PARIS — Holidermie has always taken a holistic approach to beauty, but a missing piece of its puzzle was a freestanding store. That’s set to change on Dec. 5, when the French brand opens a first boutique in Paris.
The 1,080-square-foot location will be at 102 Rue de Turenne, in the Marais district. It is to carry Holidermie’s full range of cosmetics, food supplements and beauty tools.
“We invited holistic, wellness and beauty brands — mainly French,” said Mélanie Huynh, Holidermie’s founder. Those include Ecolo, Archie and Re.Feel Naturals.
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“We will sell them in the store,” said Huynh, of those labels she cherrypicked for having similar DNA to Holidermie’s. “We launched Holidermie like this, with many experts and other French beauty start-ups. It’s very nourishing.”
The new boutique will also have ample space for services, including one room for body and face treatments, as well as an area for more on-the-go facial services, such as “flash glow.” Lucibel’s OVE mask with LED is to be used.
“We will have a little beauty bar with all our products,” continued Huynh, explaining there people can, for instance, add Holidermie’s collagen powder to a drink. Cocoa collagen cubes might be nibbled on.
An interactive digital skin diagnosis Powered by Perfect Corp. technology can be made with an iPad, to help with product and treatment choices.
“And after, we can send you by email recipes, tips or news — to create like a members’ club,” said Huynh. “It’s the future of beauty.”
It was also key to Holidermie’s past, since it was born online.
The executive — who considers hers a lifestyle label — wanted the store to have a very Parisian look and the brand’s pink and gray color codes.
Holidermie, which turned five at the end of September, has three product categories: cosmetics, with face, body and hair care; food supplements, and beauty tools. Altogether, the brand counts almost 50 stock keeping units, up from 20 at launch, with prices ranging from about 20 euros to 75 euros.
Perfumer Francis Kurkdjian, a friend of Huynh, created the body products’ scent meant to evoke urban naturality.
Holidermie has an eco-friendly strategy, including a shift last year to glass bottles, while plastic packaging is of sugarcane.
“We are working on becoming a B Corp,” said Huynh, adding all of the brand’s suppliers and manufacturers are in France, except the quartz beauty tools, which come from Asia.
Huynh built Holidermie with Jérôme Paris, an aesthetic surgeon who is the brand’s medical director. He helped patent the Holiderm Complex, used in the cosmetics and supplements. That is chockablock with antioxidants, thanks to grape seeds culled from Huynh’s family’s vineyard near Bordeaux, called Château Toulouse-Lautrec.
The Huynh family owns Holidermie, which generates about half of its business offline. After two years in the Bon Marché department store in Paris, it traveled further afield in Europe, to Italy, Luxembourg, Belgium and Switzerland. Altogether, the brand is in approximately 60 retailers worldwide.
Holidermie has been expanding its presence in hotel spas as well, including the launch of amenities range two years ago. The brand is now present in about 16 French hotels.
“We’ve always been a beauty brand from the inside out,” said Huynh.
Since the outset, Holidermie has operated an 1,940-square-foot apartment on the second floor of another Marais building. There, it’s possible to book a relaxing treatment, deep cleanse, massage or naturopathy session.
“We always wanted, from the beginning, to have a boutique to really show our universe,” she said. A location at street level was key for that.
Huynh expects Holidermie to go more international.
“We are planning now to go to Scandinavia, because it’s a beautiful market for beauty,” she said. Adding retailers in Asia — possibly Taiwan and Hong Kong — is of interest.
“We’d also like to go to Australia and America,” continued Huynh.
Product category-wise, sexual wellness will be a new segment for Holidermie.
“At the beginning of next year, we are going to have a big launch,” she teased.
