Ruba Abu-Nimah, creative director, is leading the overhaul of Shiseido's branding, with which the company hopes to achieve a more modern and globally-minded brand identity.
In confirmation of this, the company has described the re-brand as "expressing elements of contemporary Japan fundamental to Shiseido from a global perspective”.
It comes as part of the company’s long-term plan, 'Vision 2020', which explicitly positions the brand as strong beauty leader globally.
Restructuring
The Japan-based company’s wider restructuring programme is being implemented during the 2015 to 2017 financial years, and aims to create accelerated and sustained growth in the subsequent financial period 2018 to 2020.
The company refers to its ‘quantitative goals’ as being 100 billion yen ($830m) or more group operating profit and 12% ROE in FY2020 which would be derived from increased consolidated sales of over one trillion yen.
This will be supported by a total of 900 billion yen in consolidated sales by 2017, and 9 to 10% ROE.
Fresh faces
A key role in the rebranding side of Vision 20 will be played by an ethnically diverse group of celebrity endorsers. Amanda Seyfried's recent appearance at Shiseido's Cle de Peau Beaute press conference in Tokyo offers an instance of the new branding coming into play.
The press conferences marked the launch of various new products for the brand, at which Shiseido was keen to press the global nature of the range.
“With its solid presence established in the high-end market in Japan, the brand is now marketed in 12 countries and regions: Japan, China, Taiwan, South Korea, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia, the US, Canada, and Russia,” it confirmed in a statement.
The company is reportedly also due to place a major focus on expanding its travel retail offering, in further confirmation of a global-minded approach up ahead.