Cannes Lions Lessons on how the definition of Luxury is changing

At Cannes Lions 2026, the luxury industry offered a reminder that the most powerful luxury brands are not simply selling beautiful things. They are selling identity, emotion, trust and a sense of belonging.

Luxury has always been associated with exclusivity.The rare handbag, diamond necklace, limited-edition watch. The brand whose name alone can communicate status. Sitting in on the Luxury Lions Jury conversations at Cannes Lions 2026, I was struck by how much the conversation has moved beyond the product itself. The most interesting work was not necessarily about showing consumers what a brand could make. It was about showing them what a brand could make them feel.

Perhaps that is the real challenge for luxury today, in a world where consumers are surrounded by visual excess, how do you create something that people actually remember?

The answer, from the work discussed at Cannes, seems surprisingly simple: create meaning.

Luxury has an inclusion problem

One of the most important examples came from L'Oréal Luxe and its work around the Code for the Protection and Inclusion of Black Consumers in Brazil.

The initiative emerged from research into the experiences of Black consumers in luxury retail. The research identified 21 discriminatory practices that could occur during the purchasing journey, demonstrating that the problem was not simply whether luxury brands were marketing to Black consumers, but whether Black consumers felt genuinely welcomed once they entered the store. L'Oréal reported that 91% of high-income Black consumers in Brazil had experienced racism in luxury establishments.

You can spend thousands on a product, but if the experience of purchasing it makes you feel watched, unwelcome or inferior, the product itself loses some of its value. The Code therefore takes a deliberately practical approach. It establishes ten guidelines designed to create fairer and more inclusive retail experiences, including an anti-racist customer-service protocol and mystery-shopper audits. By 2025, 12 key retail clients had adopted the Code across 151 stores.

What I found particularly powerful about this work is that it does not stop at representation.

What happens when the consumer actually walks through the door? That is an important question not just for luxury, but for every industry. Representation in advertising means very little if the customer experience contradicts the message.

The hope behind the initiative is that the Code can eventually extend beyond Brazil and that ambition is important because the underlying principle is universal: no one should be judged by the colour of their skin.

For me, this was one of the clearest reminders at Cannes that inclusion cannot simply be a communications strategy. It has to be embedded into the experience a brand creates.