Advertising is a tool that most businesses use to promote their products. According to researchers, it has been evolving significantly (Liu-Thompkins, 2019). Customers need to relate to the product that is being advertised, and this is why certain marketing strategies are used to intrigue a specific target audience. The perfume industry has been known to implement such tricks and techniques successfully. Le Labo, for example, is a luxury brand that provides high-quality perfumes for individuals with exquisite taste. Juicy Couture, however, is more focused on teenage girls and young adults, advertising their products as such. While both images promote a similar thing, some differences suggest the exact target audiences both companies are willing to satisfy.
The main similarity is that both companies are advertising scents. The images clearly portray the perfume bottles, and the colors characterize them as companies. The most obvious difference is the style of the advertisement. Le Labo opted for a minimalistic background, soft tones, elegance, and simplicity (figure 1). Juicy Couture, on the other hand, picked a pink background with multiple additional details that would be attractive for teenage girls, which is their main focus.
Le Labo’s intend is to keep its reputation as an exquisite brand intact. Sandal 33 is their most popular and unique scent, and instead of giving a clue regarding the notes in their perfume, they just displayed the bottle. Viva La Juicy Sucre, on the other hand, is suggested to be sweet and girly due to the colors and background of the image. Le Labo, however, picked an exciting strategy. People who are not familiar with them as a brand will be curious to find out more and maybe visit their website, potentially leading to a purchase.
Juicy Couture is a company that seeks profit, which is suggested by the image. They picked a famous model as the face of their new scent, their slogan “#EatDessertFirst” starts with a hashtag that is also appealing to their younger audience, and they used a bright pink pallet of colors to portray the youthful and girly undertones (figure 2). Le Labo’s advertising contains the slogan “Hand-formulated, Only for you.”, which emphasized the exclusive and expensive narrative the brand exudes. They are not using common strategies to sell as many of their scents but rather make the product look unique and out of the ordinary. This would allow them to be competitive on the market despite their prices being much higher than average. While one advertisement aims to promote the scent and use any tactic possible to make it appealing to teenage girls, the other one portrays the bottle in an attractive way without making it too obvious.
The ad definitely achieves the aimed result in both cases. Juicy Couture caught the attention of their target audience and created a sweet and youthful atmosphere with the image. Le Labo presented the scent in a unique way while keeping it mysterious and exclusive. In both cases, the companies focus on specific people that would align with what they sell. Juicy Couture targeted young girls and teenagers with the colors, the famous model, the slogan, and the overall atmosphere of the ad. Le Labo is more simplistic and exquisite when it comes to advertisement, but it works for the audience that usually chooses to support them. Comparing the two makes it clear that each of the images is designed to look appealing and attractive for specific groups of people that they aim to have as consumers.
References
Liu-Thompkins, Y. (2019). A decade of online advertising research: What we learned and what we need to know. Journal of Advertising, 48(1), 1–13.
Appendix
