Branding Magazine Roundtable 8.5.15[2]

BRANDING MAGAZINE / august 2015
|The Branding Roundtable
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BRANDING MAGAZINE
AUGUST 2015
-
brandingmagazine.com
Luxury
Branding

BRANDING MAGAZINE
Chuck Kent
Writer & Contributing Editor
chuck@brandingmagazine.com
David Brbaklic
Creative Director
david@brandingmagazine.com
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The Branding
Roundtable
B
R
#14
Luxury Branding
“Some people think luxury is the
opposite of poverty. It is not. It is the
opposite of vulgarity.” So said Coco
Chanel, in a much different age.

4
But what is luxury today, in a world that would be unrecognizable to the iconic
Chanel, and how do you go about creating and nurturing a successful, 21st cen-
tury luxury brand? That’s exactly what we explore this month with three brand-
ing experts:
Tom Adams, Global Head of Strategy, FutureBrand Worldwide
Erich Joachimsthaler, CEO, Vivaldi Partners Group
Sophie Maxwell, Futures Director, Pearlfisher
So step into your Prada’s, have the help pull the Bentley around and settle into
a hand-stitched leather seat to read all about brands can best serve up the luxe
life.
Chuck Kent
Contributing Editor and Moderator ofThe Branding Roundtable

5
Sophie Maxwell, Pearlfisher
Firstly, the definition, or perception, of luxury – and what
we now expect from luxury products and services - has
changed immensely. Once solely elitist and accessible
to the wealthy, there is now a far greater scope to luxu-
ry. It has far more expressions informed by factors like
changing cultural influences (East vs. West for example)
and the bridge that now exists between the luxury and
mass worlds.
Democratization and the growth of premiumization are
driving the macro change we have seen, allowing luxu-
ry products and experiences to become the aspiration of
millions and, in turn, readily accessible to the masses.
Despite the recession in Europe, there is now a broader
desire for, and expectation of, luxury in our everyday lives
and that has created the opportunity for a greater diver-
sification for luxury brands - but it has also muddied the
waters with what is and isn’t luxury. There is now a much
more personal definition.
But, with premiumization now setting the benchmark for
special, everyday, experiences, we are now witnessing
the inevitable counter-trend of extreme luxury: recreat-
ing the exclusivity that is lost if luxury becomes too af-
fordable. This is evident across various sectors, where
the price ceiling of super-luxury goods has risen great-
How do you define luxury, in
the sense of what qualifies as a
luxury brand?
Chuck Kent: ly to preserve their exclusivity. Extreme travel is a good
example, where the search for exotic and unusual hol-
idays answers the desire for experience-based luxury.
As worldwide travel has become accessible to the many,
those with the means want something that sets them
apart and to experience moments available to the few.
We have been embracing these changes in the luxury
world for a while now. And, moving forward, it’s about
recognizing that luxury is no longer just about a specific
brand or solely synonymous with material items. A new
sensibility has emerged in the luxury world – one that is
focused on the intangible and moves us away from overt,
material things to more discreet and special experienc-
es or connections built on time, value and experience.
According to the Boston Consulting Group, experiential
luxury accounts for almost 55% of the total luxury spend
worldwide and has grown 50% faster than sales of luxury
products.
Taking the above into account we need to change our
mindset and recognize that while in the past luxury was
previously about one ideal, we feel in the future it will be
about many ideals.
Erich Joachimsthaler, Vivaldi Partners
Luxury brands have particular characteristics that dis-
tinguish them from others – for instance, luxury brands
are rare. I always like to say that ubiquity is the enemy
of luxury. Luxury brands are hedonic, they are pleasure,
they are about experiences. Luxury brands are a form of
self-expression. Traditionally, they were aesthetes’ ex-
pressions in some ways. Luxury brands should always
command a high price – much higher than the actual
value, not only for the aspirational but also for the emo-
tional value, for the internal reward: “I can afford that.”

