Give back to community to find a true purpose beyond business: Pau Gruart of L'Oréal Paris

Almost every brand now talks about being ‘purpose-driven’ or ‘purpose-led’ and this notion is changing the nature of business. Having always stood for women empowerment, L’Oréal Paris believes its sense of purpose as a brand is to be committed to address the barriers standing between women and their ability to fulfil their ambition, and to help them walk freely towards their destiny.

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Explaining why it is important for brands to authentically lead a purpose, Pau Gruart, General Manager, L’Oréal Paris, told BestMediaInfo.com that giving back to the community gives brands a true purpose that goes beyond business.

“In my view it is essential for brands to stay relevant and resonate with their consumers. Brands like us have the opportunity to leverage the respect and love they enjoy spreading awareness and education on critical issues, especially if they link with what that brand stands for,” Gruart said.

While it aims to empower women and drive change, the brand has taken an active role in the fight against street harassment by offering people a tool to be part of the solution and create a bystander movement. It launched an initiative named Stand Up Against Street Harassment in March 2020 globally and then in India in November.

“We always have stood for empowering women. We continue to build our communication and initiatives on this very purpose. In 2019, we investigated to understand the most important issue women face in their daily lives and discovered that the #1 problem faced by women and girls around the world was street harassment. Street harassment has no borders. It happens everywhere, every day, taking away the right to feel safe in the public space. To address this issue, we partnered Hollaback! (non-profit organisation to raise awareness about and combat harassment, both online and in-person) to develop and globally roll out the initiative, Stand Up against street harassment, – a training to provide simple, safe strategies against street harassment for victims and bystanders all over the world. The main objective is to raise awareness about the street harassment issue and how important it is to equip women and men on tools of intervention. We aim to train one million people by 2022,” he said.

The brand has been driving awareness through digital media and social media in partnerships with its spokespersons and key influencers. And to take StandUp to the consumers on a mass scale, it launched a dedicated training website, www.standup-india.com.

“This programme has a predominantly digital-led campaign, with our spokespersons taking the pledge and the training, followed by our influencers pledging to take the training and inviting their followers to do so,” he said.

Along with the website, which is accessible free of cost for everyone in India, it has partnered with the NGO Breakthrough to take this initiative on-ground across states and target audiences.

Apart from the digital training it is providing through the platform, it aims to drive awareness and enrol more people to the training.

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