I joined Amorepacific in January of this year. I am currently in charge of marketing for Sulwhasoo. One of my responsibilities involves designing a unique brand experience so that our customers can experience its value at every touchpoint. Before joining Amorepacific, I had worked at numerous other companies, where I helped launch and grow beauty and FMCG brands in regions like China, the U.S., Japan, APAC, and Australia. I had been focusing on building up brands from other countries for a long time. So, I decided to join Amorepacific because I was excited by the opportunity to work for a company representing Korea and a brand representing Korea.

Branding begins with listening to what customers say and drawing insights from those words. We conducted a series of in-depth customer surveys in key markets like Korea, China, and the U.S. to find grounds to strengthen our identity as an internationally renowned luxury brand. It is what we learned that building a unique identity and delivering a coherent message across all regions was the most urgent task.

The most important thing in talking about the beginning of the brand was Sulwhasoo's unique beauty philosophy, the "spirit of the pioneer" that encompasses heritage, and "the will of the succession" that goes on without stopping. It means that Sulwhasoo is not just a beauty brand but also a human brand that offers significant value attracting Sulwhasoo's customers to the center of the brand as we communicate with them.

In the way we communicate the spirit, we created content using pop-culture code so that the current generation of customers can willingly sympathize with the brand's value and enter the brand, which has been a great response from customers who have never considered Sulwhasoo. It's a significant change in the renewal that it's not just campaign content but a consistent and holistic way to make sure that customers see their products throughout the journey to explore and purchase them.

The recently launched #SulwhasooRebloom campaign harnesses our brand’s unique identity, which we rebuilt around the brand’s inherent philosophy and heritage. We hoped it would remind our customers of their aspirations and inspire them to bloom. To do this, we delivered our message using two videos that were shot using different techniques and methods. Each video tells the story about the brand’s beginning and completion in its own way, offering a chance for our customers to see the brand in a whole new light. The first manifesto film, ‘FROM 1932 TO YOU’ condensed the brand’s key historical moments and heritage. The footage starts with the camellia oil that was made by Mrs. Yun Dok-Jeong herself in Gaesung in 1932 and goes on to show the brand’s journey that all the women across different generations have helped to build. 

The second ambassador film, on the other hand, uses symbolism to unravel the brand’s journey, under the theme ‘We are born from the earth to bloom.’ The video stimulates curiosity with its fascinating footage of the earth, snow, and flowers and how they connect with the brand’s origin, which started with the spirit of ‘Sulwha (雪花)’ or ‘a flower blooming in the snow.’

We also took a different approach when we searched for new global ambassadors to join our brand. This time, we focused on finding touch points between the ambassadors and our brand. It was a fundamental change, as it required us to rethink the role of our ambassadors play. What we considered most important was how sincere the ambassadors were about the brand. Consequently, we paid attention to how Rose put herself out there as a kid to make her dream come true and we were surprised to see the similarities between her determination and Sulwhasoo’s pioneering spirit. Rose is so much more than just a celebrity who helps us promote the benefits of using our products; she is a storyteller whose own story speaks to the very philosophy and heritage we want to communicate.

The recent brand renewal campaign was a means for us to strengthen our brand identity, in other words, WHO WE ARE. Going forward, we hope to concentrate more on WHY WE EXIST. We at Sulwhasoo take great pride in being a creative brand that continues to make new things that are inspired by heritage and tradition. It’s these values that push us to try over and over again, so that we may help our customers discover and bloom their own beauty. I’ve always believed that brands with a powerful reason for existence are the ones that survive across generations. I hope that one day my young daughters will grow up to fall in love with Sulwhasoo’s heritage and philosophy, just as I did.