6
“Ubiquity
is the
enemy of
luxury.
– Erich Joachimsthaler,
Vivaldi Partners
Tom Adams, FutureBrand
The core premise behind luxury brand appeal remains
constant, but social forces introduce nuances that it pays
us to heed.
In pure economic terms, a luxury brand is the name,
symbol, design or other feature of a product or service
that is defined primarily by its high price. Luxury brands
play an important role in culture, to help people signal
their wealth and status. Demand is correspondingly driv-
en by the fact that they are more expensive than equiv-
alent choices, to the point of positive price elasticity,
whereby demand paradoxically goes up with price. This
dynamic is neatly summed up by the term ‘conspicuous
consumption’ introduced by social theorists in the late
19th century. It works in two different ways – signaling
‘who I am’ for the very wealthy, or ‘who I would like to be’,
for the less affluent.
In addition to price, there are well-recognized charac-
teristics of a luxury brand, identified by Dubois and oth-
ers, including excellent quality, scarcity, aesthetics and
polysensuality, heritage and superfluousness. Different
brands exhibit these characteristics in different ways –
from the family story of a great Champagne producer to
the hand stitched leather trim in a Bentley.
Paradoxically however, the market for luxury brands is
increasingly polarized into ‘mass affluent’ and ‘super
rich’, and more people have access to previously out-of-
reach goods and services. Recent research has demon-
strated that as price goes up, brand prominence goes
down – so the richer you are today, the subtler your sig-
nals of wealth have to be. The logo literally gets smaller
or disappears on your handbag, sunglasses or watch. So
more than ever before, the ultimate task of luxury brand-
ing goes beyond the explicit use of iconic symbols.
”

7
The rise of the global ‘mass affluent’
demographic, particularly in China, India
and Brazil arguably buoyed demand
for luxury brands following the global
financial crisis. ”- Tom Adams, FutureBrand
Who do you see, by both
demography and attitude, as
being the consumers who are
really driving the luxury sector?
Chuck Kent:
We would argue that there is no luxury ‘sector’ – instead
there are luxury brands in most consumer categories,
and they tier their offers to suit either middle class or
super rich price tolerances. The rise of the global ‘mass
affluent’ demographic, particularly in China, India and
Brazil arguably buoyed demand for luxury brands fol-
lowing the global financial crisis, continuing to purchase
more explicitly branded, entry level versions of Luis Vuit-
ton, Chanel, Rolex and others. And there is now a global
über luxury market for the multimillionaire and billion-
aire consumer. They tend to look for quality, exclusivity,
innovation, prestige, benchmark status, personalised
service and money-is-no-object experiences, and signal
their preference for less ‘mainstream’ luxury brands like
Blancpain and Aman Resorts. So luxury is being driven
by two tiers of consumers.
Building on the last question I think that today a great
many more of us are potential luxury consumers - hap-
pily for luxury brands. The gap between luxury and mass
now has this ‘premiumization bridge’ and as a result we
all desire and even expect some luxury in our daily life –
seeking a new and emotional investment in products and
brands because we identify with them, aesthetically and
values-wise.
In terms of those really driving luxury we are seeing a
new breed of hyper-connected luxury consumers - busy,
time-strapped individuals that value functionality and
convenience, but are unwilling to sacrifice quality. This
isn’t about a particular demographic. It’s about a mind-
set. But, perhaps most importantly, is how the consum-
er is looking at all these new products, experiences and
offers as the sum of the whole - and is looking for new
connections from brands, thought leaders and experts to
maximize the holistic offer and benefit. Audi’s car-pool-
ing service for their consumers feels like it is targeted
towards a younger audience (Gen X and Millennials) in
this kind of way.
We are also seeing Luxury consumers that want the
experience to be more reciprocal. We are increasingly
developing a social and ethical conscience and this is
informing our choices - we want luxury brands to give
us the opportunity to be more philanthropic and socially
conscious. This is about Luxury brands now creating a
more emotional experience and adding a guilt-free ele-
ment to our purchases.
There is a new and exciting generation of e-tailers, like
lifestyle brand Everlane, enjoying an elevated – new lux-
ury – status and success by adopting a new approach to
opening up every aspect of its brand journey, and pro-
moting a move towards sustainability and more ‘radi-
cal transparency’. Everlane champions a new breed of
straightforward and transparent consumerism and gives
its customers the confidence to indulge in guilt-free
luxury shopping. Another example has been created by
The Ritz-Carlton in Washington D.C. The ‘Do Good, Feel
Good’ package offers guests luxury perks in exchange
for helping at a local community kitchen. The luxury ho-
tel donates $100 per guest who signs up to the program.
In luxury, segmentation is dead. It is a carryover from the
“Mad Men” marketing days when the key brand drivers
were image, message, and communications that inter-
rupted and annoyed consumers. Today’s luxury consum-
er can be a middle-aged American or a young Chinese
teenager. But the driving force of the luxury sector is
now less about the spending power of a demographic,
and more about social currency. Influencers, whether
from the front row of a runway shows or bloggers on
social media, create invaluable conversations for luxury
brands. This allows them to get treated like top-spend-
ing customers.
“

