Winning Colors

Almay Makes Beauty Packaging As Easy As 1-2-3

By Ron Romanik

The Almay brand, which is now owned by Revlon Inc., was born in 1931 from the combination of the founders' names— Alfred and Fanny May—who were also known as Mr. and Mrs. Woititz. It seems Fanny May could not find cosmetics that did not irritate her sensitive skin. Alfred, a professional chemist, enlisted the help of a dermatologist to find out what ingredients were irritants and to develop new formulas that were purer and gentler for his wife to use.

Rochelle Udell, executive vice president and chief creative officer of Revlon, believes this legacy lives on today in the brand identity. "The brand wants to take care of its consumers," says Udell.

"It was born out of love." Udell leads the Revlon creative team and is responsible for collaborating with the company's brand leadership teams to create and maintain consistency of image in advertising, packaging, point-of-sale, and overall imaging of the Revlon, Almay, Vital Radiance, and other portfolio brands.

Rochelle Udell believes the new Almay "a" logo will resonate with Almay loyalists and newcomers. The purity of the hypoallergenic Almay formulas is reflected in the simple brand presentation and the ease of shopping products within the new Almay Beauty 1-2-3 system.

Since debuting as the first hypoallergenic cosmetics brand, Almay has led the way in 100% fragrance-free products, ingredients disclosure, safety testing, and customized cosmetics for specific skin types. Three years ago, Revlon began the process to introduce new lines of easy-to-shop Almay products, to refresh the Almay brand, and to consolidate and organize all Almay products under one consistent identity.

The typical Almay shopper is a busy woman who wants to look good and take pride in looking good, and Almay understands and respects the demands on her time. From the beginning of the project, the goal was to allow the consumer to get the best product for her in the easiest and quickest manner. Many departments at Revlon worked together to craft a position where packaging and merchandising would go hand in hand.

Udell says that marketing, market research and creative took a lot of time thinking about the typical Almay consumer specifically, and what they could learn about her habits. They learned how women shop and search for make-up in general, and they learned that women usually have a specific need in mind when they enter a store. "This consumer is time constrained," stresses Udell. "It's a very grab-and-go situation."

The Beauty 1-2-3 concept was repeated in product lines for skin, face, lips, and eyes. For eyes, those steps would be: 1) a bold eye-enhancing shadow trio; 2) liquid eyeliner for added drama; and 3) volumizing mascara which increases lash thickness by 100%.

The brand always comes first

Over a number of years, as Almay product offerings, line extensions, and packaging designs had grown in number, the Almay brand identity was not necessarily as clear as it should have been. One of Udell's goals was to refresh the brand and make it brighter and happier. "We felt it was important to make the brand look whole again," says Udell.

The Almay brand had traditionally conveyed a lot of reassurance—and still does today—with carefully selected ingredients that are good for all skin types. Fewer than 500 of the 10,000 ingredients available for use in cosmetics meet Almay's standard for superior performance. That economy of ingredients would be translated into an economy of style and information on the new Almay packaging.

Udell believed the small "a" logo and sans serif Almay type would provide a great "shorthand" for the rebirth of the brand. "There was a resounding confidence about the 'a,'" Udell recalls. She likes to describe Almay as, half-jokingly, "An A-list brand for a Type A personality." The economization of the Almay identity would also be reflected in the refinement of familiar Almay packaging shapes and in new intuitive functionality.

John Butcher, senior vice president of packaging and equipment development at Revlon, was responsible for packaging the new and existing products under the refreshed brand, and he is confident that the new brand image did not depart too far from its previous identity. "There definitely is that linkage there," Butcher says. "Rochelle's team did a marvelous job of pulling it together and making it sensible for the consumer." In a previous position, Butcher was responsible for package development for all the brands in Revlon's Specialty Store Division.

Udell further explains how the new Almay brand effort was conceived and executed, based on the fact that most women already know what suits them best and what skin type they have. "The whole thing was orchestrated based on who you are," Udell says. "You know who you are, and we know what works best for you."

