https://www.lelabofragrances.com/
Laboratory-style décor, minimalist labels and fragrances named for the main ingredients – this is Le Labo, a niche fragrance brand founded in New York in 2006.
In addition to an official Instagram, Le Labo also runs a special account @overheardlelabo.
“Spoken words from our Labs. Recorded on one of our pretentious vintage typewriters.”
As the account’s profile says, the content it publishes comes exclusively from conversations that take place in the shops. Le Labo is not part of their conversation, and it is just an “overhearer” and a “bystander “.
So Le Labo became a listening set, allowing customers to tell their life stories. Of course, there is also the option of printing it on the perfume label they buy. Le Labo has also made a newspaper from these conversations with the launch of Le Journal – an original-content broadsheet combining nostalgia for newspaper culture with the magic of Le Labo. As also noted on its official introduction page,
“It’s a cultural commentary with an elevated sense of smell.”
– For the brand: Let the story be the soul
Since its creation, Le Labo has always been about handmade and natural ingredients and keeping the externals simple.
It is also highly significant that it insists on no advertising. Thus @overheardlelabo is the closest thing to an advertising account, with 70 thousand followers, which has been updated since 2016. In fact, it does the best advertising for Le Labo.
These conversations, recorded by “overhearing “, are posted in @overheardlelabo with their location. Each narrator has their own unique life story, but they have all dropped by Le Labo’s shop and moved on to their next destination. Their unintentional conversations must have been tinged with personal feelings, empowering the niche fragrance brand with incredible creativity and deeper storytelling. This storytelling is mysterious, engaging, and can add to the brand’s tonality; simultaneously, these stories can inspire the perfumers for new creations in their products.
– For the creators of UGC: Some unique personal moments
Every customer who has left a word on @overheard without a second thought is the creator of UGC. Unlike ordinary UGC creators who can reap likes and attention, they may not be aware that this quirky brand will record their unintentional conversations as valuable material.
As creators, they leave behind a conversation in the Le Labo shop, but also a memory and a story. This written record means that the connection between the creator and the brand is invisibly reinforced, and perhaps when they look through this ins account one day, they will suddenly be surprised to discover that this story seems to be my story!
– For the consumers: Shopping in Le Labo is not a chore but an experience
The conversations posted by @overheadlelabo are a mix of grievances and anecdotes, and the casual and unadorned colloquial expressions add a sense of reality – they are indeed the living memories of every purchase.
These stories add a sense of mystery and interest to the purchase for the Le Labo consumer. Thus, Shopping at Le Labo is thus an experience, more like wandering through a myriad of stories and finally leaving your own story on the vintage white label – the scent of a perfume is an expression of individuality and privacy, as well as a symbol of personal identity and experience.
All in all, these overheard conversations benefit Le Labo as a brand more than anything else: not in the traditional sense of advertising, but in a much better way. It gives the brand a sense of storytelling and unique tonality and inspires new products. At the same time, @overheardlelabo, as an online community, gathers the brand’s followers, who are storytellers, creators and consumers – maybe not now, but in the future!