8
“…there is no longer such a
defined ‘language of luxury’
and instead luxury leads by
imagination and originality
to assert its status.”
– Sophie Maxwell, Pearlfisher
Does the presence of too many
luxury brands – or too much
segmenting of the market into
Ultra premium, premium and
“regular” luxury, etc. – create
problems for effective luxury
branding?
Chuck Kent:
There are too many luxury brands, especially in this day
and age. Our research shows that consumers select only
a very few brands to which they want to connect. The av-
erage consumer has three to five brands they consider
to be in the inner sanctum of brand relationships they
have. Then they have another ten to fifteen brands they
have one relationship with in some form, and beyond that
today’s consumer is so stretched in terms of attention
that they elect certain relationships and there are many,
many brands that compete for that special relationship.
There is little confusion in the mind of the ultimate luxury
consumer. We need always to bear in mind that demand
for luxury is created by price – so the more affordable it
becomes, the less a true ‘luxury’ brand it is. Otherwise
it fails to do the status and wealth signaling that peo-
ple choose it for, whether this signaling is aspirational
or not. Arguably, the characteristics of luxury have re-
mained the same, and many of them can be recreated by
more mainstream ‘premium’ brands as raw materials,
manufacturing processes and distribution have become
more reliable and cheaper through automation and glob-
al supply chains. Instead, it is the absolute thresholds for
true luxury that have increased.
Blancpain offer a $1MM timepiece, the Bugatti Veyron is
over $2MM, the Royal Penthouse Suite at the Hotel Pres-
ident Wilson in Geneva is  $83,000 per night and Hermès
holds the record for the world’s most expensive handbag
at over $400,000. These are beyond the affordability of
most people in the world, and exist to satisfy the need
for the super-rich to signal that there is no limit to what
they can afford. And there is a world of luxury beyond
these mainstream products differentiated by extreme
price that falls into the ‘Bespoke & Beyond’ category -
the epitome of personalized, tailored and rarified. In this
world, customization is key: from the choice of interior
design in your 65m fast displacement Heesen Yacht to
the cabin finish options on your Embraer Lineage 1000E
private jet. These are the rules of contemporary luxury
branding, and those that can afford them understand the
difference.
Not necessarily. The market is already established and
catering to different levels of premiumization while
co-existing – even if the boundaries are blurred - with
luxury. But we still want luxury to lead, to innovate and to
tempt us - upholding desire is the key to luxury. However,
the key thing to note is that luxury no longer follows such
strict category rules or cues – there is no longer such a
defined ‘language of luxury’ and instead luxury leads by
imagination and originality to assert its status. This does,
of course, mean that copying traditional and maybe more
prescriptive luxury cues is no longer such an easy option
for premium brands. Instead, those looking to master
premiumization need to copy the luxury approach - re-
turning to core values and quintessential beliefs to cre-
ate ever more unique and individual expressions.

