Premium Beauty News - You have recently taken control of Beyond Beauty Paris with a renewed team and the ambition to revive the event. What is your diagnosis on the show’s positioning?
Claudia Bonfiglioli - When I joined the Informa Group in September 2014, I aimed at developing the Informa Beauty Division on the global level. After six months in Shanghai and the huge success of China Beauty Expo, I was able to see the European market from a new perspective and understand the weaknesses of the show’s positioning over the past few years. There is an obvious need for renewal, which is why we decided to give it a stronger identity driven by two major sectors, Skincare and Perfumery, endow it with new dynamics, and renew with its DNA, which is mainly composed of beauty trends and innovation. Beyond Beauty Paris is the first show after summer, so it enables professionals to get back into the swing of things, discover new trends, get familiar with the new emerging currents, find different sources of inspiration, feel influences… It is an important event!
Premium Beauty News - You have taken on several issues at the same time: a more dynamic programme of conferences, an emphasis on beauty trends… How is this going to take shape along with the usual Zoom and Beyond Beauty Lab?
Claudia Bonfiglioli – The Zoom, our launching platform for emerging brands, and the Beyond Beauty Lab, whose theme will be Skin & Environment in 2015, are highly attractive and perennial areas, so they are obviously still part of the picture. In addition, as part of our renewal process, we must provide both the public and exhibitors with new highlights to complete the show’s existing offer. Our programme of conferences – the Beyond Beauty Talks – has been reinvented! We have introduced a new branding to go back to the Beyond Beauty origins and opted for a more dynamic composition: on top of the traditional 45-minute conferences, masterclass series and round tables will be integrated into a programme that is already rich, and which is designed to enhance reflection, trigger debates, and make visitors take part in exchanges with all beauty players. It will be an opportunity to discuss topics like the new connected generation, the arrival of new pharmacy players and experts of galenics, the flood of home devices and connected objects, the reinforced presence of emerging markets, not only as players, but also consumers, the influence of Asia in the Western world… and all this in the presence of great names like Clinique, Erborian, Ioma, Chanel, BASF, L’Oréal, HEC Paris, and many others. As for trends, they represent the main thread of this 2015 edition, as can be seen with our exhibitors’ products and services, our Talks, but also the new Beyond Beauty Trends area gathering styling and trends agencies like Peclers and Centdegrés.
Premium Beauty News - The launching of Beyond Beauty Fragrance is another key element of the new Beyond Beauty Paris. How will the perfumery area be organized?
Claudia Bonfiglioli – This year, it seemed essential to us that the perfume industry needed to be better represented, as it is little, or not evoked at all on French professional shows. Creating the Beyond Beauty Fragrance area was mainly a response to the rare perfume market, which achieved a 160 million euro turnover in 2011. The segment increased threefold in only ten years! The show will thus give the opportunity to this exceptional perfumery sector to express itself through various highlights: first, a dedicated exhibition area in the presence of about twenty niche brands, but also two masterclass days focused on artistic perfumery, a large round table with Thomas Fontaine, from Jean-Louis Scherrer and Patou, and lastly, an olfactory tour. We are very honoured to have been able to set up this project in partnership with Marie Huet and Johann Vitrey [2] and with the support of the Comité Joséphine. So, to start afresh after summer holidays, Beyond Beauty will offer a real odyssey in honour of auteur perfumery, and we are happy to organize the very first rare perfume meeting in Paris!
Premium Beauty News - What about Creative Beauty, the part of the show dedicated to suppliers?
Claudia Bonfiglioli - The area dedicated to the upstream part of the industry will definitely have its own place on the show! Ingredient and raw material suppliers, packaging and conditioning companies, formulators, private labels and OEMs, service providers for companies… they have all accepted the invitation. Exhibitors like B.Kolormakeup, Capsum, Baralan, Lablabo, Laboratoires Alpol, SICAF Laboratoires, Euro Vetrocap, and others will showcase their innovations and new expertise for major cosmetics groups and manufacturers to find inspiring ideas, new technologies and solutions to develop their product ranges.
Premium Beauty News - In short, how would you define this new Beyond Beauty Paris show?
Claudia Bonfiglioli – This year, Beyond Beauty Paris will mix trends and innovation with a 360° vision: from manufacturers to end users, from Europe to Asia, and from brands to suppliers. Our exhibitor offer and our programme of conferences complement each other, so visitors will be provided with a global vision of what the beauty world will have to offer tomorrow. But this new Beyond Beauty Paris has also taken a new direction towards the world of Perfumes…
