Premium Beauty News - Packaging suppliers paved the way to full service. Are designers taking the same direction?

Thierry de Baschmakoff - Yes, there are more and more design agencies offering a full range of services. Actually, there is no alternative. Most of the agencies that did not opt for diversification do no longer exist.

Thierry de Baschmakoff, Aesthete

Today, Aesthete can address both specific design issues and more global brand positioning issues.

Premium Beauty News - How did you start developing these new business areas?

Thierry de Baschmakoff - The diversification of the agency’s business happened naturally, from one contract to the other, just by answering our customers’ requests.

From the design of perfumes and beauty products, we were progressively asked to provide design services for other categories of luxury items: leather goods, luxury watches, pencils, and sunglasses… Bulgari and Fred greatly contributed to our diversification.

Another of our customers, London’s jeweller Asprey, consulted us about the design of the boutiques. That’s how we started to develop our know-how in interior design.

Aesthete’s offer now covers a broad range of design-related services. We have created two new departments, “Interior design” and “Communication” in addition to the already existing “Product design” and “Graphic design” departments.

Aesthete for Lalique

Our range of services now features design, communication and merchandising. We can therefore create a whole and consistent graphic and 3D universe around the products that we design. However, we can also get in touch with customers at later steps, directly through our “Interior design” and “Communication” teams.

Premium Beauty News - What are the advantages of full service design?

Thierry de Baschmakoff - There are obvious advantages for brand owners. The first one is time saving. Working with a single agency help to avoid wasting time with briefs, brand and product understanding, … As far as we are concerned, we work in 3D from the very beginning of a design study, meaning that once the customer has selected the shape, we can immediately start working on the communication, the 3D animations, or the POS material.

The other advantage, is money saving. Of course, working with a single supplier is less expensive than splitting a budget between several companies.

Eventually, full service design also helps to maintain the consistency of a project. It’s a kind of art direction.

Premium Beauty News - Did this broader activity help you to serve new customers?

Thierry de Baschmakoff - We’re still working with many manufacturers of perfumes or luxury items, but also with an increasing number of industrial suppliers, in particular for their communication or their website.

Suppliers have a double interest in our services. First of all, we have a strong knowledge of the luxury business, in particular the perfumery and beauty business. Then, we are also able to help them in their relation with their customers’ marketing teams. Since we are used to work with marketing departments in relation with product design, we speak their language and we know how to interest them.