Armand
A man in his thirties with an ordinary face rode the escalator of a department store in Apgujeong, phone pressed to his ear.
"Yes, I got it. I'll head down this weekend."
"Alright. Mom pickled some delicious green onion kimchi for you to take. Are you working right now?"
"No. Just stopped by the department store for a bit. Seong-jin's getting married next week, and I don't have anything decent to wear to the ceremony."
Park Hyeon-jun was a third-year pay doctor handling general practice at a dental clinic in Yeoksam-dong, Gangnam. He had finally settled into the work enough that evenings left room for hobbies and the occasional meeting with other people.
"Yes, yes. See you this weekend, then."
He ended the call and, without much thought, glanced at the advertising panel mounted on the escalator wall.
······!
He had planned to head straight to the Young & Contemporary floor on the fourth level. But somewhere between the second and third floors, an advertisement snagged his eye.
At first he thought it was a movie poster. Only when he spotted the brand logo beneath it did he realize it was a fashion campaign. Of course—this department store's second floor was the luxury wing. A random film poster would never hang there.
As if spellbound, Park Hyeon-jun turned around, rode the elevator back down, and stepped onto the second floor again. The same advertisement waited for him, pulling at the eye with almost magnetic force.
A man stood in deliberate disarray, weight cocked onto one hip, a pistol dangling loosely from one hand as if he might drop it any second. His gaze was weary and languid, yet that very weariness bloomed into a full, decadent beauty.
...Fucking cool.
The crude admiration rose unbidden. For the first time in his life, Park Hyeon-jun walked into an Armand store.
He had always known Armand was a famous luxury menswear house, but at his age he usually shopped the contemporary floors—fourth and fifth—for cardigans and casual jackets. Formal suits had always felt stiff, too dressed-up. The campaign he had just seen changed his mind completely.
If I show up to Seong-jin's wedding looking like that next week... damn, that would be insane.
The moment he crossed the threshold, a staff member glided over with a polite smile.
"Welcome, sir. Is there a particular style you're looking for?"
"Ah, nothing specific. I just saw the photo outside and..."
Judging by the practiced smile, he was far from the first customer that day to say exactly the same thing. The associate guided him deeper into the store without missing a beat.
"Please, allow me to assist you over here."
Rickard Reimer, CEO of Armand Korea, had been grinning ear to ear since morning.
He had run the Korean branch for well over a decade, ever since the early 2010s, and had constantly felt the pressure from headquarters. Compared with the rest of Northeast Asia, Korea's numbers always lagged. Korea was hardly a weak luxury market, yet matching the sales of a 1.4-billion-person China or a Japan whose domestic market exceeded a hundred million was simply impossible.
Yesterday, however—just a single day—had rewritten the story. After the campaign starring Ryu Yeon-woo went live, domestic sales jumped a staggering 83 percent against the previous year's figures. Other quarters had been flat year-over-year; no one could deny the spike came the moment the model changed to Yeon-woo.
If the momentum held, Korea might finally stand shoulder-to-shoulder with China and Japan.
And today happened to be the video conference with headquarters and the other Asian branch heads. Rickard logged on with a confident face, tongue practically itching to boast.
He never got the chance.
"Japan is up 53 percent versus the previous day and 74 percent versus the same date last year."
"China is the same. Since the campaign dropped and the billboards were swapped, sales have risen roughly 50 percent across the board."
Report after report of soaring numbers from every other branch stole the chance to put them firmly in their place.
Ah... right. Ryu Yeon-woo is a global star.
Even though he was a Korean actor, his worldwide recognition meant the advertising effect was never going to be limited to Korea alone. In hindsight it was obvious.
Left with no other option, Rickard armed himself with pure national pride and opened his mouth.
"That's all thanks to our great Korean actor Ryu Yeon-woo, isn't it? Haha. A world-class star produced by our country is driving Armand's overall sales?"
"...Our Korea?"
Of course Rickard Reimer's nationality was Swedish, not Korean. But after more than ten years living in the country, he had become the sort of honorary Korean who preferred Jeonju-style tteokgalbi over Swedish meatballs and a plate of raw flounder with soju over gravlax.
While Armand—chosen by Ryu Yeon-woo—rocketed off to a spectacular start and reminded every other brand of his commercial value, the man himself was taking a brief rest at Bernard Fenton's hotel in Los Angeles.
Yeon-woo's personal philosophy had always been "You'll rest forever once you're dead," so the break was less for himself than for the people who had come with him.
Min-su hyung needs it, and Park Jung-hyeon especially. He's overdue.
Kim Su-hyeok had managed a short leave in the middle of everything, and Lee Gyu-jin was currently off-duty, but Park Jung-hyeon had shadowed Yeon-woo's entire overseas schedule without a single day of rest. Even now he was probably circling the hotel perimeter, checking security. Still, after hunting Baeksol's trail, simple close-protection work counted as something close to a vacation.
