HJ REPORTS: WELLA DESTINATION

Destination 2023 provided a space for guests to witness inspiring hair artistry whilst networking and recharging in Gran Canaria

Over three days, Wella Company hosted an incredible industry event, Destination 2023, in Gran Canaria. The event brought together over 1,200 hair professionals from 57 countries in a stunning environment to inspire and introduce the latest styles for stylists to take back to clients.

The Wella Company White Party

Featuring six shows and 42 model transformations, Destination guests were also treated to four Look & Learn Hair festivals from Romeu Felipe, Renya Xydis, Briana Cisneros, Anthony Cole and Guy Kleinhaus who commented: “The ability to be creative every day is the greatest gift and brings me all the joy in the world.” The line up of artists included the UK’s James Earnshaw who was on hand to launch the new Wella Professionals Ultimate Repair Care line as part of the opening celebrations in a show which featured stunning hair looks from Alexis Ferrer, Briana Cisernos and Anthony Cole.

Additionally, Patricia Nikole a.k.a @paintedhair headlined the Wella Professionals Digital Factory, and shared insider tips for mastering social media as well as building a millionfollower strong audience.

Annie Young-Scrivner, CEO of Wella Company, commented on the event: “At Wella, we believe that when hairdressers thrive, we thrive. Our commitment to professionals has been the cornerstone of our iconic heritage for over 143 years. We are immensely proud to support over 500,000 salons around the world, partnering with thousands of talented stylists and technicians, and serving millions of loyal consumers who trust in our brands. It's truly special to see it all come together here at Destination.”

The iconic event concluded in style with a gala dinner and night of celebration, with the announcement of the Wella International Trend Vision Award 2023 winners. After three years of exceptional circumstances surrounding COVID-19, the legendary TrendVision Award ceremony was finally back as a face-to-face gathering at the Destination event.

The competition was hosted in 20 countries worldwide, with hundreds of entries across eight nominations, including colour, styling, editorial focus, and nail art, with Destination being the event that brought together the craft across key industry categories.

In Conversation with...

HJ caught up with Annie Young-Scrivner, CEO, Wella Company and Hugh Dineen, CMO and Global Brand President at Destination 2023 to find out what the future holds for the brand

What is the focus for Wella Company in 2023/2024?

Annie: We're focused on making sure that we make the salon successful, and that's about creating amazing looks to drive traffic into the salon and having the skillset to create services that keep customers coming back. It all starts with education, so when colourists go through our Wella Colour Expert course in the UK, they get a Wella Higher Level Diploma, a degree-level qualification, from Glasgow University.

Hugh: For us it's so much about brands, education and innovation, which we think is the lifeblood of how we can keep this industry vital. Our approach to community is so vitally different – Wella is shoulder to shoulder with the industry. We've helped them and they've helped us through really challenging moments. The next piece is about inspiring the industry and bringing new ideas and new trends to our salons. Finally, we’re focused on innovation. From our perspective, this is critical to keeping the industry relevant and bringing clients back to the salon at a greater frequency.

What does innovation and inspiration at Wella look like?

Hugh: We spend a lot of time interviewing pros and consumers and understanding digital trends. We're always listening online to better understand what clients and stylists are looking for. What we've recognised is a large, growing – and unmet – audience around repair. Having over 140 plus years of development experience, it was critical that we put forward a solution we thought would be a game changer for the industry. That is at the core of how we developed a product like Ultimate Repair. 

Annie: We’re in a hundred countries across the globe so we are able to pick out trends and best practices and then migrate them out. For example, James Earnshaw will create a look on social and it could transcend the globe instantly. Hugh and his team and our Global Ambassadors are able to help create trends.

Hugh: Our inspiration is really from our pros who help us every day to better understand where we should be heading in the future. We measure our success by our ability to inspire others to create content on our behalf. So we're always excited by pros who create content digitally for us. We’re both humbled and excited by the work that they're doing, and particularly at an event like Destination.

How is Wella supporting the next generation?

Annie: We have 91 million people that we touch every day. And when we leverage our channels we reach so many more. We are focused on talking about the incredible career that you could have as a hairdresser and how we bring people in. We also want to teach consumers about the incredible artistry that they can experience and the styles that they can have in the salon.

Hugh: We're committed to salon economics and through our educational programme we’re helping to create new service offerings that salons can charge more for, that are trending and that will bring consumers back to the salon. We believe that's part of how you continue to revitalise the industry. As the industry continues to grow it's going to attract more people and education will fuel their ability to provide better service offerings and experiences for end consumers.