9
What are the categories that
most define luxury today?
Chuck Kent:
The new sense of experiential luxury is really gaining
traction. The notion of ‘inclusive exclusivity’ has always
been the driving force for luxury consumption. However,
our constant connectivity and attachment to technology
has driven us to seek out real life experiences (rather
than items) that surprise and delight in new and vis-
ceral ways. The food and hospitality sectors have really
embraced this – answering this new desire with hidden
rooms in restaurants, secret menus, personalized sub-
scription services.
We are now more motivated by experiencing or ‘collect-
ing’ luxury experiences and services, but also sharing
them with our audiences across our various social net-
works. These experiences are the intangible luxuries
that allow us to create lasting, timeless impressions that
can create enduring memories.
Luxury used to focus on goods as status symbols. The fo-
cus is now shifting to travel. We don’t even need to “own”
a luxury item or product in order to experience this any-
more. Brands are now able to transcend specific cate-
gories and connect with consumers on their own terms.
Luxury continues to be defined today by the jewelry, fra-
grance and fashion & accessories categories, and by
brands that make strong use of one or all of the follow-
ing:
• Precious metals, jewels and exclusive materials – like
the Hublot ‘BB’ 2 million Euro diamond encrusted watch.
• Exceptional quality and rare ingredients – like the use
of Ostrich, alligator and other unusual leathers in hand-
bag production for brands like Hermes, or rare plants
like the Madagascan ylang ylang used in Annick Goutal
Eau d’Hadrien perfume.
• Hand crafted or master crafted processes – like hand
made John Lobb Alligator shoes for over £10,000.
“Luxury used to focus on
goods as status symbols.
The focus is now shifting to
travel.”
- Erich Joachimsthaler, Vivaldi Partners

10
“…the physical store is a chance
for luxury brands to plunge their
loyalists into a feeling of calm, time
and space.
–
What do you see as the most
important differentiators in
luxury branding… design,
quality, brand experience…
other?
Chuck Kent: Tom Adams, FutureBrand
There are three key differentiators in contempo-
rary luxury branding:
1. A rich digital experience – luxury brands were
slow to bring their digital presence in line with the
design quality of their products and other chan-
nels. With luxury consumers more likely to re-
search and even buy their goods online than ever
before, digital is the first and most frequent point
of luxury contact and needs to deliver the same
exquisite attention to detail, quality and service
standards and product demonstration as a phys-
ical store.
2. Recognition beyond the logo – luxury brands
are increasingly moving beyond their iconic sym-
bols to more subtle points of reference like pat-
terns, textures and silhouettes. Luxury consum-
ers can identify products by their finish, styling or
materials and are less inclined to overtly display a
logo – particularly at the upper end of the income
scale.  
3. Retail temples – the physical store is a chance
for luxury brands to plunge their loyalists into a
feeling of calm, time and space, which are argu-
ably the most precious commodities in the world
today. The less pressure there is to ‘buy’ and the
more a customer is made to feel that shopping
is about leisure and personal attention, the more
luxurious it will feel.