Shaping the new Almay

Butcher says the biggest challenge he faced with this comprehensive project was working against the clock in a truncated timeline. "There was a huge challenge in the volume and the timing," says Butcher. His team was charged with taking the new aesthetic brand definition laid out by Udell's creative team and giving it a consistent feel in primary and secondary packaging with new and existing products.

"The fundamental job of a packaging department is basically to bridge that gap between aesthetic design and manufacturable product," says Butcher. Conceptually, he sees his task as "starting from the product and working out into the package." For the Almay repositioning project, his team blended the new with the updated old by keeping some traditional Almay shapes cues, such as rounded corners, in the packaging.

Once again, the economy of ingredients in Almay products is reflected in the economy of shape and function of the packaging. The company's packaging operations department is broken into development and engineering departments that work with packaging suppliers to find the best solutions for primary and secondary packaging. Engineering is continually refining new ideas, even before the right product comes along.

Two of the new Almay products came along at the right time to be the beneficiary of packaging innovation—an efficient one-hand toner pump found in Almay's 3-Step Skincare System and a two-tiered compact for Almay's Line Smoothing Compact Makeup. With the toner bottle in the upright position, the user takes a cotton applicator pad and presses down on the flat, suction cup-like top to release a controlled amount of toner product. The new toner pump was adapted and refined from an existing pump, and Almay sourced it and matched it to a custom bottle. There is no mess as any excess drips back into the "cup" and drains back into the bottle.

Butcher is also proud of the unique solution for the Almay Line Smoothing Compact Makeup, which comes in a small rounded square package. This product required a hermetic seal to keep the makeup fresh, but most available stock hermetic compacts were large, generic, expensive, and unwieldy. Research in Butcher's department led to a combination of elements already in development.

The resulting compact is two-tiered as opposed to side-by-side, and a hinged compartment is foil-sealed in place in the middle of the compact. "It's much more useful to the consumer," says Butcher. "It was quite a complex engineering task, but we forced it through the process."

The new Smart Shade™ makeup has shade-sensing smart beads that start out white and adjust to match the color of your skin tone. The secondary packaging reemphasizes the dot/bead motif and explains: "Magically transforms into your ideal shade."

One-two-three, go!

The marketing message for Almay Beauty 1-2-3 is centered around the tagline: "Beauty made simple… just for you." From early on, packaging was considered key in conveying this concept throughout the Almay lines. The packaging would organize every product under the Almay umbrella and identify that particular product's place in the entire spectrum of products. The idea was to make the shopping experience as easy, simple, and stress-free as possible for the Almay consumer.

"The new Almay is designed to simplify beauty purchases for today's busy woman," says Elizabeth Crystal, senior vice president of marketing for Almay. Many of the product lines are based on skin type and color preference selection. Three step systems show up in products for skincare, face, lips, and eyes. For example, in skincare products the steps would be 1) cleanser, 2) toner, and 3) moisturizer. For face makeup, the steps are 1) concealer, 2) foundation, and 3) powder.

Almay package designers also considered every package as to how it would fit into the prototypical Almay Beauty Display in stores (see www.almay.com for an interactive tour of the display). The wall display is meticulously and efficiently organized by category and subcategory into rounded cubicle trays that are packed with products and helpful merchandising. Color cues aid the simple navigation.

"Proper navigation is the key to all of this," says Udell. She explains that the store functions in a number of ways: from 30 feet, from 10 feet, from three feet, and from one foot with package in hand. Udell's team continually asked: "What information is needed to provide the consumer with the opportunity to make a decision?" Udell stresses that the packaging is part of a consistent holistic effort that is reinforced at every touch point of the consumer experience, from magazine advertisements to actually using the product.

Udell believes that the in-store wall presentation achieves "intuitive navigation" by creating a "navigation decision tree." The simplicity of navigation was reinforced with design elements that identify and differentiate as a consumer's eyes scan the wall display. "All of our efforts were to simplify and make it easy for her to find the products she needs and to look her best," says Udell, "as easy as 1-2-3."