Natural and Sustainable Skincare Products on the Rise

Natural products are booming at the moment, with natural and sustainable claims on the rise. According to Mintel’s recent report, natural soap, bath and shower products are most active in APAC (64% of recent launches vs 59% globally). However, the focus is on established claims such as botanical/herbal ingredients (56% of launches). See the image below, for the bigger picture.

Image Credit: Mintel

As mentioned in our previous blogs, brands could tap into the eco-friendly/waste-free movement, to satisfy the growing demand for environmentally cautious consumers. Transparency surrounding sourcing methods, production, ingredients and overall sustainability practices is key to maintaining loyalty and repeat business from existing and future customers. This is especially important for soap, bath and shower products, but also skincare and cosmetic applications e.g. creams, lotions, facial cleansing oils etc.

What consumers look for in skincare products

In the skincare market, natural and organic products are popular with consumers and brands. In fact, 63% of new products launched throughout 2017-2018 globally use botanical claims. Followed by moisturising (59%) and brightening (32%) claims, according to Mintel research. These claims are the fastest-growing claims in the MEA region, which can be linked to the popularity of gentler micellar water, a focus on detoxing and protecting the skin from pollution, and the emergence of on-trend cleansing ingredients such as charcoal.

Convenience claims are most active in the North American facial skincare market, aligning with consumer interest. In the US 33% of skincare users prefer multi-tasking moisturisers that can do it all.

Use of trending ingredients seen in skincare can also benefit brands. Micelles, centella asiatica (cica or tigergrass), hemp/cannabidiol, adaptogenic herbs and probiotics/prebiotics are examples of trending gentle and natural ingredients making headway across other beauty and personal care markets.

These ingredients are a niche in the soap, bath and shower market in the APAC region and can expand and especially appeal to the consumer interest in both natural and ‘for sensitive skin’ formulas.

The prefered product texture in the skincare market are creams (17% share of recent global NPD).

Certified Skincare Products on the Rise

According to Mintel Global New Product Development Research, NPD in beauty and personal care products with the Soil Association COSMOS has doubled, since 2017 to reach more than 10,000 products, across 794 brands.

Similarly, RSPO certified products have nearly doubled as well, which is probably due to the rising consumer awareness of conventional palm oil production campaigned in the news last year.

The UK organic cosmetics market is at an all-time high as sustainable shoppers continue to drive the market for green beauty. According to a new report by the Organic Beuty & Wellbeing Market 2019, from the Soil Association, sales of certified organic and natural beauty products reached £86.5m in 2018 up by 14% since 2017.

65% of shoppers in the beauty market expect brands to share information on ingredient sourcing, as they seek products with greater guarantee of sustainability, ethical assurance and wellness benefits, according to March issue of SPC Magazine.

DUROSOFT® Ingredients Range for Natural Skincare Solutions

Stephenson has already gained a pioneering reputation for speciality soap bases and now with the DUROSOFT® range of natural esters has established itself in the natural ingredients sector. This range of naturally derived monoglyceryl and polyglyceryl esters are suitable for a variety of product applications across cosmetic, skincare, soap and bath products etc.

What makes DUROSOFT® unique is that it provides a wide HLB range of 4-17 for a greater stability profile. All DUROSOFT® range esters are Soil Association COSMOS and some RSPO certified, covering a wide range of HLB values and can be used in combination with each other to achieve the specific required HLB of a formulation. All of the ingredients are skin friendly, PEG and EO free with no deleterious effect on temperature sensitive ingredients. Learn more from downloading the Durosoft Brochure below.

While these ingredients are great for use in various skincare applications, DUROSOFT® PG10L-SG can be used for the production of micellar facial cleansers, as the structure allows to form micelles that help trap the lipids and foam when used in cleansing products. Requesting more information by contacting us here.