11
Luxury has always had some traditional differentiators,
and I think they will continue to be important. For ex-
ample, source. Certain luxury brands come from certain
places. LVMH is a French brand; part of LVMH is a French
mystique, their culture. And Burberry may no longer be
manufactured in the UK, but Burberry is British culture,
it’s British-ness, it’s lifestyle.
One of the most notable traits that we are seeing in to-
day’s luxury consumers is that they are increasingly be-
coming educated curators. They are inspired by a story
but are more confident to put together their own style.
They build on and around a narrative about their chosen
luxury brand or product through its heritage, the profile
of the craft, the detail of the process and the occasion of
the purchase. A big part of the new opportunity for luxury
lies in stepping away from its previous iterations - and
more obvious - communication to set new benchmarks
in creativity, craft and idealism – surely some of its most
important values – and embrace the opportunity for real
open mindedness and existing in new guises to match
the changing desires and motivations of its consumer.
But, as brands stretch beyond their original areas of ex-
pertise and categories, the importance of using brand
design to communicate a cohesive message is growing in
importance and visibility. And it is great design that has
the potential to build brands into the kind of immerse
worlds that really capture the imaginations of consum-
ers. The constantly imaginative and surprising world
created by Verve Clicquot is a pretty fabulous example
of this.
It’s about establishing your vision and the starting point
from which to evolve a seamless message and expression
that builds desirability across all touch points. Burberry’s
megastore - ‘Burberry World Live’ - was a game-chang-
ing approach, successfully converging the physical and
digital by mirroring the online experience in-store. Full
length-screens switch to act as mirrors and many items
are chipped with radio-frequency identification technol-
ogy, meaning that multimedia content relevant to the
product is triggered when an item is placed near a mir-
ror. And this ground floor experience is vastly different
to - but just as striking and important – the display of
trench coats dating back to the early 1900s showcased
on the first floor. Yes, it is another experiential approach
– a driving, strategic mission of all today’s brands - but
it is an integrated experience that plays to the art of the
brand using the retail world as an exhibition showcase
or gallery of its works but with the interactive, inclusive
approach favored by today’s consumer.

12
A Bain & Company study
notes that “The luxury-goods
industry in most markets is now
driven by touristic spending…
It requires thinking about the
product offerings from a more
global perspective…” Does
this ring true with your current
experience and, if so, what does
achieving and executing against
a global perspective look like in
practice?
Chuck Kent: Sophie Maxwell, Pearlfisher
Absolutely. But, as brands increasingly aspire to global
reach, there is also a growing recognition that not all
desires are universal and that the same message does
not necessarily translate seamlessly across cultures. Al-
though brands are closer to having a global product offer
than ever before – and a lot of fashion labels do – luxury
markets are still at different levels of evolution and obvi-
ously subject to changing financial circumstances.
A lot of expectation was placed on Russia and Asia, for
example, to be leading markets for luxury brands, but
brands here have been forced to now to reshape their
strategies due to the reversal in fortune of these territo-
ries. Added to this, we have a luxury consumer looking
for this more personal and individual connection. As a
result, brands are increasingly looking for ways to create
luxury experiences that draw on their locality - finding
ways to embed themselves into the local environment by
understanding, adapting and appreciating the character
and history of individual locations, weaving aspects of it
into how the brand is shaped, experienced and under-
stood. One example we think is an inspired approach is
Pernod Ricard’s Our/Vodka - a vodka brand based on one
recipe but produced differently based on the local ingre-
dients sourced where it is made in eleven different cities
across the globe. This allows each location’s distiller to
give the vodka an individual, locally and culturally in-
spired twist – and it is run by different tribes of people
– for example, Fashion in Berlin and Skate in NYC.

13
True luxury brands are universal in appeal and global in
character. Just as affluent consumers move across bor-
ders, so too does their signaling power – from airport
lounges to 5-star restaurants, bars and professional set-
tings. Arguably, however, whilst the brand itself needs to
be consistent globally and recognizable by its symbols,
colours and signature products – like the Hermès Birkin
bag or the Porsche silhouette – there is space for local-
ization of product to reflect culture and materials of the
place. This is particularly important today because of the
increasing relevance of craftsmanship in luxury goods,
coupled with the growth of consumer preoccupation with
provenance – or the ‘made in’ component of a product.
Prada’s ‘Country of Origin’ labeling being one example,
or the importance of collecting your new Porsche off the
production line at Leipzig, and knowing that your Bentley
was hand made in Crewe, England. Whilst luxury brand
tourism has often driven by the desire to avoid counter-
feiting, there is also great cachet in buying luxury brands
from their ‘source’ in Paris or Milan or London. Within
this, there is also an opportunity for niche and discovery
luxury brands that only exist in a specific location, if they
meet attributes of quality, scarcity, prestige and perfor-
mance.
Luxury marketers need to adopt and accept digital as the
new universal language of the industry. Global markets
require a new approach to branding, product assort-
ment, and building customer relationships. None of this
will be based on traditional segmentation. In the past,
sales assistants would know customers by name and be
familiar with their preferences. Now, the organization as
a whole needs to cater to the individual which has mas-
sive implications for all systems and teams within the
organization.
“…there is also a growing
recognition that not all
desires are universal and
that the same message does
not necessarily translate
seamlessly across cultures.”
– Tom Adams, FutureBrand

