PARIS — Chanel has enlisted Hollywood A-listers Brad Pitt and Penelope Cruz because it tries to take again the narrative surrounding its iconic quilted purses as rising costs and stories of declining high quality tarnish the model on-line.
In a purse marketing campaign first teased at Chanel’s March runway present, Pitt and Cruz re-enact scenes from Claude Lelouch’s 1966 movie “A Man and a Girl,” together with an iconic sequence the place the movie’s lovers dine with a Chanel bag sitting between them.
The multimillion-dollar marketing campaign — the French large’s first main equipment push in two years — has since been rolled out worldwide, and is full with eye-catching affirmations of the model’s most iconic codes: quilted purses, double-C motifs, a black-and-white color palette, Frenchness, cinema and enduring model.
For Chanel, the marketing campaign couldn’t have come quickly sufficient.
In current months, the home’s purses have come underneath scrutiny on social media amid stories of diminished high quality and a collection of aggressive worth hikes, the newest of which pushed the price of a medium Basic Flap bag from Chanel above €10,000 ($10,820) for the primary time, greater than the value of many sought-after Mini Kelly or Birkin kinds from rival Hermès.
Manufacturers throughout the luxurious house have refocused their consideration on top-end shoppers as demand from middle-class buyers waned amid slowing financial development and the return of spending on journey and experiences throughout the previous 12 months. The shift has been a boon to blue-chip luxurious names like Chanel in addition to Hermès, Loro Piana and Brunello Cucinelli, which additionally obtained a lift from the “quiet luxurious” development.
Nonetheless, it’s unclear how far even the wealthier Chanel prospects will stretch their style budgets after years of worth hikes intermittently defined by forex shifts, inflation or investments in provide chain and sustainability.
“We felt we wanted to reaffirm this bag, which is usually criticised for its worth, for its positioning, however continues to be the bag that embodies our model most utterly,” Chanel’s president of style Bruno Pavlovsky stated. “It’s a couturier’s bag made utilizing couture methods… This bag is positioned as probably the most costly in the marketplace. It’s a alternative the model has made; and it’s additionally a actuality attributable to its fabrication. After that, there’s a complete vary of smaller luggage and different objects which stay completely accessible.”
The most recent rounds of worth will increase at Chanel have been notably poorly obtained amid common stories of declining high quality on the model, which are likely to resonate on social networks like TikTok. In current months, Chanel-obsessed content material creators have complained of all the things from crooked stitches to torn calfskin straps to unfastened or quickly tarnishing {hardware}, main some buyers to query if one of many world’s most costly manufacturers continues to be value it.
A $17 Billion Model
Clearly loads of customers nonetheless suppose so. Chanel’s enterprise has been on a tear: the privately-held style and wonder large’s gross sales rose 17 p.c in 2022 to $17 billion. Whereas numbers for 2023 aren’t anticipated earlier than Could, Pavlovsky stated monetary efficiency within the style division has been “completely distinctive.”
In France, Chanel luggage continued to account for 3 of the highest 5 fashions in a February rating of essentially the most recognisable, unique and fascinating luxurious purses, in response to an evaluation by Bernstein and Promise Consulting.
However Pavlovsky acknowledged the standard issues. “We talk about creativity, about final luxurious. However high quality is all the time on the coronary heart of our preoccupations,” he stated. “We’re not excellent, that’s clear. However we’re actually engaged on all of those topics, that are actually basic… We’re conscious that our positioning obligates us to all the time do higher, and we’re all the time making an attempt.”
To assist enhance manufacturing in response to rising demand whereas making an attempt to keep up requirements, the model has, in recent times, acquired a lot of strategic suppliers, together with 5 tanneries with a purpose to assist it safe the very best leathers for its luggage. “Between what we have been making 10 years in the past and at this time there’s a really massive evolution. We’ve needed to practice, spend money on, and have interaction with an excessive amount of individuals to get to the place we’re at this time,” Pavlovsky stated.
Nonetheless, Pavlovsky was took purpose at vital movies making apples-to-oranges comparisons, similar to clips exhibiting the lustrous yellow of gold-plated archival luggage proven subsequent to newer fashions whose {hardware} has been galvanised utilizing way more sturdy (if much less golden) finishes. Different objects showing in such movies might even be fakes, he steered. “There’s 20 or 30 million luggage on the market within the wild; I can’t signal for all of them.”
‘Absolute Luxurious’
Chanel has lengthy promoted its model by mixing its ultra-classic codes with style fabulousness on epic proportions: exhibits underneath late inventive director Karl Lagerfeld included Chanel-branded rocket ships boosting off in Paris’ Grand Palais or fashions sporting Daft Punk-inspired helmets and tweed fits reworked to appear like pc chips.
Lately, his successor Virginie Viard has introduced the model nearer to earth, ushering in a extra relatable, wearable chapter for Chanel. Whereas the model’s double-C clad collections hardly represent “quiet” luxurious, a bolstered concentrate on timeless codes — in addition to bolstered costs — recommend a need to compete with Hermès, higher identified for purveying a 360-degree luxurious way of life than driving the style agenda.
“We’re positioning ourselves as a home of absolute luxurious,” Pavlovsky stated. “We’ve all the time valued creativity, nevertheless it’s not creativity for its personal sake. It’s creativity as a manner of luxurious, and all the time with a excessive consideration to high quality.”
Nonetheless, justifying an “absolute luxurious” positioning might require greater than a star-studded marketing campaign and the availability chain upgrades the corporate has made to date.
Final week, the style dialog on social media was centered much less on Chanel’s Pitt and Cruz adverts than on the eye-popping worth tags on this season’s merch: might a $975 pair of Chanel logo-ed flip-flops probably be value it?
