Hanken students participated in the Nordic final of branding competition

In connection with the Branding Project course, Hanken has participated in L'Oréal's Brandstorm competition for over 10 years already. The competing teams receive a branding assignment from L'Oréal, and they then pitch their proposals to the company's management.

"I am extremely proud of how well our students managed both the task and the tough competition with the other competing teams. The standard was very high this year," says Åke Finne, lecturer in marketing and teacher in the Branding Project course.

Hanken has chosen to participate in this particular competition as it is very international and can be easily adapted to the teaching. This year's assignment was Crack the new codes of beauty. The contestants had to adapt their solution to AI, VR, AR (augmented reality) or NFT (Non-fungible tokens), so it was really about creating tomorrow's marketing and technology combined with a strong customer focus.

"Through the course we could give our students extra coaching for the competition and the course also includes lectures on image management. In just a few minutes the students had to show that they understand the customers, that they know what others are doing in the market and how they would implement their idea strategically," says Finne.
The winner of the international final in June will secure a three-month internship at L'Oréal's business incubator in Paris where they will work on their winning proposal.

Hanken participated in this year's Brandstorm with three teams:

•    Team Worldwide (Pavla Pařízková, Juliette Placer, Jiachun Zheng)
•    Team B-YOND (Salomé Bayle, Erica Alexandra Niiniaho, Ksenia San Luis Kravtseva)
•    Team All of a kind/ONYX ONYX (Emma Aleksandra Joutsila, Jasu Palosaari, Severi Jonatan Svahn)