PARIS — Dom Luguay is no stranger to telling stories.
A long-time creative consultant for luxury brands, she specializes in helping brands define their identity, develop products and expand into new segments. But with the industry experiencing its deepest recession in 15 years, the luxury industry needs to branch out into new subcultures and reinvent itself, she told WWD in an interview. .
That’s why Rouguet, founder and creative director of Alchimie Paris, and Bernard Nazaire, the agency’s associate director, are launching their own magazine with a party on Tuesday during Paris Men’s Fashion Week. is.
They said in a statement that they hope the annual publication, called Resonant, will “move ideas and spark dialogue with future players.” A free-form showcase for activists, artists, writers, scientists, and experts, the first issue explores the theme of night as a space of inquiry and dissent.
“This is a diverse and free-spirited magazine that aims to help people form their own opinions and beliefs,” explained Legue, adding that the magazine is a popular choice for Italy and, in some cases, He added that it is the starting point for a series of conferences that he hopes to hold further afield.
Tuesday’s event will feature a talk hosted by Rouguet and Alina Gourdiel, editor of Ma Nuits aux Musées, a collection of books published by Stock written by writers who spend nights alone in museums. . “Young people are hungry for culture and reading,” she pointed out.
Dom Ruge
Anne de Vendière/Courtesy of Alchimie Paris
This 144-page magazine, printed on FSC mix paper, retails for 40 euros and is available at bookstores such as OFR, Les Cahiers de Colette and L’Ecume des Pages in Paris. The first issue had only three advertisers: Patou, Diptyque and Frédéric Malle, none of whom had ever advertised in print before.
Luguet believes luxury brands need to pivot away from their elevation strategy and pay close attention to Gen Z and Alpha. “We keep reading stereotypes about these groups, and it’s not very interesting. What’s interesting is that you can detect the boundaries of an emerging youth culture,” she said.
Recent statistics show that these young people are abandoning luxury in droves.
According to the latest Bain Altagamma Global Luxury Market Research, the personal luxury goods market will depreciate by 2% in 2024 at current exchange rates, the slowest slowdown in 15 years, excluding the coronavirus pandemic period. The sector is expected to grow between 0% and 0%. And this year it’s 4%.
For the first time in the report’s 23-year history, its customer base has shrunk. It announced that the luxury goods market would lose about 50 million customers between 2022 and 2024, shrinking to an estimated 350 million customers at the end of last year.
Despite expanding into areas such as sports and entertainment, brands are losing touch with the microcultures that inform young consumers who want to buy meaningful products that reflect their evolving selves. , argued Mr. Rouge.
“It’s important to speak to the very young generation who will be tomorrow’s luxury consumers, listen to them and not leave them behind,” she said. “The important question is: What is valuable to young people?”
Resonant magazine layout.
Courtesy of Alchimie Paris
It’s important to look for emotional connections rather than relying on data, she said, citing the example of niche Chinese fragrance brand Documents, which has opened a bookstore with 200 carefully selected books on the theme of trees. He cited Chanel’s Comètes Collective, which is made up of three make-up artists, as an example. Very diverse background.
As cultural leaders, she believes brands have an obligation to better understand and represent symbols and aesthetics from other parts of the world. “That’s also the role of luxury. It’s not just about sticking a dragon on the back of a T-shirt, it’s about addressing myths, totems and other powerful elements,” she said.
Alchimie focuses primarily on beauty, jewellery, wine and spirits, with a team of creative ‘profilers’ stretching from Colombia to China, and experts ranging from neuroscientists and video game experts to textiles. Thanks to our global network of 300 consultants, we specialize in difficult data. experts and ethnographers.
“Given that we sometimes work on projects upstream for four to five years, we are bound by strict confidentiality rules and are able to develop brands from the beginning for large groups. “Even when we develop it to the end, we’ve done it several times before. We weren’t even allowed to say on social media that we invented the name and the strategy,” Legue said.
“When you help someone give birth, it’s not the midwife that matters, it’s the person delivering the baby,” she reasoned.
The agency, which has traditionally relied on word of mouth, is stepping out of its comfort zone with a magazine project that sheds light on its methods and thinking.
“At one point we had a tool that analyzed areas of brands through the filter of religion, which quickly got stolen. Then we developed a tool that analyzed them according to archetypes. So we no longer use archetypes, we use a combination of numbers and anthropology,” she said.
Amid an unprecedented creative upheaval at European fashion houses, the consultant would seem to have the perfect job. “I love working on brands that have fallen by the wayside,” she said, explaining the process of forensically uncovering a brand’s identity.
“You need to define and update your own vocabulary,” she continued. “Luxury has to start anew or it will become an endangered species. A species worth protecting, but one that can no longer be approached through a very commercial, data-driven lens. I don’t think you can.”
