Liberty London
Changing deeply ingrained shopper behaviour by leveraging the senses, drawing customers to a space before it existed.
→ Culture
Fragrance was the fastest growing category in luxury beauty, and it was sold in the most rational way imaginable. Arranged by brand, by price, by counter real estate, when scent is the least rational sense we have.
Liberty's new Fragrance Lounge was going on the lower ground floor, and customers who shopped fragrance upstairs had no reason to descend. The space wasn't built yet, and it had to sell from day one. The real problem was that you cannot argue someone down a flight of stairs. You have to draw them.
→ Creativity
We built the whole creative around the bee, a creature that navigates entirely by scent, drawn by instinct rather than instruction. The imagery took the bee's point of view. Lenses and angles that followed a scent trail, the body leading the mind down and in.
It solved the behavioural problem at the level of instinct rather than persuasion. Instead of telling people to go downstairs, we made the descent feel like following your nose, which is exactly how anyone actually chooses a scent. Because the lounge didn't exist yet, all of it was built from suggestion, creating desire for a place no one had seen so the pull was already there on opening day.
CREDITS: PRODUCER: Celia Garcia. DIRECTOR: Grace Tankard. DOP: Connor MacLeod EDIT: This and That
→ Commerce
The Fragrance Lounge opened in March 2024 and was required to trade immediately. Liberty projected a 35% uplift in fragrance sales, with the category moving across two floors. In the financial year that followed, Liberty's operating profit rose with beauty among the strongest performing categories. Liberty has since stated its ambition to become the leading fragrance destination globally.
