Wrap me Dior – Style

Luxury hotels have long ceased to be just a place for a short stay, here you can live a full life and get any services. Kommersant Style talks about how cosmetic companies use the advantages of hotel areas.

“Any whim for your money” – this phrase has never been more appropriate: five-star hotels turn the lives of their guests into an ongoing happening, full of multifaceted and memorable experiences.

So, in the Astoria hotel in St. Petersburg, you can book a box at the Mikhailovsky Theater and enjoy opera passions just a few meters away, in Sochi Radisson they offer a pillow menu, like in the best boutiques of a healthy lifestyle, in Dubai Jumeirah Al Naseem in guest rooms waiting for champagne and gift cosmetic sets from Hermes. Accessories, towels, trendy straw beach bags – everything to create the right impression of the hotel and win the heart of the guest.

The expansion of beauty brands into luxury hotels is an attempt to attract new customers or strengthen relationships with those who already know and have long used the cosmetics of a particular brand. In this regard, the experiments of Dior are interesting – not so long ago, several spa cabins were opened in the Orient Express, which travels around Scotland: a kind of spa on wheels, which greatly increases the interest in such a pastime. You are not just going somewhere, but you are going with benefit, or, if you look from a different angle, you are not just wasting time on a massage, but you are going and approaching the ultimate goal of your trip. As they say, the situation is win-win.

An outdoor spa on the Côte d’Azur at the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc is another new addition to the brand this year. Valerie Muller, the hotel’s regional communications director, says their boutique stocks not only Dior cosmetics, but also Dior Eden-Roc limited editions inspired by the hotel: navy blue nail polish and eyeshadow palettes. Thus, the owners of these funds become members of a closed “club for their own”, for those who can afford it.

Victor Dimitrov, general director of the representative office of the French cosmetic brand Anne Semonin in Russia, believes that it is necessary and profitable to work with hotels. “Why does a brand need to enter hotels? To bring people down from their rooms to the spa, you need to provide them with something interesting, unusual. And having started getting acquainted with the product in the room, having got acquainted with the aroma and texture, the guest wants to continue the acquaintance already in the spa – it turns out the full cycle of the cosmetic brand,” he says.

In Cyprus, Anassa works with premium Acqua di Parma, and they put full-size bottles in the rooms – “our guests really appreciate it,” emphasizes Sebastian Wurst, general director of the hotel. He also shares his principles – to work with small luxury companies, but new, different from those that can be found in large stores, such as Augustinus Bader and Tata Harper. Another hotel that actively welcomes Russian tourists, the Maldivian Nautilus tries to give preference to small artisanal brands and moves away from the British brand Pehnaligon`s to focus on Maison Caulieres and Omorovicza.

SPA SIBO of the Radisson Collection Paradise Resort & Spa in Sochi works with both the above mentioned Anne Semonin and Comfort zone, Nashi Organ and Ligne St. Barth, that is, the emphasis is on spa brands with a proven “working” composition and pleasant organoleptic properties.

However, in order to form an identity, not everyone strives to work with recognizable brands – often a certain composition of cosmetic formulas and their own, but “no name” fragrance are at the forefront. Oksana Makarkina, Regional Purchasing Director of Radisson Hotel Group in Eastern Europe, Russia, Turkey, says that in their hotels the products have a certain composition and perfume composition, which are the property of the Radisson Hotel Group. Every few years, a tender is held among global suppliers of hotel cosmetics, as a result of which a single partner is selected and a supply chain is formed in regions and countries. “The beauty program is branded as the Radisson Hotel Group and is a key part of the company’s brand identity, which is why the Radisson Hotel Group continues to adhere to the principle of its own collection and at the moment does not have collaborations or co-branding with other recognizable or niche brands. At the same time, specialized cosmetic lines are used in hotel spas, depending on the concept of each particular spa and the choice of local hotel management,” she emphasizes.

Many island hotels operate in much the same way – it is no secret that the Seychelles and the Maldives are striving to develop the direction of local cosmetic brands, the names of which guests, most likely, will not remember at home, immersed in a state of bliss after a beach holiday. Thomas Weber, general manager of Kothaifaru Maldives, where Russian clients now make up about a third of the total number of guests, says that their main task is to help guests return to relaxation and balance. All beauty products are handcrafted from natural ingredients, and the soothing scents of essential oils are sprayed into the spa.

Another facet of interaction and impact on guests is the release of their own fragrances, so that a person leaves the hotel with the olfactory embodiment of the hotel, literally with tangible impressions in their hands. The Moroccan Royal Mansour Marrakech is proud of the collection of perfumed candles Bois De Mansour, which were developed by the perfume house Maitre Parfumeur: sandalwood, thyme and vanilla are made according to all the canons of aromatic art and speak the very language that will instantly take you to Marrakesh, wherever in the world no matter where you are.

Interiors, service and quality of service are the main thing that guests are looking for in luxury hotels, and cosmetics and services in spas have already become the benchmark for luxury holidays. Other things being equal, it was cosmetics that became the most common means of demonstrating class, a detail that you can’t help but remember, so that you can later post on social networks or happily take home with stories “but it was free.” Of course not. Nothing happens for free, all this, in fact, is already included in the price of the room, but somehow imperceptibly it turns out that in such positively colored emotional moments these nuances fade into the background.

Irina Kirienko