In 2024, the cash-back-focused online shopping platform Rakuten made a play to further engage its most active members. Rakuten invited select members to join Rakuten+, an invite-only membership tier intended to connect high-frequency shoppers with luxury brands. In exchange for a $100 annual subscription, Rakuten+ members receive at least 10% cash back on purchases from participating retailers, compared to the usual, roughly 3% cash-back rate available to all members of the platform.
Rakuten declined to share how much members need to spend to be considered a “high-value” shopper or how many of them populate its user base, but the Bay Area-based company is confident that enough of them are beauty spenders. In October, Rakuten welcomed Sephora as its exclusive beauty partner on the Rakuten+ platform.
“We wanted to have a loyalty play for brands, to connect these high-end brands in luxury with our most active and valuable shoppers,” said Rakuten CMO Wendy Bergh. “It’s a different way for brands to create loyalty with their customers. Everyone’s talking about loyalty in today’s market, but brands really need those innovative ways to connect.”
The company began with apparel retailers like Vince, Neiman Marcus and Rag & Bone before expanding to travel partners like Hotels.com. Beauty, with its highly-engaged and replenishing consumer base, was an obvious expansion.
“The launch of Sephora as our exclusive beauty partner is really exciting, because Sephora is the gold standard of beauty,” said Bergh.
These days, Sephora consumers no longer need to rely only on the LVMH-owned retailer to access many of its prestige beauty products. Brands like Fenty Beauty, Charlotte Tilbury and Rhode are not only available at Sephora and their DTC channels; they can also increasingly be found on newer beauty platforms like Amazon and TikTok Shop — often with a discount or rapid shipping that may make them a more enticing place to pull the trigger.
And in 2025, consumers looking for beauty products may not be going directly to trusted retailers like Sephora at all, but instead trusting AI-powered platforms like ChatGPT to direct them to products. That leaves traditional retailers like Sephora needing to give customers a reason to shop on their platforms.
“These AI chatbots are disintermediating platforms and retailers like Rakuten and Sephora, and there’s this real risk that they’re essentially commoditizing the shopping experience,” said Meghana Dhar, a technology and AI advisor who previously served as head of partnerships at Instagram Shopping.
“This is early — the average consumer isn’t doing it — but this is where I think shopping is going: with these chatbots disintermediating, essentially, the rest of the internet,” she added. “My feeling is that Rakuten and Sephora are trying to get that locked in now, by getting people to put money where their mouth is, to essentially combat that disintermediation.”
Perks like 10% cash back represent a play to keep customers loyal to participating retailers, without delving into discounting, which Sephora has traditionally shied away from outside of its biannual sale. Rakuten’s business model relies on an affiliate model, with the platform receiving a commission on the sales it directs to retail partners. The cash back paid to members comes from that commission.
“Ten percent [cash back] is nothing for customer acquisition,” said Dhar. “So I think it’s a great deal for [Sephora and Rakuten] to lock people in. But we shall see if it’s compelling enough for the consumer.”
Shoppers arriving at Sephora via Rakuten+ will still collect their Sephora loyalty points, which the retailer has boosted in recent years to reward regular customers.
“Sephora has always been obsessed with delivering value and creating fresh offerings for our beauty community, so we are thrilled to be joining Rakuten+ as their first-ever and exclusive beauty partner,” Emmy Berlind, svp and gm of loyalty at Sephora, said in a statement shared with Glossy. “We continue to explore ways to meet our clients where and how they are shopping, while also providing unique and elevated experiences for our most loyal members, and the Rakuten+ experience gives them the perfect balance.”
While agentic shopping is still a new behavior for many consumers, early data indicates that some consumers are embracing the model. According to Adobe Analytics, October traffic to e-commerce retailers from generative AI sources increased by 1,200% year over year. And consumers who arrived at retail sites from AI traffic sources were 16% more likely to make a purchase than those from non-AI traffic sources.
Rakuten currently has 17 million members on its general platform. The company declined to share how many members have joined its new plus network or how many shoppers are invited, but a spokesperson described its target shopper as “women aged 35–65 who are value-conscious, savvy and focused on maximizing their savings.”
According to Rakuten, 10% of Rakuten shopping trips are now driven by beauty retailers, an increase from 9% in 2024. The company said Rakuten+ members have already demonstrated that they have an average order value 416% higher than the average Rakuten member, and that Rakuten+ members overall spend 349% more than the average Rakuten member annually.
Rakuten believes that those numbers mean paying $100 to shop is worth it for its Rakuten+ members. But the company is considering other perks to attract savvy — and spend-heavy — consumers.
“There are definitely other areas we could extend to. The key is that we need to see member interest, and, ultimately, it needs to hit the bar of: Is it fitting into the luxury brand messaging and perspectives that our members have?” said Bergh. “[Members] are ultimately buying into this program because it’s giving them that elevated cash back on these luxury brands. It’s almost, in a lot of ways, a lifestyle. I want to have access to these luxury brands, with an elevated cash back.”
