Claudia's new business model
Claudia Schiffer is starting to look like her age. This is less a reference to the 33 years notched up by the German supermodel sitting opposite, than the age of celebrity we now live in, where famous faces sell anything from fragrance to finance, magazines to music.
As many as one in five advertisements are estimated to feature celebrity brand endorsements and they are increasingly finding their way into editorial, too, via discreet and not- so-discreet star-based product placement (see story on page 10). So here's the first anomaly.
Advertisers crave integrity and authenticity, argues Karen Ellis, head of beauty at advertising group Grey, and a seasoned marketer in the industry. But in order to communicate those values, they turn to a person almost everyone will recognise and hardly anyone truly knows - a person like Claudia Schiffer.
Over an almost 16-year career, Schiffer has been used to market some of the plum brands in the $201bn global cosmetics and toiletries market, including Revlon, Chanel and, for the past seven years, L'Oreal, as well as other categories including cars (Citroen) and chocolate (Ferrero).
And they, in their own way, have been used to market her - as a cipher for blonde, chic and unthreatening sex appeal. Like a Euro version of Grace Kelly (before the biographers took up the case). Or a kempt Bardot (before she took up the case of animal rights). And latterly, there has also been Schiffer as model-turned-mum.
Sitting in her Bayswater flat, Schiffer says she first learnt the importance of "self-marketing" at the age of 20 from executives at Revlon. "You have to build a brand around yourself, an image that is associated with your name. Agents might not always have your long-term interests in mind. That's why it's so important to look at yourself from the outside and understand that there is a brand. There is also a person and there is obviously a connection, but you have to be able to stand outside yourself."
So here's another anomaly. Advertisers like celebrities because, as Hamish Pringle, the author of Celebrity Sells, says, they "bring with them a huge cluster of values, associations and imagery from their celebrity lifestyle. They are a shorthand."
In reality, however, this shorthand is a scribbled montage of press coverage, brand tie-ins and carefully controlled PR. (For this interview, Schiffer's London PR agency originally asked for - and was immediately refused - copy and headline approval.)
And the process can work in reverse, with advertising and promotion used to "reveal" another aspect of the person/brand, which can then be commercially exploited.
Schiffer, who is expecting her second child with her husband, the filmmaker Matthew Vaughn, recently appeared on the cover of German Vogue with her one-year-old son. Mother and son subsequently fronted a German mail-order catalogue and a television commercial for Ferrero.
I discussed it with my husband and we both thought: why not? It's a choice that we made - other people might make a different choice."
She adds: "I never went into this business to be in the press. Fame on its own is of no interest to me. I only go to public events or give interviews if it means I can help a cause, or support my contractual partner in their advertising campaign. There always has to be a good reason for me to go public."
And there are reasons. For, compared to the likes of Kate Moss, for example, Schiffer has a much lower profile. ("Isn't she married to David Blaine?" asks someone in the FT's offices - a slightly awry reference to Schiffer's previous and long-gone relationship with US magician David Copperfield.)
And while in photographs she looks pretty fresh-faced, and recently signed deals with watch maker Ebel, apparel brand Jones of New York, and renewed with L'Oreal, her key industry - fashion and beauty - is one where the likes of Liz Hurley and Isabella Rosellini and lose contracts because they are regarded as "too old" to embody the aspirational, fantasy values of beauty campaigns. It seems some advertisers want reality, but only if it comes with a sell-by date.
So the distinct undercurrent to our conversation is that Schiffer is looking for a business partner who will enable her to head in a new direction. Rather than continuing to advertise other people's products, she would like to start developing and marketing her own - perhaps in beauty, fragrance or children's clothing.
"I'd like to be much more involved - to be the owner of my own company, where you make decisions on the quality of the product and where the product should be sold."
Schiffer says that she once turned down a E30m deal to licence her name and image to a range of products, though she doesn't name the company. And, she says, her career plan has always been to try to balance promotions against creative editorial fashion spreads for magazines, mass-market names against high- end ones. Given the ageism of the sector she mostly operates in, this sounds like a bid to adapt the "Schiffer" brand for yet more markets, and make way for other younger models in the beauty sector.
This, in turn, throws up another puzzler. The convergence of modelling and celebrity, exemplified by supermodels such as Schiffer, Moss, Naomi Campbell and Linda Evangelista, seems to have turned things about face: rather than models becoming celebrities, celebrities become models. Think Christina Aguilera striding down the cat walk in - unusually for her - a state of full dress. Only the Argentinean model Giselle Bundchen has developed an international profile in recent years, and that is mostly due to her relationship with Leonardo DiCaprio.
"It's never been more difficult to be a [modelling] agent," says Sarah Doukas, founder of Storm Modelling, who discovered Kate Moss and also looks after Eva Herzigova and Elle McPherson. "Celebrities will take away the advertising campaigns because they take about 60 per cent of magazine covers. You make a model through PR, but nobody knows who the new girls are. They still want to know about the old girls we made famous."
She adds: "It's very difficult to make a girl famous unless they are with some fabulously well-known boyfriend or have some other fabulous string to their bow. So apart from the Hollywood lot, the campaigns stick to the four or five really well-known girls."
Schiffer agrees: "It's almost impossible for a young model nowadays to become known globally. The entire industry is celebrity- driven now. To be on the cover of Vogue as a model is almost impossible now."
So if the beauty and fashion industry believes that the power of celebrity exceeds the power of youth, it may find itself still calling on its established names, particularly for multinational or global campaigns.
Karen Ellis adds: "Actors and musicians have replaced supermodels. Huge amounts of money is spent on their PR. They have agents, they have managers, there is a lot of effort put into branding them."
This is why Ellis believes that those models who have crossed over into the celebrity realm will still have pulling power: "Claudia will be in the business for as long as she wants to be." Whether she wants to be, however, is another matter.
"After I was discovered in 1987 [at the age of 17] it took me three years to understand how the industry works. It hadn't been my dream to be a model and I wasn't interested in becoming famous. So I told myself, if I'm not going to university I better make this last and turn it into something."
Ready for your makeover when you are, Ms Schiffer.
名人面孔的市价
克劳迪娅?希弗(Claudia Schiffer)看上去开始“入时”了。我并不是在说这位德国名模的33岁芳龄，我指的是我们生活着的名人年代。在这个年代，名人的脸可以推销一切，从香水到金融产品，从杂志到音乐。
据估计，如今有五分之一的广告有名人以品牌代言人形象出现。同时，通过潜移默化和不那么潜移默化的产品安插(product placement)手法，名人为产品代言的现象，也越来越多地进入传媒和娱乐内容。这是第一大怪现状。
卡伦?埃利丝(Karen Ellis)是广告集团格雷广告公司(Grey)化妆品业务负责人，也是一位业内资深营销人。她争辩说，广告商渴求正直、真实的品格。但在传播这些价值观时，他们偏偏去找老少皆知，却又没多少人真正了解的人物，即克劳迪娅?希弗这样的名模。
全球化妆品市场的价值高达2000亿美元。在将近16年的职业生涯中，希弗女士曾为化妆品行业的某些知名品牌进行营销，包括露华浓(Revlon)、香奈儿(Chanel)、以及欧莱雅(L'Or
