Is it possible to transfer the essence of the beauty of perfumes, creams, and makeup into a package? If you ask Baralan, the answer will certainly be yes.
For the Lombard company, which has been operating in primary cosmetic packaging since 1962, packaging is not just a simple container, it is something that encompasses beauty- a precious container that is fundamental to enhance what is enclosed within it. An object capable of arousing emotions.
Only a product born from a strong passion for its craft is able to arouse such emotions and looking at the history of Baralan, you can understand how strong this love is. For Baralan, packaging is the result of passion for work, for quality, and for beauty.
A passion that has always defined the company and has been handed down from generation to generation just as Maurizio Ficcadenti, Global R&D Manager Baralan tells us in this interview.
What are the strengths of your strategy?
The strengths which we strongly focus on are closely linked to the goal of ensuring the quality of our products. Quality, not only visual, but also technical and practical, whereby through our experience and dedication, we aim for innovation and excellence. This is kept in mind throughout the development phases- from conception to prototyping and up to the production of our products which are then enriched with a variety of decorations and finishing touches to offer a complete range of services to the customer.
Let’s talk about the latter. One of your assets is the ability to combine excellence and simplicity, two concepts that are seemingly opposites. What is excellence for Baralan?
For us excellence is related to the high level of quality that we offer through our products and services that can be achieved only with dedication, precision, and consistency.
It is the result of a creative process in which complexity gives way to simplicity aiming at essentiality, a discovery of the balance between aesthetics and functionality, between sophistication and practicality of use. Less is more is basically a mantra for us and it is no coincidence that Baralan packaging is easily and immediately recognizable: it stands out for its clean lines, minimalist design, and the harmony achieved with its shapes and forms. The simplicity of excellence is our trademark.
How do you apply the concept of excellence to the world of Skincare, Make Up and Fragrance?
We would say that excellence in the skincare world is achieved when you are able to protect and preserve the natural beauty of a product and its properties. In make-up, it means being able to protect the texture, compactness, and the appearance of products, while in fragrances, it means knowing how to capture the transient, fleeting nature of perfumes and essences. Such skills can only be achieved by combining economic, technological and human resources, just as Baralan has been doing for almost 60 years.
What does it mean for you to create trendy products?
It means always keeping up with the demands of the market and at the same time, helping customers set trends that do not go out of fashion. Our daily challenge is to create products that have a functional design and an impactful aesthetic that meet the needs of both the customer and the end consumer while remaining attractive and inspiring. That’s why we call ourselves “Trends Ambassadors”: to describe our ability to express the creative spirit and needs of our time and, at the same time, to acknowledge our expertise in creating something timeless.
Following fashion is a natural tendency, but creating a new trend is something very different, implying a taste for beauty and pleasure in something new. A dual perspective, just like the soul of Baralan: aimed towards innovation yet faithful to its history and values; spokesperson of new trends and creator of products with timeless aesthetics, a cultivator of luxury that is always in search of what is truly essential.
A key element of your philosophy is customization, which allows you to express the creative spirit of the brand and make the product unique…
True! Customization is a crucial element of our work, because it allows us to make the packaging unique and to reflect our own creative flair and that of the customer. There are many decorating techniques that we carry out within the group’s companies: varnishing, metallization, and opaque effects… We could say that the customization possibilities are endless – they range from glossy to opaque, from satin to degradé, from metallic to different shades of color. And let’s not forget screen printing and hot printing which enrich packaging with text and logos and turn it into a true finished product. Thanks to the various techniques and decorations, each packaging becomes unique, original, and emotion-inducing.
This is the Baralan tradition at its best.