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New look read­ies home­grown UAE ayurveda-based range for re­gional ex­pan­sion

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UAE-based ayurveda skin­care range Herbline Es­sen­tials re­brands as dis­tri­bu­tion broad­ens. L’Oreal’s Clar­isonic PLUS Sonic Skin Cleansing Brush sweeps into Kuwait and the UAE. Tefal boosts so­cial me­dia in­ter­est for new cam­paign. Unilever’s Pond’s launches lat­est BB cream vari­ants. Louis Vuit­ton draws on ‘cal­ligrafitti’ artist for char­ity project. Valentino un­veils oud-ac­cented per­fume. Busy month for Nis­san with its new Ti­ida cam­paign and plans for Saudi mar­ket. LG uses Shops and Re­wards app for the G2 launch. Rasasi Per­fumes en­ters the skin­care sec­tor. Sam­sung un­veils Galaxy Note 3 and Galaxy Gear. Nor­we­gian brand makes a splash in the UAE’s wa­ter sec­tor. The Brand Union opens in Riyadh. PAE ex­pands into the re­gion through True Ad. OMG MENA an­nounces neuro-com­mu­ni­ca­tions ser­vice, In­te­gral Sense. For­mer Im­pact chief resur­faces with new ‘im­mer­sive agency’. Amer­i­can Univer­sity of Shar­jah and Chal­houb Group launch the re­gion’s first Lux­ury Brand Man­age­ment Pro­fes­sor­ship, plus Mar­ket­ing Moves.

UAE Nat­u­ral per­sonal care brand, Herbline Es­sen­tials, has re­branded in readi­ness for re­gional ex­pan­sion be­yond its UAE-based phar­ma­cies.

Launched in 2008 by Har­mony Cos­met­ics, the ayurveda-based range is made from 100 per cent nat­u­ral in­gre­di­ents sourced from the Hi­malyas. It is also ha­lal cer­ti­fied and en­rolled in PETA’s ‘Beauty with­out Bun­nies’ pro­gramme, as well as oc­cu­py­ing the space be­tween su­per­mar­ket FMCGs and depart­ment store ranges.

Dur­ing its short his­tory, Herbline has grown from eight SKUs to 30-plus and from eight phar­ma­cies to 140, in­clud­ing Dubai Duty Free phar­ma­cies at Dubai In­ter­na­tional Air­port, says Aly Rahim­toola, owner and man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of Har­mony Cos­met­ics.

“As a gen­eral rule we’ve had a 33 per cent year-on-year growth since last year against over­all cat­e­gory growth of 14 per cent.”

He at­tributes the ‘phe­nom­e­nal’ per­for­mance to ed­u­ca­tion, largely through its so­cial me­dia. Face­book fans to date to­tal 25,000, along with a strong twit­ter fol­low­ing. “My be­lief, as a com­pany, is that we have nat­u­ral so­lu­tions to peo­ple’s prob­lems, and in the course of ed­u­cat­ing them, you con­vert peo­ple. They un­der­stand.”

The new look, high­light­ing the range’s or­ganic cre­den­tials, was cre­ated by UAE-based, Brand­worx and is a nat­u­ral step in the com­pany’s evo­lu­tion, says Rahim­toola.

“With this im­age change comes a re­newed fo­cus on en­hanc­ing and ex­pand­ing our pres­ence in the re­gion and in­ter­na­tion­ally,” he adds.

Roll out be­yond the UAE has started in Kuwait and Pak­istan, with Tur­key, Saudi Ara­bia, Iraq and South Africa slated by the end of Q1 2014.

Re­peat pur­chase re­quests from non-UAE res­i­dents prompted an over­seas ship­ping ser­vice. Mar­ket­ing plans in­clude in-store ac­ti­va­tion and a print cam­paign. The rebranding also segues Herbline into wider dis­tri­bu­tion and the in­tro­duc­tion of a pre­mium po­si­tioned, cer­ti­fied or­ganic vari­ant later this year, to be priced at least 20 to 25 per cent more than the orig­i­nal.

Nat­u­ral beauty: Herbline’s new im­age

Ed­u­ca­tion: Aly Rahim­toola

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