdrop of a challenged e-tailer and department store (a crucial channel for luxury beauty) space. In its 2025 earnings Estée Lauder reported fragrance sales were flat, dragged down by “retail softness” in North America for Tom Ford, which is stocked at Nordstrom, Sephora and Ulta Beauty. Travel retail, another key channel for Tom Ford, is also still struggling, and decreased 28 percent overall for the conglomerate during 2025.
The luxury beauty market is also more crowded and competitive than ever, packed with a number of new entrants with niche takes. Hermès launched a line of lipsticks, eye shadows and balms in 2020 followed by Valentino in 2021 — then Dries Van Noten, Balmain, Paco Rabanne and Prada. Louis Vuitton launched its first-ever makeup collection in late 2025; Marc Jacobs Beauty, originally produced by LVMH, is set to relaunch next year from new parent Coty. In recent years, as prices for luxury fashion have steadily risen, brands have looked to beauty — including by adding bespoke experiences to their flagship locations — to entice priced-out shoppers.
While Tom Ford may have been one of the first designers to create a modern beauty label, a big name and great product are no longer enough to drive lasting success. Luxury beauty lines also don’t just compete in a silo, but directly with indie darlings like Gucci Westman’s Westman Atelier, celebrity brands such as Hailey Bieber’s Rhode and cult fragrance labels like D.S. & Durga.
It has been harder than ever to acquire customers and Estée Lauder has “has not been in a position where investment was flowing freely,” said Lauren Lieberman, analyst and managing director at Barclays.
But with the right product development, marketing buzz and simply attention, Tom Ford could reclaim some of its glory. Innovation, however, takes time.