An American Auction in Paris

Article Synopsis

Emily in Paris is a 10-episode series review from the perspective of a MARKETER. From each episode, I will try to extract my top 3 learnings. For those who haven’t watched the series yet, this is going to be a spoiler-filled segment, so go watch it before you start reading.

Episode 9 – An American Auction in Paris

The episode starts with Emily’s presentation on the campaign idea for “Champere” (Please refer to Episode -8 article). She ships a box of champagne to one of her favorite bars in Chicago and captures real moments of people spraying the champagne. As a marketer, I found her idea that “spraying champagne is not only for a big win in sports but it can be for everyone” very interesting. The brand idea is to make “Extravagance Accessible”. As usual, her boss Sylvie replies sarcastically that it’s “very American, to be wasteful” although she approves the idea.

At an art gallery party, she introduces her team to Camile to get ahead with the client-agency relationship. Being a smart marketer she doesn’t miss the opportunity to meet Mathieu Cadault at the party and cracks a collaboration with “American Friends of Louvre” by donating Pierre Cadault’s Dress through auction at the charity event.

The charity event is one of the best events that the scriptwriter has written. In the star-studded event, with media and who’s who of Paris, Emily has to wear Pierre Cadault’s white dress like a model on the stage auctions. In an unexpected turn of events, founders of an upcoming youth apparel brand called “Grey Space” crash the party in Ghostbusters uniform and spray paint Emily’s white dress grey. It is a well-thought publicity stunt in front of the entire media that makes Grey Space the talk of the town. I must say hats-off to the scriptwriter for this brilliant marketing piece. 

The next day, as expected, all media coverage includes pictures of Emily wearing the white dress spotted with grey color. The brand “Grey Space” manages to steal the entire limelight in someone else’s event at a bare minimum cost through a witty publicity stunt.

As a marketer, I felt sorry for Emily for a while but to my surprise, she manages to change things around for herself. At the office when Sylvie shows Pierre’s Instagram account and tells her how badly the incident has affected him, Emily shows her the silver lining. She explains that Pierre’s account has in fact attracted 1,00,000 new followers driven from Grey Space’s account and that Pierre is part of the conversation like he has never been before. It’s a beautiful moment for a marketer to be able to spin a failure to a win.

I admire another insightful line when Pierre says, “His dress used to be worn by most beautiful ladies in Paris but now it’s worn by old ladies that’s why the other brands mock him.” Emily responds that it’s not mockery but celebration. She eventually pitches a collaboration with Grey Space.

As a marketer, my top 3 extractions from the episode – 8 are as follows:

• As a Brand Marketer, the focus should not be as much on the product, as it should be on who you are as a Brand.

• As a marketer, sometimes you should know how to steal your competitor’s thunder.

• No matter how bad the situation is, as a human being and as a marketer, you must look for the light at the end of the tunnel.

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