Alongside the launch of Molton Brown’s 12 new EDPs and 15 repackaged EDTs in September 2019, I ran an event in collaboration with Industry Award body CEW in order to support the brand’s fragrance credentials with an Industry-facing event. This provided a unique opportunity bringing four of their perfumers together in one room to discuss their individual fragrance industry experiences (something not previously done by any brand). Master Perfumer Jacques Chabert, Senior Perfumer Carl Chabert, New Gen Perfumer Jérôme di Marino and New Gen Perfumer Maia Lernout provided fascinating and differing experiences in their careers. Mediated by Kathleen Baird-Murray, soon to be Contributing Editor at Vogue, the discussion dove into the perfumery careers of our perfumers thus far. Questions for the perfumers had been preset by myself (and then discussed with Kathleen) before being shared with the perfumers. Equally I managed the presentation with Mintel and CEW.

Guests were welcomed to New Covent Garden Hotel with breakfast hospitality and an array of the full EDP collection to sample. After the chance to network, the discussion took place in the theatre room with time at the end for questions. Every guest took away two samples of the iconic Recharge Black Pepper and Fiery Pink Pepper EDPs (creations of Jacques Chabert and Carla Chabert) and the matching bath and shower gels respectively.

Supported by Mintel’s new research on evolution within the fragrance industry, Margaux Caron, Global Beauty Analyst, presented statistics clearly showing that fragrance is going through a major change in the modern climate with customers becoming more drawn to niche fragrance that express their individuality rather than commercially driven blockbusters. Attendees heard how this project was worked on through the voices of the four Molton Brown perfumers who each brought their own stories and creative flair. We asked how the industry has evolved over time in response to changes in customer behaviour and demand and their journeys to get to where they are today. With a focus on creative freedom and expression, the perfumers create fragrance by individuals for individuals. The perfumers shared how they work, what inspires them and how they create their fragrances with Molton Brown.

Attendees such as Harrods, Jo Malone London and Estée Lauder joined us alongside industry insiders such as Caroline Neville MBE, President of CEW. We received fantastic feedback from everyone (Caroline commented that’s she felt ‘extremely privileged to be in a room with so many perfumers at once’ having never seen another brand do this before).

We sold over the initial proposal due to demand and had a total of 57 guests turn up (compared to 59 tickets sold) which is the best percentage of turnout they have ever had. Newly appointed Managing Director of CEW UK and previous Associate Publisher of British Vogue, Sallie Berkerey was also extremely pleased with the event.

Leading up to the event, we had three solus emails go out to CEW’s industry insider database as well as on their social media (3.7k+ followers). We had a feature on their events page on their website. In addition Kathleen Baird-Murray mentioned us on her social media (11.7k+ followers), giving us fantastic exposure to her beauty audience.

Credits:

Photography by Kurt Rebry

Supporting the Eaux de Parfum launch in September 2019, I worked on exclusive content for trade partner Fenwick to use on their Daily Muse blog.

In collaboration with Fenwick writer Natalie Chui and the Molton Brown copywriter Editor the following was published in October 2019, focussing on Senior Perfumer, Carla Chabert’s experience.

The launch of Molton Brown’s new fragrance Suede Orris in March 2019, aligned with the Fragrance Foundation UK’s Fragrance Week. This provided an opportunity for the brand to cement its fragrance credentials and tie in with wider activity across fragrance week to garner more visibility.

I ran an intimate, closed-door, customer facing event in the flagship store on Regent Street. Focussing on the perfumer behind the fragrance, Jérôme di Marino, I hosted a live interview, encouraging him to share his creative process and give customers an insight into his work and inspiration. We were also joined by Brand Marketing Manager, Georgina Potts who had worked on bringing Jérôme’s creation to life.

In total 22 out of 24 guests attended on the night and 20 of these went on to make purchases.

Running up to the event, details were posted on Fragrance Foundation UK’s website & social, The Perfume Society’s website and social and Regent Street online’s website. Additionally, the event was publicised on Molton Brown’s social and in a direct email to their London database.

We had a total social reach of 365,334 impressions across Instagram, Facebook and Twitter and reached 29.5k+ via CRM.

Credits:

Photography by Lia Toby

With the launch of Molton Brown’s new fragrance, Jasmine & Sun Rose, I wanted to create one-of-a-kind completely unique pieces for our loyal customers.

Artist Rhea Thierstein had worked on the campaign imagery and come up with a marble-effect concept for the whole campaign. I approached her and asked if she would be willing to try and use her concept on the fragrance bottles themselves. After a bit of experimenting, Rhea presented me with the bottles you see here on the right. I hope you’ll agree she did a fantastic job!

A very limited quantity were made and sold at a price point of £115 (the normal RRP was £69 at the time). Every unit instore sold out before the end of the campaign.

Whilst at L’Occitane en Provence, I was responsible for the creation of kits and sets for our Trade partners. Part of the overall management included the creation of copy for all sets to be shared with Trade partners such as John Lewis, Debenhams and independent pharmacies. A small part of this was to also manage the photography of the sets, working with the photography studio to have the products pictured correctly and in a way that was reflective of size, colours etc.

The copy for these sets needed to educate customers on the L’Occitane brand heritage and values (when relevant) and clearly list the products in the set, evoking an emotional response in order to encourage sales.

In total, I created and managed the copy for 50+ kits a year.

