Looking into the crystal ball at Cosmoprof North America
Three trends — going zero waste, smart adaptogens and vegan products — are shaping the beauty category across channels, and retailers looking to maintain or grow their share of sales in this vital category need to pay more attention to them.
The 17th annual installment of Cosmoprof North America, held in late July at the Mandalay Bay Convention Center in Las Vegas, gave more than 40,000 attendees and 1,400 exhibitors from 43 countries a taste of just how important these trends are to the current beauty marketplace, and how professionals are viewing future prospects.
“Beauty with a conscience is a key driver for innovation today,” said Lan Vu, co-founder and CEO of the Paris-based trend forecasting agency Beautystreams. “From zero-waste practices to ethical ingredients to sourcing and clean formulations, brands know that consumers are seeking to live ever more mindfully, while still delighting in the user experience. If eco-living is the price of entry for brands today, holistic innovations across multiple touchpoints will be the key differentiators.”
Marcia Gaynor, a beauty retail executive strategist and former Walgreens beauty executive, said natural ingredients and ingredient transparency were hot topics on the floor, especially in regard to skin and body care, as well as some color lines. All channels are getting into this segment in response to consumer demand, she said. “It’s going to be a matter of their efficacy and whether they perform to the consumer’s expectations as to whether they will succeed.”
Naturally, several of the trends identified by Beautystreams were seen in items presented by exhibitors at this year’s Cosmoprof. The following is a roundup of some of the most interesting products on the show floor that reflected the latest trends, as well as some brands that were just pure fun.
Zero Waste
Daily Concepts Bio-Cotton Makeup Removers
The latest in makeup-removing pads are reusable bio-cotton rounds that can be washed and reused, and are sold with a laundry bag. Daily Concepts’ version instructs users to add a small amount of warm water, remove makeup, wash the remover pad and use again — no cleanser needed. By reusing pads, consumers are “dramatically reducing waste,” said Emilio Smeke, founder and CEO of Daily Concepts. The $12 kit includes various sizes of pads.
Foamie Shampoo Bar
This innovation from Germany is playing off the very hot trend of container-free hair care products. Positioned as “the world’s first hair care range on a rope,” Foamie Shampoo Bars are formulated to optimize hair and scalp with vegan, cold-pressed formulas. Items are plastic-free and made and engineered in Germany. “Each bar is ergonomically designed with a curved shape that adapts to the head, and also has three bumps to massage the scalp,” said Carlos Soares Moreira, vice president of Americas. The bars are available in three versions: Hibiskiss for Damaged Hair, Aloe You Vera Much for Dry Hair and Shake Your Coconuts for Normal Hair. Each bar retails for $10.
Vegan Products
Crayola Beauty
Anyone doubting whether color cosmetics will survive the category’s recent stagnation need not look any further than Crayola Beauty. One of the chicest collections to debut at Cosmoprof, Crayola Beauty, created by Crea Cosmetics, also has heart: all formulas are vegan, made in Italy, and utilize the brand’s iconic yellow and green boxes.
The line’s project manager, Michelle Pinedo, said the collection aims to deliver an elevated beauty experience. “We are working with luxe manufacturers who make premium brands. And, all products have been made to be used and applied with your fingers,” Pinedo said. Roughly 60 color items, not including foundation, with the hero item being its Face Crayon, can be used on eyes, lips and cheeks. Crayola Beauty is priced from $15 to $40 for highlighters, mascaras and palettes.
Mineralgia
Capitalizing on the wellness-meets-beauty phenomenon is Mineralgia, founded by Los Angeles-based chiropractor Bridgette Rozenberg. The line targets ailments ranging from back pain and sore muscles to arthritis. Rozenberg, who operates a wellness practice, developed the cream more than 10 years ago, and it has since become an effective tool in treating her patients.
“I wanted to develop a completely safe, natural pain reliever that would work in my practice. The result is Mineralgia, a product that is so gentle I can use it on my kids, who are into sports,” she said. The paraben-free cream is vegan and contains Dead Sea minerals, in addition to camphor, menthol and arnica to target sore spots. In preparation for the move to retail, Mineralgia was repackaged in January. It retails for $34.95.
The Lip Bar
Launched in 2012, it is easy to say that The Lip Bar was way ahead of the vegan-formula craze. “We are the first to have inclusive, vegan and cruelty-free lip products,” said Lip Bar founder Melissa Butler. “Beauty once looked like a linear landscape. Now, inclusive is what all beauty brands are trying to be.”
The Lip Bar is inclusive by offering shades that work with a variety of skin tones, and marketing them with imagery that reflects a diverse consumer base. “We have shades for everyone from Anne Hathaway to Lupita Nyong’o,” she said. The Lip Bar makes everything from lip glosses, lipsticks and lip lines. Prices average around $13. The brand received an investment in 2018 from beauty industry veteran Richelieu Dennis, co-founder and CEO of Sundial Brands.
