On Friday 8 November, Lotte Duty Free hosted an exclusive event to promote Gucci makeup’s new Rouge à Lèvres Lunaison lipsticks; seasonal additions to a full lip wardrobe first introduced to travel retail earlier this year.

 

Lotte Duty Free, which actually previewed the the lipsticks on 1 November, will carry them exclusively until 15 November.

 

On Saturday and Sunday Lotte opened up the experience to the general public welcoming around 2,000 guests.

 

On Saturday evening fans of famed Korean makeup artist, Pony, were treated to an exclusive Q&A session.

 

As reported, parent company of Gucci Beauty, Coty, revealed that the eccentric Italian fashion brand had added to the range with two limited-edition holiday Rouge à Lèvres Lunaison shades; 25* Goldie Red and 710 Fay Turquoise.

 

STAR QUALITY

Gucci Creative Director, Alessandro Michele kicked off the re-launch of Gucci Beauty with three lipstick collections earlier this year: Rouge à Lèvres Satin, Rouge à Lèvres Voile and Baume à Lèvres.

 

Friday’s VIP event in Korea welcomed guests to its Star Lounge on the 14^th floor of its main Lotte Duty Free store in Myeongdong Seoul, comprising around 250 ‘influencers’, celebrities and representatives from consumer and trade media titles, including TRBusiness which reported live from the event.

 

Dani Miller, one of the faces of the Gucci Beauty campaign and lead singer of punk band Surfbort, attended the event, together with models Mae Lapres and Ellia Sophia, who also starred in the campaign. Guests enjoyed DJ sets by Dani Miller and MUSHXXX.

 

Gucci Global Makeup Artist Thomas de Kluyver’s team were on hand to apply lipstick to guests, choosing from the 60 different shades and four formulas.

 

‘MOST IMPORTANT PART OF THE BUSINESS’

The Gucci launch is just one of a flurry of exclusive events which Lotte has staged in recent months in partnership with leading global beauty brands.

 

Merchandising Director, Beauty, Jeffrey Davis told TRBusiness just recently that experiential retail – incorporating powerful social media marketing campaigns – with a focus on personalised brand experiences is now the ‘most important part of the business’.

As the company moves further away from the traditionally transactional shopping environments – knowing that its customers prefer to make purchases online or on their mobile phones – it continues to push the boundaries of what retail means today in Korea, but also overseas.

 

BEST-IN-CLASS

“We have so many different ways of making our store really disruptive; from our lounge where we host VIP events – for our true VIPs, KOLs and celebrities – which gives them a compelling reason to come to Korea and visit us,” Davis told TRBusiness.

 

“They may re-route their trip, just to attend one of our events; they are that important to them.”

 

Davis insists that Lotte’s events are ‘best-in-class’, but its high standards could not be reached without extraordinary commitment from its brand partners.

 

“It’s not just Lotte, it’s the brands who have really done some extraordinary things with us and we are super happy with our collaborations thus far,” he said. “Every time we host one of these events, we do it better.”

 

TRBusiness asked Davis how the company measures ‘success’. “It depends on what we are looking for,” he qualified.

 

“Are we looking for impressions (social media), or for sales? Some of our brand partners really just want impressions, they want customers to see what their brand represents. Other brands just want sales.”

 

Gucci makeup hosted a takeover of the light boxes and digital displays on Lotte Duty Free’s Star Avenue. See video below.