Monday, January 27, 2020
Interview with Vincent Delavenne, Vice President Coty luxury packaging.
At Coty, we want to meet all the new challenges that are linked to plastics. And these new challenges are first and foremost in the field of sustainability. We are in the process of rediscovering the value codes of luxury, with the integration of renewable, recyclable and refillable materials, by making them desirable to our consumers.
Before answering your questions, allow me to introduce myself. My name is Vincent Delavenne, Vice President Coty luxury packaging. I have 25 years of experience in packaging, mainly in luxury. I have worked for different companies (Shiseido, Bulgari, Oriflame, Dior, Unilever), in different countries (France, Switzerland, Belgium, China), and for the perfume, make-up, and skincare categories. At Coty, 9 billion euros turnover in beauty, I am in charge, with my team, of the packaging development for Boss, Calvin Klein, Gucci, Tiffany, Burberry, Marc Jacobs, Lancaster, Philosophy, Mexx, Bruno Banani, and other brands.
What are your new expectations regarding plastic products and packaging?
My expectations from plastic parts, products and packaging are multiple and diverse. First of all, they have to fulfill the essential functions of a packaging: protection of the product, distribution of the product, and then design/beauty function and consumer information. All this while allowing the logistics of transporting the product from the filling point (the factory) to the final consumer, who can be anywhere in the world.
Seventy years ago, there was no plastic, and we only had glass bottles, metal bottles, returnable or not, but above all, we had many more dry products and few liquid products. All this changed with the use of plastic. With a thin plastic barrier, packagers have increased by 10 the shelf life of meat with trays, and your bottled drinking water can be kept for almost 2 years! It's the same thing for beauty. We use plastic to have flexible tubes, caps that open easily without a can opener, we need plastic pumps for our perfumes, and of course to guarantee the waterproofness of our products. Plastic packaging has allowed the beauty industry to multiply its offer and meet new needs, while making it accessible to the greatest number of people. My expectations for plastic packaging are first of all to fulfill the basic functions of a packaging: protection, use, design and information, and logistics. But it is also obvious that there is the cost of the material, its availability, and, obviously, the environmental aspect. This function is now integrated into the basic functions that packaging must provide.
This brings me to your second question: do my new products/packaging have new features, like new materials, recycled materials? My answer is yes. All plastics are being restructured and all known balances are changing. You only have to look at the craze for the new plastic economy, created by the Ellen McArthur Foundation, of which Coty is a member, to understand the systemic change underway. To begin with, plastic will no longer come exclusively from oil, as other sources are emerging (renewable sources from different crops), but above all, from plastic itself, from plastic already produced. This is what we are advocating for our brands. This is the big new source, and this "new" material is coming from our garbage, our new gold mine. Small start-ups are developing revolutionary processes to reproduce plastic from... plastic! From PET, PE, PP, we are moving to R-PET, R-PE, and R-PP (R for recycled). This is a revolution for our entire value chain, in all its aspects: availability of materials, their transformation into the required quality, the search for transparency, and also in the new perceptions of our consumers. Consumer testing is going to become key again, because the attributes that define quality, or luxury, are changing very quickly, all over the world, and to make things more complex, at a different pace on different continents. We are in the process of rediscovering the value codes of luxury, with the integration of renewable, recyclable and refillable products, making them desirable to our consumers.
For your last question "How does Coty meet the new challenges related to plastic?", at Coty, we want to meet all the new challenges related to plastic. And these new challenges are first and foremost in the field of sustainability. The information on this subject has multiple origins, on materials, on new solutions, and we want to anticipate as well as possible the demands of our consumers, with our fashion house. The requests are general and come from all levels, and this is healthy. We have therefore launched three avenues for a new use of plastics at Coty. Our first path is to put into practice solutions that already exist and are already available, on certain projects, such as bottles with recycled plastic (R-PET) for our perfume bath lines. Our second pillar, which we have already integrated in the packaging department, is a change in our approach to developing a new project and we integrate the environmental aspect from the start. And, to put it into practice, we build a sustainability index for each project, with one imperative: do better than before! This index is reviewed at each phase of a project's development, and the Coty Group has only one objective: to improve this index as quickly as possible! But in order to influence the choice of projects, you have to know what you are talking about! and not have any preconceived ideas! Our third pillar is a back-to-school program on sustainability. We have launched a 20 hour training program for packagers, with a university in Holland, done by high level university professors, to start again on solid bases, and to bring everyone up to speed, first and foremost for vocabulary and definitions.
With all this, we will be able to better respond to all the challenges that are coming. We are only at the beginning, and the whole plastic industry, from the producer to the end user, and continuing through our used plastic packaging, is reinventing itself. It is up to us to reinvent the world we want to live in.