Supporting the launch of Molton Brown’s new Suede Orris range ahead of Mother’s Day in John Lewis & Partners, we negotiated a six week exclusive period. In that time, we launched instore with a window installation in their beauty window at the front of the store, facing on to Oxford Circus.

Working to the safety regulations of the site itself whilst remaining true to the campaign imagery and feel was of upmost importance. I managed the project from start to end, ensuring that the installation worked for both the Molton Brown brand and John Lewis & Partners. See the photos for the beautiful result!

Leading up to the first launch of Charlotte Tilbury in to the German market, social media was an important tool in engaging with KaDeWe’s beauty customers in order to raise awareness of the launch. Brand imagery, iconic products and store installations were all used to introduce customers to the brand, to Charlotte herself and the products. We ensured drops of information to drum up excitement prior to the launch as well as coverage on the night of the launch itself with backstage photos of the VIP event, including Charlotte.

In 2015 and 2016, L’Occitane en Provence took part in Chelsea Flower Show (winning gold medals both years). This provided a fantastic opportunity to educate our customers on our brand origins and bring our fragrances to the forefront of the campaign.

As well as the campaign displays created for our Trade partners, I worked on a series of touchpoints for our consumers including but not limited to postal mailers and email newsletters. All copywriting was managed by myself with focus on fragrance.

Tasked with creating updated packaging for a small Verbena duo set, I worked with the creative team on the design I wanted.

To keep the set feeling natural but keeping cost price low, we worked on a background that would give the impression of craft paper. In-keeping with this theme, we used dark green leaves in a matt, simple style.

The copy itself I wrote to invoke the smell of the scent for customers who would be unable to open it and smell for themselves. I wanted to transport them to the ingredients’ place of origin.

Tasked with creating a simple overview of the evolution of the Immortelle and Divine range at L’Occitane en Provence, I created the accompanying sheet.

This was to be used for the training of trade staff in locations such as Marks & Spencers and so needed to be succinct, engaging and with digestible, easy to remember points.

Alongside the instore displays I managed for our Trade accounts, I worked on supporting CRM and Direct Mail activation for our database. These included around 5,000 postal mailers and 12,000 email recipients. All copywriting across these touchpoints was written and managed by myself.

Additionally, I managed a double page spread in John Lewis Editions magazine in order to reach out to a different audience base to our own.

These are examples of the copywriting I owned for every campaign (there were around eight campaigns a year).

Whilst at L’Occitane en Provence, I worked on the creation of sets and kits for the wholesale environment from creation to implementation. This required me to create the concept for the kits, working with our creative team on the design, write all copy, ensure all ingredients were correctly listed and manage the production process with suppliers. Once created, this also meant communicating with our warehouse to have the packaging correctly implemented and the kits fulfilled in the correct manner. Costs had to be kept to a minimum but still ensuring that the quality was premium and brand-elevating.

Packaging varied from pouch creation, sleeve production and full box packaging creation. In total I managed 50+ kits a year.

The objective was to ensure that we stood out in trade environments and made it easy for consumers (both new and current) to understand who L’Occitane were as a brand as well as educating on the kit and its contents. A priority was to ensure that we were assisting customers in self navigation, particularly in environments where there were no L’Occitane staff.

Unveiling the new launch of Molton Brown’s first Eau de Parfums was a momentous project for the brand. The release itself coincided with a much wider project on bringing the brand’s heritage to the forefront once more and so the product launch had larger implications. The press release had several goals behind it - it needed to provide context on this brand heritage rebrand, discuss how Molton Brown worked with its perfumers (and how that differed to the industry standard) as well as practical information on the Eau de Parfums themselves.

As part of the Molton Brown heritage rebrand project, I was tasked with pulling together a set that would act as a space to allow guests to our meetings and sell-ins to be able to understand and feel the new style of Molton Brown.

This set needed to be able to be taken down and put up again easily so elements needed to be easily transportable and adaptable, allowing us to use different products in the space in a way that still felt natural but stylised.

Molton Brown originally opened in the 70s as a hairdressing salon that was filled with plants and natural ingredients. My task was to help bring this into a contemporary setting so that it still felt relevant and stylish today.

Both L’Occitane and Molton Brown worked with QVC on a very regular basis. Two to three times a year, QVC hosted TSV shows (Today’s Special Value) which focussed on at least one particular set that for only 24 hours, would be sold at a much lower price that its usual RRP.

These shows generated a huge amount of sales in a 24 hour period and provided the opportunity to make at least £1 million in sales during this time. Part of my role in this was to arrange the sets with props that spoke to the campaign and entice the buyers watching at home. This required knowledge of where the cameras were going to be during the live shows as well as understanding what would and wouldn’t work on screen. These often fell around Christmas time (as shown in some of the photos) and I really enjoyed setting up these spaces.

To add more intrigue around new product launches instore, I managed the sourcing and implementation of activation that would cause a buzz and drive sales, increasing ATV and strengthening customer affiliation and loyalty. I reached out to various artists that created work that was inkeeping with the brand and organised the implementation of their set up in selected stores, focussing on high footfall areas and during peak traffic times.

Inspired by Anya's admiration for the traditional craft of ropework, Anya Hindmarch created a new collection of bags and accessories using these methods as inspiration. Artist Rhea Thierstein was asked to create rope sculptures that used some of these craft techniques in a way that was reminiscent of marine use. I assisted Rhea in the creation of two of these sculptures for their display in both a London flagship store and Japan.

For more information on Rhea Thierstein, please click here.