Fresh is updating its mix for 2007 with a West Coast retail initiative and several product launches.
On the heels of two new Southern California freestanding retail stores, the Boston beauty company (partially owned by LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton) plans to open a San Francisco retail store in late March. The new California stores will complement the brand’s existing door in West Hollywood, Calif.
“We’re very excited to expand on the West Coast and to have the chance to showcase the brand,” said Lev Glazman, who, along with wife Alina Roytberg, entered the beauty world in 1991 with Nuts About Beauty, a multi-brand retail store in Boston. A year later, Fresh was born. “We have great relationships with our retail partners, but a space of your own is a kingdom,” said Glazman.
“In someone else’s space, you adapt things to work. In your own, there are no limitations in terms of how you can express your brand.” For instance, the South Coast Plaza space offers a treatment area and a one-on-one demonstration room which is located off the selling floor.
Fresh had a soft opening for its South Coast Plaza store in November and is planning to hold a grand opening celebration on Feb.12. The brand’s Santa Monica, Calif., store opened at the Third Street Promenade in October.
Despite the speed with which Fresh is opening California stores, Glazman is in no hurry to open more doors. “We would like to open one store a year,” he said. “We are very selective in terms of location, but we need to be in all of the major cities. We are looking at Philadelphia and in New Jersey. They will likely be the next stores to open.” Fresh already operates five Manhattan stores — two on the Upper East Side and one each in Union Square, the West Village and NoLIta — and Glazman has his eye on the Upper West Side. “There’s a lot of opportunity there,” he noted.
While the 13 existing stores — in addition to those listed above, doors in London, Seoul, Boston, Chicago and Las Vegas — vary in size, most of the newer doors are between 550 and 700 square feet, said Glazman. “We don’t want a store that’s bigger than that right now,” he said. “That’s the perfect size for us right now.”
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Glazman is also bullish on the prospects of the brand’s new Mamaku Night Serum. According to Glazman, the serum — powered by Mamaku extract and sourced from New Zealand tree ferns of the same name — taps into the skin’s circadian rhythms, reenergizing cells overnight. Mamaku extract is an effective skin soother, he said, adding that its effect is magnified by the skin’s efficient nighttime absorption. Lotus extract, meadowfoam seed and grape-seed oil in the formula are also said to aid the skin in nighttime regeneration.
The product will be launched in May in 350 U.S. specialty stores, including Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Saks Fifth Avenue and Sephora, as well as in Fresh’s freestanding stores and on fresh.com.
Fresh is also giving its Sugar body care and fragrance collection a more uniform look with the January launch of Sugar Lychee Eau de Parfum, the company’s fourth Sugar fragrance. An extension of the existing Sugar Lychee collection of bath and body products, the fragrance contains top notes of grapefruit, Italian lemon and lime blossom; middle notes of lychee, lotus flower and freesia; and base notes of sandalwood, tonka bean and amber. It will retail for $65 for a 3.4-oz. eau de parfum. Though the company will not mount an advertising campaign for the new products, it will distribute 200,000 fragrance samples of Sugar Lychee in stores starting in January.
Fresh also has changed its packaging to create a more cohesive brand image; prior to this, collections have varied greatly in colors and types of packaging. “We wanted to enhance the look of Fresh and give it a more unified look,” said Roytberg of the delicately colored designs on white backgrounds. “We want it to be less about being distinguished by individual collections and more about being a unified brand.”
In February, Fresh will introduce High Noon Freshface Glow, $36, a part bronzer and luminizer designed to give skin a sun-kissed glow, in addition to bronzers, lip glosses and an eye-shadow trio.
Executives declined to comment on sales projections, but industry sources estimated that Sugar Lychee would generate about $2.5 million in first-year retail sales, increasing the Sugar collection by 25 percent to reach between $8 million and $10 million in retail sales by the end of next year.