Joban Beauty
The newest player in deodorant offers a category-changing twist. Coverant is the industry’s first nontoxic deodorant and full-coverage concealer by Joban Beauty. The patent-pending product is designed for multicultural women who tend to suffer from “dark underarm syndrome,” which company officials said can make women very self-conscious. Available in three shades — light, medium and dark — Coverant is formulated to suit any skin tone and is transfer-resistant, water-resistant and sweatproof. It’s also vegan, free of aluminum or parabens, and features a natural fragrance.
“It’s an unfortunate phenomenon when there are annoying little dark hairs trying to peek out of your cleanly shaven follicles,” said Sati Bains, who founded the company with her sister, Sharan Bains. Coverant targets a range of underarm discoloration issues from dark spots and large pores to darkening.
“Multicultural women or women with darker hair are more likely to have this problem,” Bains said. The product also can help women who suffer from acanthosis nigricans — a skin condition that causes dark discoloration in body folds and creases, typically affecting armpits. Coverant will retail for $18.
Ayr Skin Care
Founded by Kirsten Thomas in a quest to create a product that would work for her sensitive skin, Ayr is run by her daughter, Fiona Briggs, with self-taught Thomas in the lab overseeing batch production.
The family-owned and -operated business’ most unique trait is its “patent-pending … technology, incorporating a blend of plant-based ingredients to create a silky texture for creams and serums,” said Briggs, who is vice president of marketing and operations.
Ayr consists of 12 items with a focus on facial care. The line, which launched in 2017, recently was repackaged with sleek teal and white containers, and is manufactured in its own facility in California. One of the most interesting items Ayr features is its new Awaken Revitalizing Eye Serum, with a vegan formula that incorporates vitamins C, E and B5 to counteract the effects of diminishing sodium hyaluronate levels, along with a natural blend of probiotics, green tea, pomegranate and caffeine for antioxidants. It retails for $65.
Smart Adaptogens
Golden Elixir
In February, June Faraham launched Golden Elixir, a phytoactive face oil for the face and neck, utilizing pure plant extracts and actives to repair, hydrate and regenerate skin. Ingredients include vitamin C, CoQ10 and Collageneer, a trademarked blend that includes turmeric and pepper, a combination Faraham said is reliant on one another to be effective.
In addition to the face oil, Golden Elixir includes three superfood adoptegenic blend powders — cacao, mushroom and golden — each of which addresses a different need. Mushroom aims to release anxiety, cacao looks to add a boost of energy and golden fights inflammation. Each requires one teaspoon of powder to be added to 8-oz. of warm nut milk or water.
The oil sells for $88 and the powders range from $44 to $48. Farahan saw an opportunity to create an oil that would “not only deliver precious ingredients to nurture skin, but fill a gap in the luxury market for such a product.”
Urang
This Korean beauty brand, positioned as a line steeped in wellness, uses natural and organic ingredients for sensitive skin. Launched in late 2016, Urang was founded by Jina Lee, a mother and holistic aromatherapist who was desperate to find products that suited her atopic, allergy-prone skin. She set about creating unique formulas and dived into studying cosmetic ingredients, chemistry and fragrances.
The Urang line consists of 13 items, several of which are quite distinct. Take their Urang Love Rose x Hibiscus and Urang Love Cica x Opuntia Masks, “both of which utilize a unique two-pouch system that preserves the freshness of the liquid essence to be combined with the 100% organic cotton mask,” Lee said. The Rose x Hibiscus Mask brightens and hydrates, while the Love Cica x Opuntia Mask looks to soothe and hydrate, with organic centella asiatica and Korean prickly pear cactus. Each mask retails for $8.
Just for Fun
Blenderelle
While makeup sponges are all the rage, one recurring question is how one properly stores them in a vanity and cosmetic bag. Enter Blenderelle, The Original Makeup Blender Case, founded by Sam Palmer in 2015, which is an antimicrobial, ventilated makeup sponge case. “I was using a makeup sponge, and there was no good place to store it. I filed a patent to protect the idea and launched a ventilated swirl closure case,” said Palmer, who now has three patents on her product.
The case is formulated with silver, which acts as a natural antimicrobial that lasts the lifetime of the product, and is designed with effective ventilation so the sponge can “dry on the fly” after rinsing. Available in pink, black and gold, Blenderelle retails for $12. And this year, Palmer launched an updated version of the case, which now snaps to close, that retails for $12.
Hemp Beauty
CBD products were well represented at Cosmoprof, with one of the brightest lights coming from Hemp Beauty. Founded in 2018 by CEO Lindsay Solomon, Hemp Beauty includes three different lines — one for wellness, one for skin care and one for body. One of Solomon’s most popular items is the Good Vibes Relief Roller priced at $50, which has a metal tip that “cools skin to the touch and eases muscle tension to the neck or sore muscles with a combination of fast-acting CBD, magnesium and lavender,” she said.
The CBD used in the products is sourced from Colorado and Kentucky. Products bear QR codes that, when scanned, reveal each item’s certification of authorization, batch numbers and testing information for peace of mind.