Monday, March 31, 2014

Nubile Forms, Their Voices Echoing in the Woods

Cacharel produced a romantic (and I bet to be discussed) commercial for the first flanker of Anais Anais in 3 and a half decades (the original was issued in 1978), Anais Anais Premier Délice.
Sarah Moon gives her place to Olivia Bee (barely 19 herself) for this time around, shooting what looks like teenager models having a hippie good time in the woods. Dora Baghriche and Olivier Cresp of Firmenich have composed the new fragrance (eau de toilette 50 ml sells for 39,90 euros at the time of writing, international launch set for April 2014). The scent of Anais Anais Premier Délice starts with green pear, bergamot, galbanum and orange, with the heart familiarly floral with peony and hyacinth, while the anchoring notes include cocoa and cedarwood.


It's an interesting, though not novel, approach, since the flanker is supposed to capitalize on a well-established brand, which however has lost much of its fresh, youthful appeal now that its original audience is comprised of mothers with their own daughters. So, in order to capture the daughters, L'Oreal, who hold the licence to parfums Cacharel came up with this plan. After all, three quarters of the sales of Cacharel come from the perfume sector!

What do you think? Wow or Yawn? (I refer to the advertising aspect, rather than the list of notes)

11 comments:

  1. Kind of a yawn for me, really.

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  2. Anonymous20:08

    a goddess cult! with initiation by pollen. how cute. and perfectly targeted to the younger audience. i would've wanted to frolic in those pretty woods in my teenaged years. still do! but i would've wanted some boys to tag along, and i kept waiting for a boy to show up in this one.

    cheers,
    minette

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  3. Adorable! And what minette said!

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  4. Maria02:06

    The concept is old but still wow, the video is yawn anyway. But it does look promising as a first perfume for a girly girl daughter of a conservative mother, aka my elder niece. No set opinion before testing, of course, but green pear, orange and peony on cocoa and cedarwood sound about right for a 10 to 11 yo. As such, definitely to be tested.

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  5. Not bad in the (admittedly unexciting) world of perfume ads. As you had pointed out in a previous post, the novelty of the original ad was that they were girl. Now that hypersexualized girls are all over the ad world, it seems that the girl image shifted to an innocent, almost a-sexualized environment. Hippy, as you said, but preraphaelite, sort of like the girls in Julia Cameron's pictures having a found a bit of energy in organic food.

    As for the scent, Anais Anais stood apart from the rest exactly because of its fresh, prim, but non-sweet character. But current teen taste dictates sweetness. As long as they keep doing the original stuff...

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  6. Anonymous08:25

    Cacharel knows how to thrill us ...
    A LouLou lover myself !

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  7. I never cared very much for Anais Anais, but love Noa and Lou Lou. The commercial could have been more subdued, a different soundtrack would've made it better. And a boy peering through the woods, of course...

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  8. Anonymous14:21

    Seems pretty much the same idea as the original - a sort of girls on the cusp of womanhood having a vaguely gay moment. If I didn't relate to the broderie anglais white lace innocence of it then, I certainly don't now as a cynical middle-aged woman! I was a Magie Noire sort of teenager.
    But I still quite like the smell of the original, looks like this one is fruity, and it looks like they're rubbing some sort of horrible fruity gel on their faces, oh well

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  9. Anonymous14:23

    Girls of color are conspicuously absent from this advertisement. The year is now 2014. C'mon, L'Oreal/Cacharel- what gives?

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  10. Excellent points all of you, thanks for commenting!

    I suppose it's a remake of innocent girls nuzzling each other, since it caught on first time around, this time less stylized perhaps and less flou but more "nature calling". (like Cacio says Preraphaelite and into macrobiotics, possibly!)

    I sorta like the absence of a boy myself; this isn't a "seduction" perfume, which is not bad in itself, seduction perfumes being so many and often boringly promoted. As to the music, though, hmmm, a bit vague to be catchy or dreamy. Hmmm.


    As to women of color: another great point!!
    They're generally missing from perfume ads, not just this one, though in recent years we have come to see some, thank god. What strikes me as a non entry for this one is how women of color have so frequently being featured as the more "tough" or "cookie smart" or "street smart" girl, therefore negating (in mainstream ad terms, not our own) their inclusion in this "lalala" land of AA Premiere Delice….agree? Or is that not it? I don't know, that's my theory and I'm sticking with it. :-p

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