Chief Merchandising Officer, MACY'S INC
How to Dominate the Beauty Industry with Nata Dvir, Head of Macy’s Beauty Business
An open-mind can take you far! According to Nata Dvir, surrounding yourself with the right people, knowing the customer and ...
About Nata Dvir
Nata Dvir, Chief Merchandising Officer at Macy's, received the Fragrance Foundation's 2024 Circle of Champions Award in November 2024. In her acceptance speech, she described Macy's as "the fragrance powerhouse" and stated that the company holds the leading market share in the fragrance category. She said, "We are not a force in fragrance, we are the force in fragrance," and attributed the energy on the selling floor to Macy's beauty advisers. Dvir also credited her team for embracing Macy's "bold new chapter strategy" and for evolving marketing, elevating the in-store experience, and modernizing the shopping journey. In a 2019 interview, Dvir discussed her role as Head of Beauty for Macy's, describing her responsibilities as finding the best brands for customers and managing product assortment. She noted that the future of beauty is "constantly changing" and highlighted a "huge skincare moment" driven by consumers' awareness of what they put on their skin. Dvir emphasized the importance of surrounding oneself with capable people, stating, "Having a great idea alone is not enough. Surrounding yourself with great people who know how to get it done, that's the secret sauce."
Transcript (12 segments)
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Nata Dvir0:00
It's always been important for me to think about what future leader I wanna be and then what are the things that are gonna help me get there.
So as the Head of Beauty for Macy's, what I'm really responsible for are finding the best brands for our customers, taking the brands we already have, and making sure that we have the best product, we own the right amount of them. I have the best job. I have 13,000 beauty advisors that work in our stores that are really responsible for bringing you the best experience, whether that's finding the right makeup or really helping you figure out what's the right skincare for you. They're the real heartbeat of our stores. But then I have a team in New York that's really focused on finding those best brands.
When I was growing up, I thought I was gonna be like an artist and I thought I was gonna be working like all on my own and doing my own thing. And so I never thought I'd be working in a corporate job and every day getting to work at 8am and staying until 6. That's just not what I thought I was gonna be doing. One of the things that I love about this job is it's really creative. It lets me try all these new things. But also, I have this big responsibility on delivering business every single day.
Oftentimes I meet people who wanna work in beauty but are really focused on working at one specific job or one specific brand or one specific category. You've gotta be open-minded to find the right experiences and surround yourself with the right people because they'll help you get to your end goal of where you really wanna be.
When I started working in beauty, I thought beauty was just like a bunch of products that got marketed to you. I didn't really understand the connection that product had with our customer. I realized that the products that we have really impact the way that our customers' lives are. People are obsessed with beauty not just because they're obsessed with newness or obsessed with product, it's about how the product makes them feel.
Guys love to shop by brand. They're super loyal to brands. Once they find one thing they like, they just wanna buy it head to toe. Women are really different. And I think that's the way she shops in beauty too. She just wants the best product. She just loves to learn about all the different brands that we have out there and new techniques. She just is watching YouTube videos all day long, tutorials, she's just hungry to learn more about the product. And so it's kind of a great job to be able to bring those products to her every single day.
One of the great things about what I do every day is, I get to be just like our consumer. I get to study the newest trends, I get to try all these great products, but I also am responsible for a really big business at Macy's. And so what that requires is for me to be a really strong leader for my team and to make sure that we're really focused on a set of priorities.
Being a strong woman in a leadership role is kind of an interesting position to be in because it gives you this opportunity to motivate a team. We wanna have fun while we're doing it because I think that's really important. If you don't like what you do, then it's really hard to show up every single day but it does take a lot of work. And so what that requires is for us to sit and focus on the things that we wanna accomplish with clear objectives and clear strategies on how to get that done.
I think a lot of people have a lot of big ideas. But not everybody knows how to get them done. And so with my team, we're able to get so many new ideas implemented and that's the hallmark of great business. So, having a great idea alone is not enough. Surrounding yourself with great people who know how to get it done, that's the secret sauce.
It's always been important for me to think about what future leader I wanna be, and then what are the things that are gonna help me get there. And one piece of advice I always give a lot of people is, you've gotta really develop your own brand story. What are you gonna be famous for? Because there's a lot of people who accomplish great things, but you need to help figure out what your story is that's unique to you, so that you can articulate that and people understand like, oh, that person, she's really good at that.
You know, I feel like one of the things that is really important is to have confidence in yourself because you have to be your own best cheerleader. There's tons of things to be proud of and there's probably tons of things that you can probably regret, but that's not gonna get you anywhere. And so it's exciting to see the little wins that you got, because I think they create more wins in the future. And so, not being ashamed of the things that you're able to accomplish is really important if you wanna keep accomplishing great things.
I think the future of beauty is constantly changing. And so I'm not sure where it's going. But I think it's one of the things I love most about the category. Where it was a year ago to where it was ten years ago has totally changed. There's a huge skincare moment happening right now. With all of the selfie moments and YouTube videos that are out there, you've gotta look good. And so, what that really starts with is great skin. I think people are really conscious of what they're putting into their body, and so they wanna also be conscious of what they're putting on their face and on their skin. And so when you think about beauty, every time you put on a red lipstick, or every time you put on that right skincare regime that really fixes something that's been bothering you, you feel better and there's not a lot of categories that make you feel better every day.