Beauty Business News June 2024

Olay is choosing their brand new Cleansing Melts to be the ‘official face cleanser’ of the Paris
Olympics. Water and plastic saving in production and use are the holy grails of the beauty industry at
the moment so you can expect many more iterations of the melt coming up in the future. While you
do need water to activate the melts, they’re made with 8 concentrated ingredients (think of the
millions of melts they’ll sell and picture concentrated squash or washing liquid and it will start to
make sense) which impregnate some ‘threads’ (that’s all they say on their website) and dissolve on
contact with water within 3 seconds, leaving behind a cleansing foam. They’re not in the UK yet but I
am dying to try them.

While the Japanese natural brand, Boscia, was more popular in the US than the UK, it’s still a name
anyone who prefers botanical and preservative free will know. After 20 years of being ahead of their
time, Boscia has closed, reportedly after bankruptcy. It’s not entirely clear what went wrong –
Japanese brands in the US and the UK are having their time just now with a reputation for being
exemplary so it seems so strange that this brand is the one to fold.

Yay to MAC Cosmetics who have a one-to-one virtual make up artist service for 45 minutes now with
the option of a BSL (British Sign Language) interpreter to join, making this service accessible for
those with hearing difficulties. What’s even better is that it’s free (book 72 hours in advance for this
service).

The strange tale of former Miss World, Alice Taticchi, and L’Occitane, who have got all hot and
bothered about her attempt to register her skin care brand, Arboria, has been something of a secret
up to now. As you know, L’Occitane owns Erborian – Arboria was felt to be too similar in both looks
and pronunciation to be safely no competition (I think there are 6 products in the entire range
compared to Erborian who have 16 product types, never mind actual products). But, this has
rumbled on for over two years with the upshot that Taticchi’s beauty line is blocked from trading as
Arboria. But, due diligence discovers that it’s trading anyway and looks absolutely nothing
whatsoever like Erborian. You know when IP lawyers don’t have enough to do? That.

My favourite news of last month is that Dwayne (The Rock) Johnson has brought out a shampoo and
conditioner in one for his men’s personal care brand, Papatui – obviously, TikTok and Instagram got
all agitated that a man with no hair is somehow an authority in hair care but Johnson is resolute,
claiming, ‘my hair would have loved this 2-in-1’. It’s approx. $7.99 in Target if you’re curious.

The BBC has brought to light that jasmine used in Aerin fragrance (ELC) and Lancome Idole has been
using jasmine sourced from Egypt where workers are paid £1 a day to pick the flowers. They won’t
be the only brands by a long margin but they’re the named brands so far. One of the big worries
(amongst many, many concerns) is that on such a low wage, women pickers have to bring their
children to the farms in the middle of the night (the correct time to pick the jasmine to gather them
at their most powerful scent giving) where they are not only short on sleep, but are exposed to
chemicals and often end up joining in the picking. In a predictable response from the fragrance
industry, they’re all conducting ‘investigations’ and the supplier featured has been dropped by the
fragrance houses. Which doesn’t solve the problem at ALL. L’Oreal, who owns Lancome, responded by saying that they were already taking action by setting up a coalition partnership with the Egyptian government to protect the livelihood of the families who work in the jasmine farms.

Sarah Creal (joint founder of Victoria Beckham Beauty who left two years ago and ex ELC) has created her own luxury beauty range aimed at mid-life women. It’s absolutely beautiful and is exactly what I want on
my dressing table. Pick from Back of The Cab Mascara, Face Flex Concealer and The Adults Are
Talking Lip Serum. It’s not yet available to the UK but watch this space – it won’t be long.

Complicated if you don’t understand biometric laws, but it looks like the US class action lawsuit against e.l.f. cosmetics violating the Illinois state’s Biometric Information Privacy Act will go ahead – in part. Concerning the e.l.f. Virtual Try On Tool, it’s alleged that e.l.f. collected and captured users’ face geometry. The problem here is that biometrics are unique to any one individual so if a compromise takes place the user has a heightened risk for identity theft.

It looks like M&S is in the running to rescue The Body Shop which is going up for sale (again) after plans for a company voluntary arrangement (a formal insolvency process) fell apart. The other runner is Next and the method of sale will be an auction. The very fact that either party are interested in this shows that they think there is life in TBS yet.

Over in India, a three year legal battle has been taking place between Ponds (Unilever) and Nivea (Beiersdorf) focusing around trademark infringement and unfair marketing practices. Nivea accused Ponds of taking part in ‘deceptive practices’ with sales people applying Nivea cream on one of the potential customers’ hand and Ponds on the other, using a magnifying glass to prove a point that Nivea leaves more residue on the skin. Nivea got very annoyed about this and presented formulation details to show that the comparison was no comparison because the Nivea cream being used contained 25% fats whereas Ponds uses 10% fats so yes of course, it’s going to sink in quicker. Additionally, there was some wrangling from Nivea about the use of the colour blue for the Ponds cream with Ponds insisting that Nivea doesn’t have a monopoly on the colour blue. Gosh, I wish I’d been there! Anyway, the Indian judge found in Nivea’s favour and Ponds have had their sweets taken away and been sent to bed early.