VENTURING FURTHER: The luxury slowdown is shuffling the cards on where luxury brands can play a winning hand.
For Nichapat Suphap, who founded Thailand-centric boutique talent agency The Venture Management last year, there’s opportunity in leveraging regional dynamics in Southeast Asia.
Her nine-month-old agency is opening The Venture SEA, a branch headquartered in Bangkok and dedicated to talents and projects in the region.
“This is not just to work with luxury brands because [they] all have local press agencies or offices,” she said. “Right now the spotlight is moving to Southeast Asia and there’s cross-market synergies. The Venture aims to globalize local stars and localize global brands.”
“When you’re a brand from, say, Thailand, kickstarting expansion outside the country’s borders starts in the region, not in the Europe or U.S. as there is a high entry barrier in terms of product exports but also communication and other practical concerns,” she continued.
Southeast Asia will generate $1.71 billion in luxury good sales in 2024, according to Statista, which forecasts a compound annual growth of 9.86 percent in the next five years, for a project market volume of $2.74 billion by 2029. This is on par with the growth projected for the U.S. for the same period.
Nichapat Suphap
Mohamad Abbas/Courtesy of The Venture Management
In addition to The Venture’s opening roster of Thailand-based talent, which includes the likes of Vachirawit “Bright” Chivaaree and Nattawin “Apo” Wattanagitiphat, The Venture SEA has an initial four seasoned talents from the region whose cumulated fan base tops 65 million on Instagram.
On the list are leading Indonesian actress and presenter Luna Maya, a former runway model who made a mark on the silver screen in horror flicks and garnered some 38 million Instagram followers; singer and actress Chi Pu, hailing from Vietnam, who is considered among the region’s most influential digital stars; Malaysia’s Sharifah Nor Azean binti Syed Mahadzir Al-Yahya, best known as Scha Al-Yahya in her career as model, actress and TV host, and Pia Jauncy, the Filipino model and actress who won the title as 2015 Miss Universe, going on to represent her country and the pageant organization at a United Nations meeting about combatting AIDS.
“As a A-list stars from the region, they are driving strong conversations and community in their respective countries, while growing their international relevance thanks to a global interest in culture and entertainment from the region,” Suphap said.
A corporate communications graduate, Suphap cut her teeth in the executive training program at Macy’s and Bloomingdale’s in the 2010s before scouting brands with the Central retail group for six years on a freelance basis.
Currently pursuing a master’s program in public administration at Harvard, she bootstrapped her experience as image consultant and personal manager for actress and model Praya Lundberg and collaborations with Southeast Asian actresses like Maya into The Venture last year.