14
Innovation is fairly well an
obsession in most categories –
what role does it play in luxury?
Most luxury brands need to wake up to the fact that con-
sumer adoption of technology is going to disrupt their
business, if it isn’t already. Most luxury brands have a
simple narrative or story that supports their product
like “Buy me, and you can attain a bit of an aspirational
lifestyle. Perhaps you can even live like a celebrity.” It is
a story of hope. Charles Revson, the founder of Revlon
said, “We don’t sell perfume, we sell hope.” Yet, innova-
tion will come from offering products and experiences, in
addition to creating a story or narrative that weaves into
the story that consumers are creating for themselves.
This is why it is so important that luxury brands tran-
sition from selling on aspiration to being a part of their
consumers’ lives – which will be driven by data, technol-
ogy and analytics.
Luxury, at its best, has historically been one of the most
innovative categories of all – which can be forgotten
when we see old-school representations of it. To create
luxury at the highest levels, defining and differentiating
and building on your established brand equity, is essen-
tial in increasingly competitive categories. If this is done
with excellence – by brands like Verve Cliquot with imag-
inative and pleasure-driven experiences, Burberry with
technology or by Hermes with sustainability and crafts-
manship championed by Petit H - then you are taking
centuries of craft, intrinsic originality and the heart and
soul of the brand and reframing it to continue to set the
benchmark for a hugely important part of our culture.
In many cases, this approach is now allowing brands to
extend far beyond their core expertise and innovate in
new areas.
Chuck Kent: Luxury brands today need to build complete and immer-
sive worlds for their consumers by introducing the unex-
pected, adding rich layers to their lives and by exploring
and reframing their desires. And this should result in a
truly perceptive, creative and visionary brand and retail
strategy with more emotional behavior and expressive
brands, products and services in line with our contem-
porary culture.
“…it is so important that luxury brands
transition from selling on aspiration
to being a part of their consumers’
lives – which will be driven by data,
technology and analytics.”
– Erich Joachimsthaeler, Vivaldi Partners
It might seem like a contradiction in terms to marry the
novelty of innovation with brands that depend so much on
tradition, heritage and craftsmanship for their success.
But, instead of just being novelty, if we think of innovation
as ‘commercializing inventions’ – there is a powerful role
for new technologies, techniques and materials in luxury
products and services as long as they reinforce the im-
portant characteristics of luxury, from quality to scarcity
or superfluousness.
For example, luxury aircraft and yachts depend on the
most up-to-date materials and technology systems to
drive fuel efficiency and comfort: features sold by their
manufacturers as functions of quality and customization.
Apple Watch is also arguably the beginning of Apple posi-
tioning as a luxury brand and entering the global market
for exquisitely crafted timepieces – marrying the cues of
precious metals, precision finishing and elegance with
digital display and a software ecosystem unavailable to
its Swiss counterparts.  There is also the potential for
luxury brands to innovate in service experience as a way
to reinforce their credentials, like the London Selfridges
Fragrance Lab that matches a unique scent to your re-
quirements.