Yeon-woo was stretched out on a sun lounger, gazing idly at the beach, when a hotel staffer hurried over—not to him, but to Bernard Fenton on the next lounger.
"Sir."
Bernard pushed his sunglasses up and answered.
"What is it?"
"Guests from the EPA have arrived again."
"Haa, they really know how to stress a man out. Fine. Show them to the reception room. I'll be there shortly."
Listening in, Yeon-woo tilted his head.
EPA... that would be the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
He looked at Bernard's darkening expression and asked lightly,
"Did you secretly dump wastewater into the ocean like some villainous corporation?"
Bernard snorted a laugh, the joke cracking through his foul mood.
"Haha. Not a chance. Do something like that in this country and the hotel would be torn apart brick by brick."
"Then why is the Environmental Protection Agency harassing you?"
Bernard heaved a long sigh and began to explain as he rose and headed for the reception room.
The story, boiled down, was this: certain guests put on the hotel's complimentary slippers, walked out onto the beach, and simply abandoned them there. The problem was especially common among Asian honeymoon couples—Bernard's most frequent guests. Switching to reusable slippers or charging for them risked dingy scores on the annual five-star evaluations the hotel had maintained for well over a decade. Most guests never took the slippers outside; only a minority caused the mess. Sacrificing customer-service scores to catch a few fleas would be burning down the whole house.
Bernard's Hollywood content ventures rode on the cash flow of that hotel empire. A drop in rating would hit his core business hard.
While Bernard met with the EPA people, Yeon-woo walked down to the beach himself. Even a short stroll yielded nine discarded disposable slippers—enough to fill both hands.
Nine makes five pairs, and one slipper is still missing somewhere.
If the waves had taken it, it was probably drifting somewhere in the Pacific by now.
So this is the headache keeping him from focusing on work...
That was a problem. Yeon-woo needed Bernard fully engaged on the overseas side of things. An environmental lawsuit or public scandal would be equally disastrous.
I have to solve this somehow.
Every hotel along Santa Monica—and probably every high-end beachfront property—was dealing with the same issue. No brilliant fix sprang to mind immediately.
I feel like I had a conversation like this with someone recently...
He searched his memory and found the face.
Right. Vincent Clerc, chief designer of Armand.
The chat they had shared on set over tteokbokki and fish cakes came back clearly.
"The food is wonderful, but Korea really does use a tremendous amount of disposables."
Vincent had mentioned that his hotel sat near Hangang Park and that even a short evening walk turned up discarded single-use containers. The snack truck that day had served everything in Styrofoam as well.
He seemed quite environmentally conscious...
Bernard's earlier remark surfaced next.
"Armand and Capela are probably even more famous in America than in Korea. Hollywood people are nothing if not extravagant."
Yeon-woo clapped his hands once.
"It might just work."
He checked the international time on his phone.
France is seven in the evening right now. Perfect for a call.
He dialed Vincent Clerc. After a few rings the line connected.
"Oh? What a surprise call."
"Did I catch you at a bad time?"
"Not at all. I just finished dinner and was about to relax. Though... isn't it the middle of the night in Korea?"
Yeon-woo smiled.
"I'm in LA at the moment. It's morning here. I saw the Armand campaign went live."
"I received reports that the reaction has been extremely hot. I felt it on set already, so the result is only natural. Haha."
They traded a few more easy remarks before Yeon-woo steered the conversation to the point.
"Mr. Clerc."
"Please, just call me Vincent."
Yeon-woo gave a concise summary of the hotel's slipper problem.
"So you're telling me you personally walked the beach collecting discarded slippers?"
"Only for a short while, but both hands were already full. I couldn't carry any more."
Then he laid out the proposal.
"What if the slippers were produced under contract with Armand's logo embossed on them, and either a portion of the sales or a royalty from the hotel's slipper budget went to Armand?"
Of course Bernard would have to agree, but the idea was simple: put a small Armand logo on the sole of the disposable slippers. The same cheap item, once stamped with a luxury brand, would feel entirely different to the guest. Even paper shopping bags printed with brand logos sold for cash on Korean secondhand sites. If the slippers carried an Armand mark, people might take them home unused—but almost no one would abandon them on the sand.
"Ohhh, that's an intriguing thought. I'll have to put it before the board, of course, but personally I'm quite positive. It would also fit nicely with the CSR initiatives our brand is already running."
Yeon-woo ended the call on that encouraging note just as Bernard returned from the EPA meeting, face still dark from another circular, fruitless discussion. Spotting Yeon-woo standing there with both hands full of discarded slippers, Bernard hurried over.
"Ryu—don't tell me you went out and collected those yourself?"
Yeon-woo grinned.
"Bernard. I've already floated the idea, so I can't promise how it will go, but I think I may have found a solution to this problem."
"What?"
Bernard's eyes went wide at the completely unexpected words.