Juan Pedro Abeniacar Trolez's first job was as an engineer in a nuclear plant. But he soon discovered that it was not the career he wanted. So he shifted gears and chose management ... and embarked on a scentsational career. Shalaka Paradkar talks to the president of Perfumes Loewe
Do you know the scent of summer? Well, it's the aroma of sweet ripening fruits, of creepers heavy with white jasmine, of patchouli and vanilla, amber, sandalwood and lavender and honey ...
Juan Pedro Abeniacar Trolez knows the fragrance of this scent. And so smitten was he by it that he helped create a seductive perfume that smells exactly like summer.
"It was inspired by a song," says Trolez, sniffing the scented air appreciatively. "Creativity has a known, yet secret, path. It's the result of the work of many people."
If it were to emulate its inspiration, this summer song in a bottle may well become a roaring hit. Quizás, Quizás, Quizás (pronounced as kithass and which means perhaps, perhaps, perhaps) was written in 1947, and became a classic, beloved of millions of people and sung by everyone from Nat King Cole to Julio Iglesias.
Over 100 cover versions of this song have appeared, and now, thanks, to the efforts of Juan Pedro Abeniacar Trolez, president, Perfumes Loewe, it's a song you can spritz on and wear an aura of seduction.
"One day, we had a breakthrough, we got a fantastic opportunity to purchase the rights for this song and created something new ... never before has a fragrance been based on music."
Mapping a perfume to music sounds easier sung than done. "The link between music and fragrances is intimate and sensual. It is true that when you talk about a fragrance you talk about the concert of notes and harmony. There are many words that are shared in the vocabulary of musicians and perfumers," says Juan Pedro, in his rich Spanish accent.
"Quizás, Quizás, Quizás is one of the unique examples of a song written to seduce. We played on the concept in a creative way - it had to be delicate, fresh and happy."
He adds, fingers winnowing the air, much like a maestro, "It's linked to that delicate moment in the ritual of seduction: I like you, you like me, but when? How?"
Juan Pedro has been lured by fragrances since he was a child. The son of a Spanish father and French mother, his earliest childhood memories are of the Miss Dior perfume his mother wore and his father marketed as the sole representative in Spain of the House of Dior.
Over the past 25 years, Juan Pedro has had the opportunity to develop several perfumes with International Flavors & Fragrances (Jesús del Pozo, Dior, Loewe).
Since taking over the reins of the company, Juan Pedro has more than doubled the turnover of the business unit, making Perfumes Loewe one of LVMH's most profitable operations.
Established in 1846 as a leather goods store in Madrid, Loewe today is one of the luxury fashion, leather goods and accessories brands in the LVMH stable.
Their fragrance portfolio includes Agua de Loewe (2000), Esencia Femme (2002), Aire de Verano (2003). Recent fragrance releases include I Loewe You (2005) and Quizas, Quizas, Quizas (2007).
Married with two children, this civil engineer turned fragrance baron believes that although the Middle East's olfactory taste in fragrances is inclined towards the spicy, Loewe will continue to attract new customers.
"In the Middle East, Loewe is still the most respected classical luxury perfume brand by most distributors, which grant the brand a privileged spot in their boutiques," he says.
"There are many similarities between the Arab and Spanish cultures, because the Arabs were in Spain for eight centuries. The Arab legacy in Spain is absolutely unique - we have lots of Arabic words in our language, and even the smell of the south of Spain is a testament to the Arab legacy.
"It smells of roses, jasmine and orange blossoms, very spicy and Mediterranean. We may not have spices like frankincense which are part of the Arab culture, but we have all the flowers in Spain."
I
I had a normal childhood, and was a very good student at school. My memories of this period of my life are all pleasant. We were fortunate to own a very nice family home in the Madrid suburbs, in an area that had gardens and condominiums.
I studied civil engineering because I was drawn to mathematics and physics. At the time it was possible for civil engineers to work anywhere in Europe. So it was not a choice born out of conviction, but convenience.
At the beginning of my career as a manager, I was more traditional in my approach. I was handling a company, a commercial team and marketing.
But now I am also heavily involved in the design and creation of new products and the creative aspect of designing a fragrance. I think over time, I have developed some good skills in this aspect of the business and this has become the most interesting part of my professional life.
I have been in the fragrance business for 25 years. Today it's much more complex, sophisticated and competitive, though not necessarily more interesting. When I first joined the business, the European market was booming but nowadays that's not the case.
It was more of a local job for me then, as I was fully dedicated to the Spanish market. Today, 25 years later, I have a global view of the market.
As a team leader, I think I have been able to earn my team's respect. They may disagree with some of the things I do, but most of the time they like to work with me - I hope!
I am not a night bird. My favourite time of the day is dawn, when I am fresher and work better.
I have travelled so much on business, and have been in contact with so many cultures, that I like to enjoy the food of the place I am in. My favourite food can be a simple dish of poached fish or an exquisitely prepared French meal.
Me
Me and my first job
Since I have always been interested in maths and physics, I opted to study civil engineering. After I finished my civil engineering studies I worked at a nuclear power plant - it had very little to do with what I do now!
My first job was working on a road construction project as a quality construction engineer. It was a highway being constructed in southern Spain and it was hot, dusty and painful work.
The most important thing I learnt during this time was that earning money required some effort. Nothing in life came free. Before taking up this job everything I needed was provided by my family, with a lot of love. I didn't have a sense of the effort that went into providing for a family.
Me and career change
I thought management would be a more interesting career than civil engineering. I married at 29 and enrolled for an MBA.
I completed my Masters in business administration from INSEAD, Fontainebleau, France and went on to complete the AVIRA programme (for CEOs and Board members) also from INSEAD. I was seduced by what I learnt there, and decided to dedicate my life to managing people.
Studying at INSEAD was a unique experience. My wife and I rented a gardener's cottage, attached to a big property. My oldest son was born there while I was studying, which contributed to making it a fantastic experience. I studied very hard and was extremely rewarded for my efforts.
Me and my family
I met my wife Maria Paz through a common friend. Ten months later we got married. She is a lawyer and has an independent practice. She has been able to balance her professional and personal life far better than I have.
I, on the other hand, dedicate a lot of time to my profession - I think I did not have any alternative, but perhaps, I didn't want any other alternative. Maria has dedicated a lot of her time to the children and our house.
Both my sons are lawyers. My elder son Pablo, is 24, and working in a law firm. My younger son, Ivan, will soon be graduating from law school. They are fantastic boys.
I think a person builds his character through many aspects of his personal life - marriage and fatherhood being two of them. It is difficult to say which one is more influential. It is a compound and the most important part of who you are as a person.
When you are single, you just think about your own life. As a family man, you are responsible for other people's lives as well. Your actions have to be weighed against those consequences: whether you are planning a vacation or deciding how to spend your free time.
I dedicate my leisure time to my family and sports. I try to get involved in as many sporting disciplines as I can. I like snow skiing, scuba diving, cycling and travelling. I try to involve my family as much as possible in these interests.
Me and the fragrance business
My first job after graduating from INSEAD was as a commercial director for a fragrance company. It was an interesting job because I was on the field a lot dealing with retailers, distributors and consumers. I spent 10 years there and later turned an entrepreneur. I launched my own Spanish designer brand of perfume.
After several years, the firm split as my partner took another direction for his personal and professional growth and I joined LVMH (Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy SA).
Brands that are known by most people were not available worldwide in the 1970s. It's a different scenario today. There has been an explosion of brands. Even if you factor in inflation, the market has expanded ten times over.
The emerging countries such as Russia, China and India are a phenomenon of the past 10 years. The internationalisation of leading perfume brands in recent years has also been quite a phenomenon.
I have always been stimulated by my work. It's never been routine, but a very interesting job. The corporate philosophy at LVMH encourages us to think like entrepreneurs.