15
Digital doesn’t seem to be
having a huge sales impact in
luxury – just 5% of total global
sales. Does it have other impact
besides online sales, and do
you see its importance growing
in the future?
There is increasing evidence that digital channels are a
primary source of research for luxury brand consumers
around the world – particularly in important markets like
China, Brazil and Russia. And that a small, but growing
number of luxury consumers are buying products on-
line, because of the convenience it offers. In this context,
whilst physical retail is still the primary sales channel
for luxury goods, there is some debate about when the
decision to purchase is actually made. Luxury brands
have realized this and in addition to evolving their retail
strategy – focusing on storytelling and brand experience
like the Harrods ‘Pradasphere’ – are also providing more
video product display online: helping consumers to see
the texture, size and quality of products virtually before
they buy. This is going to be more and more important
as consumers expect the convenience of instant omni-
channel shopping experiences combined with rich, im-
mersive product demonstration and interaction.
Chuck Kent:

16
Yes, for this market, it’s about much more than just sales
but not all brands are maybe at the point of being able
to translate what the opportunity means for their brand.
The initial doubt around luxury and tech was the fact
that luxury is such a tactile and immersive experience,
how could that ever be replicated on-line etcetera. But
there are some amazing successes where people have
rethought what it could mean for their brand or proposi-
tion. Net-a-porter, for example, was a concept that was
initially doubted and has gone on to massive global suc-
cess. It is just taking time for us to re-adjust our expec-
tations around what the luxury experience should be. We
also need to remember that getting online is often our
first port of call today, whatever the sector.
The online world of the future will allow us to build a
world of luxury around the individual and could be said
to offer the opportunity of an even more personal, inti-
mate – and less intimidating – relationship. If you think
about it the luxury world makes desire real, granting its
audience ultimate control, allowing them to shape their
world, imagine and then realize their dreams – and no-
where is this more true than with the digital world in all
its forms. It has the power to move the relationship from
a distant to an ever more intimate, in-depth and dynamic
connection.
Most importantly digital application should no longer be
seen as the end point for a brand’s realization. It is an
integral opportunity to form an even more personal con-
nection with the brand, to help build and shape future
identity and interactions and to maximize its potential
for future creative and commercial success. Social-me-
dia is all about sharing knowledge, creating connection
and offering the opportunity for co-creation – which is
completely in line with the motivation of today’s luxury
consumer. The new, and increasingly popular, fandoms
could be a truly apposite way of engaging with both ex-
isting customers and help draw affluent and aspiration-
al fans to a brand’s channels and increase its follower
base. Net-a-porter’s recently launched ‘Net-set’ is a
great example of this, an online network of style tribes
that differs from applications such as Instagram or Pin-
terest because every single thing featured is shoppable
and all based on the idea that social media has boosted
women’s interest in what each other is wearing. A sim-
ple but brilliant idea based on the brand’s core truth of
fashion available through an accessible format. As Net-
a-porter Founder, Natalie Massenet, says, ‘Digital inno-
vation doesn’t stand still and neither do we’.
The perception that luxury customers solely prefer to
shop in physical mono stores is changing. Think about
how Tesla is successfully selling premium cars online.
However, digital shouldn’t be assessed on its ability to
drive sales. After all, it allows brands to deliver a new
experience to the customer. The challenge for luxury
brands lies in orchestrating those traditional and new
communication channels to deliver one holistic brand.
Burberry managed to do this by integrating their digi-
tal platform with their value chain. This gave their cus-
tomers the opportunity to become a part of the Burberry
world. But Burberry is an exception. It is not a website or
a social media campaign. It is a social or digital enter-
prise through and through.

