Word: revlon
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Bergerac has doubled Revlon's advertising budget, to some $135 million this year, and developed a merchandising program called Retail Partners, under which Revlon designs displays and provides promotional materials for stores to encourage them to put on splashy shows. One for Bordeaux lipstick, nail polish and other cosmetics took a whole floor of Manhattan's Bonwit Teller; Revlon supplied books on wine and even old wine barrels to show off. When a Revlon product is a hit, Bergerac quickly follows it with others under the same name. Charlie, for example, has spread since 1974 from a fragrance...
...Borghese perfume ("The Perfume of the Night") feature an obviously nude woman, her head and shoulders bathed in a rosy glow, the rest of her body outlined in deep shadow. Bergerac's favorite ad, which shows a bare-breasted Borghese woman in silhouette, also ran in the Revlon annual report...
Borghese's name, of course, was also chosen (by Revson) to lend a note of elegance; one woman who uses the perfume was let down to discover that it came from Revlon. Says she: "I bought it because I thought it was Italian." Cosmetics names in general are picked to convey some image, but among the thousands of nail polish and lipstick shade names, the images get a bit fuzzy...
...Revlon's line, the appeal of Passionata Pink or Pink Vivido might be clear enough. But Blase Apricot? Bergerac himself laughingly wonders, "What kind of psychological profile could you draw for the woman who buys Blase Apricot...
...investors, happiness is rising sales and profits, and Bergerac has certainly given them that. Sales jumped from $639 million in 1974, Revson's last year, to $1.1 billion in 1977. Profits rose even faster, from $54 million in 1974 to $98 million last year. That includes international operations; Revlon manufactures in 25 countries and sells in more than 100. Bergerac is negotiating with officials of the Soviet Ministry of Food Industry, which has jurisdiction over cosmetics, to work out a deal to sell Revlon products in the U.S.S.R. "The market is clearly enormous," he says. Foreign cosmetics...