At the same time I am involved in international business development, the design of new products and corporate strategy. I have the chance of belonging to a group where I have plenty of opportunities to learn worldwide.
And since I am also responsible for all of LVMH's Perfumes and Cosmetics business for Spain and Portugal - including brands such as Dior, Givenchy, Guerlain, Kenzo, Benefit and Acqua di Parma - it adds a lot of variety and opportunities to learn.
Of all these brands, there are two that hold a very special place in my heart: one is Christian Dior - the brand I have lived with since I was a baby, or over the past 50 years, and am now responsible for it at a country level.
The other one is Loewe, as I am responsible for everything going on with that brand. I am the conductor of the orchestra as far as Loewe is concerned.
Me and my support system
There is no easy way to identify a fragrance that will work - it's exhilarating but also fraught with risks and a lot of hard work goes into designing a smell, writing a formula and working with a perfumer.
At Loewe, we work closely with a world-renowned perfumer called Carlos Benaim of International Flavors & Fragrances (IFF). Our inhouse perfumer Emilio Valeros and myself would travel very often to New York to meet with Carlos.
We have also worked on other perfumes with him, such as Solo Loewe. Carlos is one of the top noses of the fragrance business and also a dear friend.
To work with someone with whom you share a relationship that goes beyond the professional helps creativity to explode. It makes for a special team and helps us develop perfumes that are striking and well accepted.
Another good friend is Alberto Moreas, the chief perfumer of Firmenich, a Geneva-based fragrance manufacturer. These fragrance designers all have their own signature styles, in the way they handle raw materials.
Some of them prefer a number of raw materials in their palette, some show a preference for particular materials, which determines their style. Another good friend of mine, who works at Firmenich Paris, is Oliver Cress, with whom I have worked on a number of perfumes. But the biggest support pillar of them all is my wife.
Myself
What has been the biggest risk in your life?
Like everybody's life, there are moments of pain and times to be grateful. I prefer to forget the pain. Everybody has had bad experiences, and so have I.
When I decided to stop being an entrepreneur and join LVMH, the future was full of uncertainties. I had been independent until then, but suddenly I was linked to a multinational company with a lot of reporting and rules to be followed.
In my career, that was a big challenge. I am happy now it turned out well, but it was a risky move then. My life would surely have been very different had I not taken that decision.
From a song to a perfume in a bottle ... How was the journey made?
The most exciting part of the journey is the creation of a fragrance. It's also the most uncertain and stressful part. As the chairman of the company, I am responsible for the success or failure of the fragrance. This is the riskiest part of the job but also one that I enjoy the most.
We try to build our fragrances on a story that is inspiring, real, intelligent and cultured. In that sense these fragrances are based on very different inspirations, yet share these common values.
The last men's fragrance we did, Solo Loewe, was inspired by the man who lived in the 10th century in Toledo, Spain, a place where people from three different cultures lived in peace and harmony, with respect for each other's beliefs.
The fragrance was based on the history and heritage of Spain, translated into a fragrance that was modern and comprehensible.
The most important region in the world in terms of producing natural products for perfumes is Grasse in southern France.
Our perfume has been designed in the IFF laboratories, with strong inputs from Emilio and I. The way it works is that we give a brief to the fragrance designer and they develop a perfume based on that brief.
We participate actively in the design process, suggesting a few modifications here and there. That's something which is not very common. And it's one of the last few fields where the computer hasn't taken over, it's all dependent on the nose.
As one of the successful "noses" in the business, do you do anything to keep your olfactory sense performing at an optimum?
I don't do anything special to keep my sense of smell sharp. One just gets more educated as you get more experienced. It's a different attitude where you try to structure the way you smell in a professional way.
A layperson would just say that they like or hate a fragrance. But as a fragrance professional, I have to structure the way I smell. It's somewhat like looking at a picture as an artist - where you analyse and understand technique or think about how it can be better.
So when you are building up a fragrance, your sense of scent has to be more intellectual than just as a passive receptor of smell.