17
Given the rising concerns about
income inequality, and the next
generation’s reported demand
for greater purpose and
meaning (in both the brands
they buy and the work they
do), do you see any potential
for backlash against luxury
brands? If so, what should
luxury brands do?
This is a very prescient topic. As we are witnessing, the
consumer perception of luxury is no longer based on
price, heritage or reputation but a more intrinsic sense
of worth. Essentially, we don’t believe that the traditional
luxury brands need to totally reinvent themselves but it
would appear that not all are yet fully embracing new
ways to connect with their consumer or exhibit more
mindful or good behavior. Some marked exceptions are
Burberry, which has always demonstrated a belief in
sustainable behavior where possible, and the aforemen-
tioned Hermes with its Petit H range of unique products
made from its precious off-cuts. The new generation –
Stella McCartney and Everlane - have built this into their
DNA from the get-go.
And, yes, luxury brands do need to reframe the defini-
tion of the luxury experience in retail. Edited or curated
retail is nothing new. However, the concept of selling a
lifestyle and experience over product is continuing to be
sharpened and refined. Physical retail spaces will evolve
into the ultimate showcases of the brand. This is per-
Chuck Kent: haps nothing new when it comes to the high-end fashion
brands but it is now being adopted by other luxury sec-
tors. Last year’s ‘The sound of Porsche’ was a multi-sen-
sory and interactive, pop-up experience designed as a
modern-day record store and offering customers the
chance to hear the story behind the brand identity and
indulge in a virtual drive – a hospitality industry inspired
selling environment to counter the ‘hard sell’ ambience
of traditional automotive showrooms.
Each generation has its own ideals and lifestyles, but
common truths and higher order goals remain constant.
Luxury has always has been about showing status, re-
warding yourself and indulging. Those core principles
will remain; let’s not forget that the share of wealthy
people is continually increasing. The good news is that
many luxury brands, given their price premium, can still
afford to produce domestically. Mass brands, on the oth-
er hand, need to source from low wage economies. The
good news for mass brands is that people still find it
meaningful to buy local.
There will always be a role for conspicuous consump-
tion in culture, regardless of changing economic condi-
tions. But people may feel a pressure to signal ‘who I
am’ (for the very wealthy, to peer groups who know the
difference), or ‘who I would like to be’ more subtly than
before, as broader cultural norms change around the
word. That doesn’t entail a backlash, as long as luxury
brands move with the times to address our preoccupa-
tions with ethics, sustainability or the need to articulate
‘why’ they are here beyond profit. In a sense, they have
always done so – by emphasizing the care, provenance
and craftsmanship in their products. But we expect to
see more concern with and use of sustainable materials,
more supply chain transparency and more sensitivity to
packaging waste, as well as a focus on the longevity they
offer – like the fact that you never ‘own’ a Patek Philippe,
but simply look after it for the next generation.

18
Please share an example of a
forward-thinking initiative the
brands you work with are taking
to move luxury branding into
the future?
Vivaldi Partners Group’s client HUGO BOSS represents
a great example how a luxury brand can redefine its in-
teraction with consumers. We’re working with them on
shifting loyalty from being a program to becoming a two-
way phenomenon.
Nespresso is a great example of a global luxury brand
that is attending to the imperatives towards
innovation and greater ethical and sustainable creden-
tials. Its Nespresso Cube concept offers the ultimate in
automated, personalized shopping, allowing the brand
to appear in unexpected locations and provide the tai-
lored experience that Nespresso loyalists have come to
expect. Similarly, Nespresso’s ecolaboration initiative is
part of the brand’s global commitment to taking respon-
sibility for its ecological performance – from sustainable
sourcing of coffee to pod recycling initiatives and the im-
proved energy efficiency of its coffee machines.
One macro theme we have been looking at closely, and
working with clients to develop for the last year, is that of
technology facilitating ultimate personalization. And, al-
though it will ultimately impact the mainstream, I’m sure
it is perfect for luxury as it is inspired by the key luxury
values of individuality, craft and detail but reframed by
technological advances.
Chuck Kent: While our initiatives are currently under wraps as works
in progress, brands like Geneu - the skincare brand
based on London’s Bond Street - showcase this perfect-
ly. The brand accesses its consumers DNA and stores it
on a micro-chip – the first time this technology has been
accessible – and then uses it to create products which
are perfectly tailored to their consumers needs and so
can be expected to achieve previously unachievable re-
sults. And, at the end of the day, that typifies true luxury:
achieving the unimagined and unexpected - raising the
game to inspire from the very pinnacle of our desires - to
give us the want we never even knew we wanted.
One macro theme we have
been looking at closely, and
working with clients to develop
for the last year, is that of
technology facilitating ultimate
personalization.”
“

19
NEXT MONTH
on The Branding Roundtable:
Destination Branding
Moderator:
Chuck Kent
Director of Brand Content, Avenue &
Contributing Editor, Branding Magazine

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