Introduction: “Innovation is what drives the creation. The drive for innovation is really the core of what we are doing.” So says Coty Chief Brands Officer Prestige Jean Holtzmann as he reflects on the beauty house’s milestone anniversary. “This was the founding spirit of Coty in the past, and it’s the way we want to look forward.”
For Holtzmann, the 120th anniversary isn’t just a commemoration but a call to reconnect Coty’s storied legacy with a bold vision for the future. The celebrations showcase not only Coty’s pioneering past in fragrance but also a future-oriented perspective with innovations such as the Infiniment Coty Paris collection.
A key theme in Holtzmann’s approach includes embracing technology and storytelling to deliver meaningful consumer engagement. This is particularly relevant in dynamic settings such as travel retail, a channel which he describes as a “crossroads of humanity”.
Having joined Coty in 2017, Chief Brands Officer Prestige Jean Holtzmann is leading the global beauty house’s prestige marketing efforts on its milestone 120th anniversary.
Commenting on this pivotal moment, Holtzmann says: “My role is really to steward this team of scientists, inventors and creatives to bring the best of science, art and innovation as we celebrate Coty’s 120th anniversary.
“When we go back to the roots of Coty, it was really about starting something special and then sharing with people,” Holtzmann says. “One hundred and twenty years is seven or eight generations of people who have worked under the same roof and carried the same founding spirit of Coty and that’s an important heritage that I am the caretaker for.”
Coty celebrated this milestone in style with a special Paris exhibition looking back at its disruptive, pioneering fragrance history dating back to 1904. It showcased Coty’s first fragrance releases and honoured its impact in shaping the world of perfumery.
It also highlighted Coty’s memorable fragrance heroes over the decades, previewed its latest scientific innovations and celebrated the Infiniment Coty Paris collection.
“When you say you’re 120 years old, it’s important to see how it started and what were the founding creations,” Holtzmann explains. “What we are celebrating is not the end of a journey, but instead the first chapter of Coty’s next 120 years. In French we have a saying ‘passé le relais’ or ‘passing the baton’, and that’s what I think this moment was all about.”
Describing the inspiration behind the Coty 120 exhibition, Holtzmann says: “We are celebrating this special moment by reconnecting to the original creations and finding the facets, thinking and philosophies that we have carried over time.”
Infiniment Coty Paris: An echo of Coty’s founding spirit
“This spirit of renewal and reinvention is also what drove the creation and launch of Infiniment Coty Paris,” Holtzmann says. “We knew we were not going to do it as a museum, but as if we were reinventing the Coty name for the modern day.”
Finding a balance between heritage and reinvention is tricky, but one that Holtzmann and his team achieved with Infiniment Coty Paris, a house brand co-created by Coty CEO Sue Nabi and entrepreneur Nicolas Vu. The collection comprises 14 scents that evoke dawn, day and dusk. Highlights from the range include Matin de Jade, Après l’Amour and Soleil d’Ikosim, all created to express positive human emotions.
“From the origin there was this idea of science and craftsmanship, and this is what we have today, and this is what we want to continue. This is really the red thread that ties all the elements of Infiniment Coty Paris together.”
The goal, according to Holtzmann, is to put Coty front and centre. “We started this project when Sue arrived as CEO because this was a big piece of her vision. That was the moment of reconnection and the starting point of this journey. We wanted to reconnect with the founding spirit of Coty.
“Sue is a 21st-century visionary and with Infiniment Coty Paris we created an echo of what happened at the founding moment of Coty.”
As a brand builder, the Infiniment Coty Paris project is one that bears important meaning for both Holtzmann and the company.
“We really wanted to build something totally new and that the industry hasn’t seen before, so we spent a lot of time reconnecting to the founding spirit. It was important to say that if a brand bears the name of Coty, it must be true to the founding spirit.
“So, we came back to the original stories, including that of Coty’s La Rose Jacqueminot in 1904 which blended natural and synthetic ingredients to enhance nature. This was the founding idea for Infiniment Coty Paris; blending the power of natural ingredients with synthetic ones and using technology to enhance the quality and longevity of the fragrances.”
Notably, Infiniment Coty Paris was made using Molecular Aura technology, which modulates the evaporation of olfactory molecules to amplify and extend the power of the scents. This ensures the fragrances last up to 30 hours. Additionally, the collection is produced entirely with alcohol derived from captured and upcycled carbon emissions.
Each fragrance is tied to a distinct emotion shown and measured by neuroscience: sensuality, pleasure, fondness, self-esteem and more.
According to Holtzmann, travel retail will play a key role in the launch plans for Infiniment Coty Paris.
