Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique

Pierre Fabre is the second-largest private pharmaceutical company in France and the second-largest dermo-cosmetic lab worldwide. Pierre Fabre-portfolio covers multiple products from prescription medication and over-the-counter drugs to dermo-cosmetics. They are in particular famous for the brands Eau Thermale Avène, A-Derma, Ducray, and Klorane.

Challenge

Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique only sell their products through pharmacies because they want them to be sold with professional advice from a pharmaconomist, but this sometimes presented some challenges.

They needed to teach pharmaconomists to sell even better by offering customers improved services based on greater knowledge of the skin and the company’s products.

“In the past, we would mostly invite the pharmacy staff to major training events in the evening outside working hours.

We noticed that they were not particularly participative, some even sat there knitting, and that won’t help you remember much afterwards.”

Kamilla Greisen Bacher, Nordic Marketing Director for Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique

Solution

Kamilla and the Danish Commercial Manager created a training course focused on learning about the A to Z of the skin, consumer needs, and the products. The training lasts a year, and participants receive a title and diploma at the end.

Learningbank helped structure and manage the entire process and helped Kamilla and Helle further in the process by creating the digital platform for Pierre Fabre Academy.

One of the learning initiatives was a story module, where the pharmacy employee travels to the head office of Pierre Fabre to learn more about the products in order to offer customers improved advice and service.

However, as you reach the office of Mr. Pierre Fabre, you cannot enter because you have lost the key. You have to continue your journey to Pierre Fabre’s first pharmacy in Castres, where Mr. Pierre Fabre has hidden a spare key.

In the original office, you have to solve a number of interactive challenges, while you learn about the history and mission of Pierre Fabre.

Each challenge earns you a number for the combination to the safe where the spare key is stored.

Finally, with the right combination of numbers, you can open the safe and travel back to the head office, where the expert turns out to be waiting – ready to praise you for solving the challenges and for learning about the history and the Pierre Fabre DNA.

Results

Short on Time? Here Are The Key Results: 

•  Sales figures for Pierre Fabre products increased twice as much for pharmacies in training compared to other pharmacies
• Sales to consumers increased 3 times more in pharmacies that had   a participant in the training course (compared to the previous year)
• Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique has gained a new image in the industry as innovative and pioneering in learning
• The Nordic subsidiary of Pierre Fabre become frontrunner in digital learning and received requests from other international divisions  

“The whole training has been received with an incredibly positive attitude, and the evaluation feedback from many has been: “The digital modules are super cool. Many also thought it was great fun to complete”

Kamilla Greisen Bacher, Nordic Marketing Director for Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique

Now that the participants have passed the exams, the analysis shows that sales to pharmacies, which have had a participant in the course have risen twice as much as to other pharmacies.
The most striking and important result is that their sales to consumers have risen three times more during the period than at other pharmacies, which is indeed noticeable.

“We presented the training and the digital modules internally to the directors of all the international subsidiaries, and they were completely blown away with the design as well as the results, and also by the fact that we succeeded with this in spite of limited resources.
Now we’re getting specific inquiries from other countries that are very interested in copying the digital modules and translating them”

Kamilla Greisen Bacher, Nordic Marketing Director for Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique