With 1.3 billion Chinese people, and a booming middle class estimated at 400 million, China is the most attractive market for international brands. Particularly for French luxury brands, where 1 in 2 buyers is under 35. Shanghai continues to rise in the rankings of the world’s fashion capitals, now nipping at Rome’s heels.
Such dynamism attracts expatriates from all over the world, making China the USA of the 21st century, and Shanghai the new New York. With its 23 million inhabitants, Shanghai is now China’s most populous city and the heart of the country’s economic life.
As China’s main hub for global trade, the city is an international capital that drives Chinese trends, particularly on the web.
The country’s dynamism can also be seen online, as it boasts 513 million Internet users, the number one in terms of audience, and social networks attract 61% of the population in a digital landscape that has nothing to envy our own. The Chinese cousins of Twitter, Facebook and Pinterest – Weibo, Weixin and Huaban – are more technically advanced, offering more tools for their users than their Western counterparts, and are becoming essential digital contact points. The digital playground is also mobile, as the number of Chinese mobile users has just passed the billion mark.
Located in two buildings in Paris, FRED & FARID GROUP has 6 branches, 250 employees and will achieve estimated sales of 45 million euros in 2012. This move into China marks a logical continuation in the group’s development.
5 years after its creation, Fred & Farid launch the international expansion of their communications group. With the granting of its Chinese business license and the opening of bank accounts for its Shanghai WFOE, the Fred & Farid group this week announces its official opening on Chinese territory.
FRED & FARID PARIS- SHANGHAI
“Our entire career has been international, first in London and then in the United States. Today, almost 50% of the group’s revenues come from international brands, for international campaigns managed from Paris. It was quite natural for us to think about physically expanding the group outside France. Our Creative Director Feng Huang has been with us for 10 years. We’ve been preparing this Chinese project with him for five years. Fred & Farid
This new agency, which has taken up residence in a 1,000 square meter warehouse in Shanghai, is a 100% digital agency (mobile and social media).
The agency has already started work for 10 groups in China: L’Oréal, LVMH, Pernod Ricard, Oxylane, Yves Rocher, Interparfums, Vicomte A, a Chinese digital group Sohu, and another European group which for strategic reasons wishes to keep its expansion in China confidential today.
To fully illustrate its bi-cultural dimension, the group has chosen a new Sino-French logo for the whole group, for its “parent” agency: FRED & FARID PARIS-SHANGHAI, and for its digital agency KIDS LOVE JETLAG PARIS-SHANGHAI.
The Shanghai team will be made up mainly of Chinese people, and non-Chinese people from all over the world who love Chinese culture. This bridge between the two agencies, Paris and Shanghai, will enable us to support both Western brands wishing to set up in China, and Chinese brands wishing to set up in the West. The French agency has been employing Chinese people in its Paris offices for many years.
To fully illustrate its bi-cultural dimension, the Group has chosen a new Franco-Chinese logo for all its documents, including those relating solely to business in France. And every member of the group is now required to choose their Chinese first name, which is printed on their business card in Chinese ideograms.
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