A disruptive fragrance history The legend goes that when the manager of the Grands Magasins du Louvre refused to smell François Coty’s first-ever fragrance, La Rose Jacqueminot, he dropped a bottle on the floor. By doing so, he covered the air with the scent of sweet roses, capturing the attention of the department store’s luxury clientele who bought Coty’s entire inventory. While it is uncertain if the legend is true, it is a story fondly told within the company to underline the pioneering and indomitable spirit of Founder François Coty. Coty broke the perfumery rules of his era by designing accords more sophisticated than the floral or citrus ones available at the time. In 1905, Coty launched Ambre Antique, the first amber fragrance; followed by Chypre, which contrasted bergamot with oakmoss and patchouli. These important fragrances formed the beginnings of the Amber and Chypre fragrance families that we know today. By using synthetic molecules and bases combining natural extracts with synthetic creations, he expanded the perfumer’s palette and magnified flowers and woods in his fragrances.
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He says: “Travel retail will play an important role for the brand. Travel retail is a place of interconnection; interconnection with different places, different cultures, different people. The channel itself is the contemporary expression of who we are as people.”
Much like how the journey from ideation to launch took some time, so too will Infiniment Coty Paris’ launch in the channel as Holtzmann takes a step-by-step approach to rolling out the brand. He says: “The key word for me is that we want to take the necessary time, because this line bears our name and so we must treat it with care.”
In Holtzmann’s view, travel retail – often described as a ‘shop window to the world’ – is more than just a brand-building channel. “To be honest, I’m not too fond of the phrase ‘shop window to the world’, because it has a passive element and I think travel retail a very active channel and I have seen many exciting concepts born from it. It is by essence a window, but it’s so much more.
“To me, travel retail is a place where we can blend different cultures, different people, and have things which are very specific. This is interesting in terms of how we can communicate because how we engage with consumers in this channel can be temporary, topical and locally adapted, which is special compared to other channels.”
Valorising fragrance heroes
As Coty Chief Brands Officer Prestige Holtzmann has led the storytelling and brand-building initiatives of some of the company’s most important fragrance pillars over the years, including Burberry Goddess and Marc Jacobs Daisy Wild, both pre-launched in travel retail.
How does he bring these ‘rooms’ to life? Holtzmann says: “The creation process starts with the desire to open a conversation with people, and with having something new and differentiated to say in fragrance.
“For instance, for Marc Jacobs Daisy Wild, we wanted to write a new chapter to the Daisy story which started in 2008. We wanted to revive it in a completely different way, to tell a different story about youth.
“Whenever we do this exercise, the idea is more to envision what we want to add to the conversation. That’s a story in a fragrance. To achieve that, we are heavily investing in fragrance capabilities, in technologies and in people.”
Bringing fragrance back to the centre of the bottle
Coty, predominantly a fragrance player, has benefitted from the post-pandemic fragrance boom of recent years.
Holtzmann believes that travel retail has played a crucial role in driving fragrance’s acceleration. “Fragrance is really back at the centre of the bottle,” he says. “In social media, we see how many consumers are talking about the juice itself, which is a great sign. They have become very knowledgeable and we see this in skincare as well.
“This development is also interesting for our skincare brands. As consumers learn more and gain a deeper understanding, they also become more demanding about storytelling and information and are challenging what is sold to them.”
Has this democratisation of beauty knowledge made the marketing of beauty more challenging? Holtzmann says: “I think this is a good thing because it means that we’re not having a one-way conversation with our consumers and are instead having a dialogue.
“I believe travel retail has played a role in this because it helped spread some of the trends more globally. We have seen this in terms of concentration, which started in certain regions and spread globally.
“Travel retail allowed more people to discover new juices and trends and then want to talk about it, to want more information and to engage, which is, for me, a virtuous circle.”
One of the biggest success stories for Coty in travel retail is Burberry Goddess, pre-launched in travel retail in 2023 via a dynamic pop-up campaign which the company described as ‘best-in-class’ in terms of ambition and scale. Burberry Goddess was Coty’s top female fragrance launch of 2024 and was number one in Germany, USA and Canada.
According to Holtzmann, blockbuster beauty animations such as this will continue to play a key role in Coty’s marketing approach in travel retail moving forward.
“We are very proud of this launch,” he answers. “I like the pioneering spirit that of the travel retail industry, this appetite for experimentation and for trying new things. I think this is because of the format of the channel.
“When people travel in airports, you need to catch their attention,” he adds. “In travel retail, there is a specific mindset of delivering newness in exciting and engaging ways. Travellers expect experiences, they expect brand interactions. However, this need of catching their attention and offering something new in an often-crowded airport environment is very challenging.
“I think ‘challenging’ is always an opportunity because it’s a way to reset your mind and try to think of something new.”
The next chapter for Coty
Going back to the 120th anniversary, Holtzmann shares his insights on what the future holds for the beauty company. Importantly, he discusses how he is balancing Coty’s 120-year heritage with a drive for innovation and embracing of the future.
“Innovation is what drives the creation. The drive for innovation really the core of what we are doing,” he says. “Innovation is also what drives the market and the novelty. We must constantly challenge ourselves about what we are bringing to the table.
“This was the founding spirit of Coty in the past, and it’s the way we want to look forward.” ✈️
