Still riding high from the success of beauty festival Meccaland in Sydney last weekend, upmarket cosmetics retailer Mecca has joined forces with Westfield to launch a series of after party events across selected stores in Australia and New Zealand next month.
“We are so thrilled to be partnering with Westfield on the #Mecccaland After Party Experience,” said Mecca creative director Marita Burke.
“With so much excitement surrounding the main event, we’re looking forward to extending the experience to so many more customers and offering them the chance to be a part of the beauty, fun, frivolity and festivities that is the #Meccaland experience.”
Fifteen thousand revellers descended upon Australian Technology Park over the three-day event, featuring impressive activations from more than 40 covetable brands offer limited edition exclusive product.
Attendees also had the chance to rub shoulders with 170 brand ambassadors, founders and influencers and enjoy a range of services, including complimentary makeovers, massages and hairstyling sessions. Meanwhile, the program of beauty workshops and masterclasses hosted by influencers was packed with audiences, hungry for information and education.
There was a plethora of social media-friendly moments, including a giant Mecca-branded pink ferris wheel, slippery dips, a glittering disco dancefloor, joyful Mecca staff on rollerskates, a bubble machine, performance artists, an over-the-top drag queen called Karen from Finance and 100 inflatable pairs of lips suspended in the air.
Mecca founder Jo Horgan is thrilled with the event and described it as “an extraordinary success”.
Off the back of the festival, the after party events in June will showcase different Instagram-worthy Meccaland experiences and ‘selfie’ moments, including masterclasses, styling services, free product offers and limited-edition products.
“At Westfield, providing unique and memorable experiences for our customers is at the heart of everything we do, so partnering with Mecca to bring this experience to customers who may not have otherwise had the opportunity, is incredibly exciting to us,” said Bronwyn Cooper, head of brand experience content and programming at Scentre Group.
“The #Meccaland After Parties will be an extension of the main event and will be tailored to each individual centre and the interests and tastes of its community. We’re looking forward to seeing the fun unfold across Australia and New Zealand next month.”
Physical retail: alive and well
According to Horgan, one of the key learnings she gleaned from Meccaland was that while e-commerce is certainly growing rapidly, customers still have “an insatiable appetite” for meaningful offline experiences and it is up to retailers to invest and create innovative events for them.
“Physical retail is primed for one master classes, it’s primed for brand pop-up installations, it’s primed for community events where people who have common interests are brought together by speakers or panels or demonstrations,” she said.
As for hosting Meccaland again next year, Horgan and her team are currently considering all options. The recent Sydney festival was the second year Meccaland took place. According to Horgan, a team has been working on the event on the year, while it took 12,000 hours to build, 2000 shifts and 150 palettes of beauty products.
“I think we all know that in retail, you just have to innovate all the time to stay ahead of customers. It’s our job to surprise and delight. So next year, Meccaland would delight, but would it surprise?” Horgan pondered.
“As much as we’d love to have Meccaland all day every day, it would kill all of us! But what do we take from it and how do we either integrate elements into our stores or take smaller elements of it and [add it to our] calendar or do satellite events?”
“On one level, I’m dying to another one. I have never been to a better party in my life. I just loved every second of it!”
