In announcing its sponsorship of this year’s Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF), Montreal-based L’Oréal Paris Canada said its 2012 campaign will be on a grander scale than the brand’s first festival foray in 2011.
“It’s going to be much bigger than last year, because last year we were just starting,” said Hugo Thibault, brand communications director for L’Oréal Paris Canada.
The sponsorship will offer a number of beauty-related services and opportunities for stars and fans alike. For the stars, the brand’s official makeup and hair artists Eddie Malter and Eric Del Monaco will offer a variety of makeup and hair services, including cosmetic touch-ups before press conferences and galas.
For the fans, L’Oréal Paris will be launching a special TIFF cosmetics collection, which will be sold for a limited time in Canadian drugstores and mass retailers in August and September. The special collection will feature a number of L’Oréal Paris products meant to evoke the red-carpet glamour of TIFF.
A new two-floor “beauty complex” will also be erected near a TIFF red carpet location to provide non-celebrity festival goers with hair and makeup touch-ups – “so people can finalize their lipstick before going to a premiere or one of the many TIFF parties at night,” said Thibault – as well as the chance to sample some of the brand’s products.
L’Oréal has also introduced a beauty correspondent scouting contest. The winner will get to chat with the stars at screenings alongside two professional reporters. Their red-carpet interviews will be posted on the L’Oréal Paris Facebook page and on YouTube.
The contest will be carried out through social media channels like Twitter and Facebook.
According to Thibault, the glamour and celebrity-focused aspect of TIFF makes it a perfect fit for L’Oréal.
“A global strategy for us is to align with all the red carpet events,” he said, noting that the L’Oréal Group is developing red carpet programs for events such as the Oscars, Grammys and Cannes Film Festival. “Movies, for us, are a really good fit.”
