At 60, Clarins looks great for its age

After 60 years, Clarins is the No. 1 luxury skincare brand in France and Europe, and seems set to dominate the rest of the world in the next 40.

How can it not, when the French brand offers not only effective products that are a pleasure to use (I am a huge fan of Double Serum), but also an exclusive kind of pampering at its Clarins Skin Spas, which employ the Skin-Touch Method developed by founder Jacques Courtin-Clarins 60 years ago?

I normally dislike getting facials but offer me one at Clarins and I am so there, because I know that what awaits me are not painful extractions and steam up my nose but a heated bed, soothing music and the gentlest hands applying fragrant balms in the most relaxing massage ever.

Yes, at Clarins, the massage is anything but random. The number of hand movements, the pressure, length, and even the speed of the movements have all been taken into account to provide the most benefits and maximum sensory pleasure.

It’s this level of thought and care, coupled with scientific innovation, that has led Jean-Marie Le Roy, Clarins sales director for Asia-Pacific, to liken Clarins to Apple or Hermès: a company that thinks differently but retains a strong family heritage (the company went from being public back to private recently, Le Roy says).

Jacques’ sons Christian and Dr. Olivier Courtin-Clarins currently run the company, and granddaughters Virginie, Prisca, Claire and Jenna are already in training at Rue Tronche in Paris, also known as “Clarins Street.”

“While working in a hospital, Jacques Courtin-Clarins witnessed how a patient was devastated by her deformed arm, and how crucial it is for women to maintain their beauty,” Le Roy says. “So his life’s work was to build a bridge between medicine and beauty.”

Listening to women is one of the secrets of their success, and asking their clients, “What can we do for you?” was the start of many an iconic Clarins product.

“Eau Dynamisante was created because people wanted something that smelled and felt good,” Le Roy says. “Shaping Facial Lift was an encounter between Japanese ladies and Jacques Courtin — ‘We want our faces to look slimmer.’ Double Serum … the active ingredients can’t mix because they have water and oil, so we did two jars in one. We’re a very pragmatic company that has respect for environment and does what it says. That’s why I’ve been there so many years,” notes Le Roy, who, at 43, has worked at Clarins for two decades.

At a lunch celebrating the brand’s 60th anniversary, Rustan’s Commercial Corporation EVP Anton Huang related how one of his employees gave him a Shaping Facial Lift for Christmas.

“It helps, definitely,” Le Roy tells him, attributing his own youthful looks (despite being a father to four kids) to Clarins. In Europe, where there’s no stigma attached to men using skincare, Le Roy says he started using his mother’s Clarins moisturizer at 16 to treat his dry skin, and has now shifted to ClarinsMen Super Moisture Balm.

So how did Clarins become No. 1 in Europe? Here are highlights from the brand’s 60-year history:

• 1954 – Jacques Courtin-Clarins creates the Clarins brand, naming it after his character in a school play. Trained in massage, Jacques opens the first Clarins Institute at 35 Rue Tronchet in Paris, where therapists practice his exclusive new massage method with plant-based body treatment oils designed to rejuvenate, contour or relax.

• 1966 – Clarins releases its first slimming gel, precursor to a long line of body-shaping treatments that include Body Shaping Cream (2012) and Body Lift Cellulite Control (2013).

• 1968 – Clarins is the first skincare brand to provide customers “wish cards,” and perfects its formulas by listening to client comments.

• 1974 – Jacques asks eldest son Christian Courtin-Clarins to join him in the family business. As president of the board, it is Christian who drives the company’s worldwide expansion.

• 1978 – Clarins develops Refined Day Cream, the world’s first lotion devoted to the special needs of 40-plus women.

• 1980 – Clarins becomes the leading luxury skincare brand in France.

• 1987 – Eau Dynamisante pioneers a new trend in cosmetics as a “treatment fragrance,” combining the action and fragrance of plants with an uplifting scent and sensation.

• 1990 – Clarins becomes No. 1 in Europe, a position it retains to this day. At present the brand has over 20 subsidiaries and is sold in more than 160 countries.

• 1995 – Younger son Dr. Olivier Courtin-Clarins, after a career as an orthopedic surgeon, joins the company after working at Clarins Research for 10 years. As managing director of the Clarins Group, he oversees the development of Clarins Skin Spas and Spas by Clarins, a new generation of ultra-personalized spa with a holistic approach to beauty and relaxation.

• 1998 – V Face Essence, the first “facial lift” skincare product, is released.

• 2002 – Men’s skincare line ClarinsMen is launched, formulated with energizing bison grass at the heart of its formula.

• 2011 – Clarins joins the FEED Foundation, committed to alleviating the problem of global hunger for children.

• 2013 – Double Serum is launched. The gold dual bottle housing the first water-and-oil compound formula is awarded 80 beauty awards and one bottle is sold every three seconds around the world.

To mark its 60th anniversary, Clarins is reissuing the golden products that started it all in, appropriately enough, shimmering gold bottles: the moisturizing Blue Orchid Face Treatment Oil and firming and toning Tonic Body Treatment Oil.

“You use the body tonic against stretch marks, it’s fabulous, it works,” attest both Le Roy and Huang, who say their wives used it for their pregnancies and developed no stretch marks at all.

This reminds me of what Dr. Olivier Courtin-Clarins once told me during an interview: “We don’t promise miracles, we promise results.” And that’s another secret to why Clarins remains No. 1.

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Clarins is available at Rustan’s The Beauty Source. The Clarins Skin Spa is located on the fifth floor of Rustan’s Makati. Call 817-8414 or 813-3739 local 271 for inquiries and appointments.

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