French heritage beauty brand Klorane launched a new U.S.-focused blog on Wednesday to bring its brand story to the forefront as it preps to match its product portfolio across markets.
In Europe, the French beauty brand offers hair, skin and body care, plus baby care and products for pregnant women, but its U.S. assortment is more limited. U.S. consumers know the brand for its hair care and dry shampoo products, available at Ulta, Bluemercury and Sephora, said Jacqueline Flam, Klorane CMO. Founded in 1966 by a pharmacist, Klorane positions itself as a masstige natural beauty brand that bases all its products on flowers and botanical ingredients. While launching a blog has become commonplace for brands, Klorane views it as an opportunity to familiarize U.S. customers with the brand’s history and ingredient story ahead of an undetermined number of hair care and skin-care product launches in the market in 2020.
“With the ease of product development and more indie brands entering the market, it’s important for us as a heritage brand to focus on the core DNA and the ‘why’ of our 50-year history,” said Flam. “Our reason for being can’t always be accomplished at a point of sale. Having a place to share thoughts in a more informal way is a [strategy] to get closer to the consumers.”
Klorane declined to share any sales figures, but its revenue increased by 119% between 2017 and 2018, according to Rakuten Marketing. Other foreign brands like NatureLab Tokyo and Jill Stuart Beauty have recently tried to enter or expand within the American market. They launched in March and April, respectively, to test the waters for their larger parent companies. NatureLab Tokyo looked to celebrity hairstylists and 150 unpaid influencers as brand ambassadors, while Jill Stuart Beauty worked with 100 unpaid influencers and held a booth at to Popsugar Playground where attendees could try and buy products.
Compared to these other efforts, Klorane’s strategy and investment seem small. The blog is handled by the marketing team, but Klorane recently made a dedicated hire for content creation, Flam said. Since Klorane already has an established retail presence, its blog is viewed as a play to broaden consumer awareness beyond dry shampoo.
Ad position: web_incontent_pos1
The blog has its own drop-down menu category on KloraneUSA.com, and it launched with five stories. It will feature at least four stories a month on topics like ingredient education and winter skin tips, as well as wellness. With every new piece of content, Klorane will send an email to its undisclosed number of email recipients, according to Lana Rovner, Klorane’s marketing director. Additionally, the brand will post links through its Instagram, where it has 126,000 followers, and on Facebook, where it has more than 800,000 “likes.” Google Ads will also drive to the blog, although Rovner declined to state what financial investments.
“Shopping patterns and how we consume information is so much more fluid now,” said Rovner. “Brands have to think about how to capture [the attention of] consumers in a particular space. One thing Klorane can do is to provide content to make the [online] shopping experience more of an experience versus a transaction.”
