THE Stars making a mint on QVC

As Oscar-winning actress Catherine Zeta-Jones expands her business interests to include selling a homeware collection on the shopping channel, she is following in some very famous footsteps...

IN AN unguarded moment during an interview this week actor Michael Douglas admitted that acting roles “for ladies at a certain age become much more difficult”. Which may explain why his 48-year-old wife, the Oscar-winning actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, is now turning to other business ventures, namely her bedding, sleepwear and towel collection on QVC – the television shopping channel that now has global sales of nearly £6billion a year.

“I find working on Casa ZetaJones one of the most amazingly fulfilling things to do,” she says of her brand.

“If I’m not in front of the camera acting I need that creative outlet. I didn’t want to lend my name to something, I wanted to be that something.”

But Zeta-Jones is far from the only star who has signed up to be a QVC “brand ambassador”. The late comedienne Joan Rivers is said to have sold over a billion dollars’ worth of jewellery, clothing and beauty products during her 24 years on the channel, netting her a cool £7.7million a year.

Retail expert and independent shopping consultant Patricia Davidson says she is not surprised at all to see A-list stars making a second career on QVC (which stands for Quality Value Convenience). “The channel offers access to the marketplace in an incredibly easy way,” she says. “I can’t imagine established, upmarket brands like Louis Vuitton wanting to sell on there.

“But for a celebrity who has become a recognisable name with a global reach it is a natural progression to aspire to become a brand.”

QVC may not be the epitome of cool but it does broadcast 24 hours a day to 350million households in seven countries. And for those who pass the rigorous selection process it offers the holy grail of retail: volume sales.

It may be a modest format yet the products sell by the bucketload. All deals are confidential and QVC declines to disclose what size cut their brand ambassadors take, although A-listers are said to retain up to 25 per cent of the sold value of each item.

“We don’t give the celebrities who appear any training,” says Brian Farrelly, QVC’s broadcast director. “We don’t want them to be sales people we want them to be themselves. They don’t need training for that.”

Here we profile some of the most successful stars making a mint from the popular TV channel.

CATHERINE ZETA-JONES, 48

Her Casa Zeta-Jones collection offers affordable homeware and bedware in a muted palette of feminine shades and she says her inspiration comes from the needlework lessons she took with her seamstress great grandmother, as well as the style tips she has picked up from the set designers with whom she has worked.

Items start at an affordable £25 for a faux fur throw and the same for a faux silk robe with hood – although it is hard to imagine the star, said to be worth £35million, wearing faux anything. A set of two quilted storage ottomans will set you back £43 and for £38 you can buy a 24-inch illuminated Casa Zeta-Jones spring floral wreath.

What she is making: The terms of the deal are confidential but it is likely her cut will increase if she exceeds sales targets. Normally the company will negotiate a flat fee to the celebrity for agreeing to appear on the channel for a set number of hours, then take a cut of future sales. One expert suggests Zeta-Jones is likely to be enjoying an initial deal of £2million – equivalent to her past earnings as an ambassador for Elizabeth Arden perfume.