It is Marketing 101 that when choosing a brand name, something short, easy to pronounce and spell, and memorable in various cultures and countries is the way to go.
My sister Cyrille and I chose Alchimie Forever as our brand name, many years ago in a delightful tea shop in the Old Town of Geneva. If I had a penny for every time our brand name was misspelled or mispronounced… What were we thinking?
Watch me tell the story here or keep reading.
As we started brainstorming, we identified four guiding principles:
- We wanted a name that started with A (first letter of the alphabet, A like Ada, who knows…)
- We wanted a link to Forever Institut, the medical spa our skin care brand was born in
- We wanted a word in French (elegant, Swiss, international), and a word in English (universal, American, approachable)
We started listing French words starting with A… and suddenly my sister lit up and said “Alchimie!” And then we switched from drinking tea to celebrating with champagne!
It made sense for so many reasons. Alchimie (pronounced al-shee-mee) is the French word for alchemy. And alchemy is very much at the heart of our skin care philosophy.
- Alchemy is the medieval science that became chemistry. And how can you formulate skin care products without chemistry, without labs, without clinical studies? There can be no skin care without science.
- Alchemy is also part magic. The Alchemists were involved in such mystical pursuits as transforming lead into gold and finding the stone of eternal youth (both endeavors somehow related to beauty and youth). And skin care is indeed part magic…
- The Alchemists were also among the first to identify plants as having healthful benefits. And potent botanicals are at the core of our formulations.
So yes, our brand name is hard to pronounce, and hard to spell – and now you know why: science, magic, and powerful botanicals!
