“The most interesting thing we’ve heard this week is about travel retail and the correlation of international air traffic with store penetration and conversion. From all the reports from around the world, we hear that traffic is increasing extremely fast but market and business are not increasing at the same speed. This is what we, as a Trinity, are facing a collective challenge.”
The words of outgoing L’Oréal Travel Retail President Vincent Boinay, speaking at the division’s annual press conference in Cannes, summed up a widespread sentiment across the travel retail community as post-pandemic spending recovery in many locations fails to keep pace with the passenger volume rebound.
As reported, Boinay, one of travel retail’s most-respected executives, has been appointed President of the French beauty group’s North Asia Zone and Chief Executive Officer of L’Oréal China.
“That challenge is on different levels,” said Boinay, warming to his theme. “The first challenge is penetration, which is why we have all this digital acceleration in everything we do to boost pre-flight engagement. To boost conversion, we have to constantly offer new innovations that meet the diverse needs of travellers and offer them a beauty-tech experience they can’t get anywhere else.”
Boinay then introduced Emmanuel Goulin, a familiar and highly regarded face in the channel, who will become President of Travel Retail and join the Group’s Executive Committee at the beginning of 2024.
After the press conference, media were taken on a tour across the beauty giant’s key brands and launches for 2024, starting with its prestige brands led by L’Oréal Travel Retail Luxe Worldwide General Manager Baptiste Beau.
Beau said: “The ambition is to provide beauty for all travellers. We want to offer the best of beauty in terms of sustainability, personalised and memorable experiences. We need to balance beauty expertise and human connection and each category has a role to play.
“In skincare, our focus is scientific innovation and services. In makeup it is engagement and newness. In fragrance it is to highlight our fragrance expertise and our modernity – to show that our fragrance portfolio is in tune with its time.”
Beau took guests through the Lancôme, YSL Beauty and Prada Beauty spaces. At the Lancôme space, Beau highlighted the revamped Rose Agora retail concept, which highlights the heritage and expertise of the Lancôme brand, the number one brand in L’Oréal Travel Retail’s prestige portfolio.
According to Beau, YSL Beauty is performing strongly both in travel retail and domestic markets driven by its couture positioning and its newest fragrance launch, MYSLF. YSL Beauty has historically performed well in fragrances with Libre ranking as the top three global fragrances in three years after its launch.
Beau also highlighted the YSL Beauty Les Vestiaire des Parfums collection, a range of couture-inspired scents that take inspiration from designer Yves Saint Laurent’s most memorable fashion archives.
Beau’s priority for the brand is to keep on strengthening its position in each category from fragrance to makeup and skincare. 2024, according to Beau, will be a year for lips for YSL Beauty.
Prada Beauty, which was named as one of the hottest brands in the Lyst Index for 2023, has recently launched its debut makeup collection with a new counter in its home airport of Milan Malpensa. Prada Beauty’s skincare range is designed to help skin adapt to environmental changes. It offers everything from a cleanser to a foundation, which delivers skin-boosting benefits.
Prada Beauty’s colour collection celebrates self-expression and offers products for eyes and lips in a range of versatile, fashion-inspired colours and textures. The lipstick line is inspired by the mattified lips seen on Prada’s runway shows and draws from the brand’s extensive fashion archives.
Following the opening of its debut counter in Milan, Prada Beauty will also be opening in Samaritaine Paris, the cdf Sanya International Duty Free Shopping Complex and the cdf Haikou International Duty Free Shopping Complex.
L’Oréal Paris Travel Retail General Manager Karina Behar Lecuiller highlighted the brand’s strong recruitment power in travel retail. A study with m1ndset revealed that 13% of travellers enter the P&C store thanks to L’Oréal Paris and that 30% of those travellers buy another brand on top of L’Oréal Paris once inside.
Behar Lecuiller also introduced two new makeup ranges, the Panorama Mascara and Infallible Lipstick lines. L’Oréal Paris recently held its sixth fashion show during Paris Fashion Week, which was held underneath the Eiffel Tower for the first time. The show also marked the debut of American model Kendall Jenner as the new face of the brand.
“L’Oréal Paris is honoured to announce our partnership with one of the most powerful women in the world,” commented L’Oréal Paris Global Brand President Delphine Viguier-Hovasse, who was also in attendance. “It’s a new high in our mission to empower every woman, everywhere. At any other time, Kendall Jenner might have been as successful as she is now, but her worth and her choices and her image might have been defined or even controlled by others.
“Nobody defines Kendall Jenner but Kendall Jenner. She is the embodiment of everything Gen Z stands for; owning her image, proudly growing in her self-worth, and inspiring others to do the same.”
L’Oréal Travel Retail Dermocosmetics & Professional Products Divisions General Manager Anne-Laure Lecerf took media through the company’s flourishing dermocosmetics division, which is outperforming the overall skincare market.
She highlighted the Kérastase, La Roche-Posay and SkinCeuticals brands.
La Roche-Posay, which was the subject of our latest Moodie Davitt Spotlight Series eZine, has launched a mole check campaign to promote the early detection of melanomas and skin cancer. The brand reached 60,000 travellers in Oslo Airport via a dermatologist-led educational summer campaign on the ABCD method of mole checks.
Lecerf said: “La Roche-Posay is suitable for all skin types, colours and issues. Our skin cancer initiatives are very dear to me, especially during cancer awareness month this October. La Roche-Posay has been very much involved in Oncology and provides solutions to help ease the skin-related side effects of cancer and chemotherapy.”
In 2022, the global dermocosmetics market grew by +13%, an upward trend which bodes well for the Groupe’s brands in the channel and especially La Roche-Posay.
As reported, the media briefing concluded with an important announcement that L’Oreal Travel Retail and Gebr. Heinemann have partnered on a green roadmap to meet joint sustainability goals. The news was announced by L’Oreal Global Sustainability Director Kim Rowney at the TFWA World Exhibition & Conference in Cannes. ✈
