Tomorrow, September 9, we observe International Makeup Day and, by extension, celebrate all that the world of cosmetics offers us. Cosmetic and personal care products offer different benefits for a wide variety of individuals, and that’s certainly something worth commemorating.
It’s a particularly exciting time for the industry right now, too, with positive trends emerging that will shape the future of the market. For one, there’s the push for more sustainable practices and products, with 92% of consumers stating that they’d rather support businesses that espouse environmental and social causes.
There’s also the increased emphasis on offering a variety of colors and shades that work with the full spectrum of human skin tones, helping to boost inclusivity and body positivity in the world of beauty. Healthy skincare is also on the rise, with related products now accounting for 40% of the market, and men are a sizeable portion of the buyer base, with that segment expected to reach a valuation of $18.92 billion globally by 2027.
Taking these developments and other shifts in consumer tastes into account, your cosmetics and personal care business will need to prioritize new product development (NPD) and conduct the process in order to remain relevant and profitable. To make sure your teams have the tools they need, you need to ensure that you have the right industry-specific product lifecycle management (PLM) software in place.
From there, you should follow these six basic steps to bring your new product to market and take full advantage of your PLM system and the benefits it offers at each stage.
To begin, you’ll need a sound and well-constructed product brief—the document that outlines the business case, general product specifications and how the item will be presented to the target audience. While you won’t have exact details in this phase, you should strive to make the brief as complete as possible, covering all that you can of category, function, color, odor, texture, size and other key attributes.
Because many teams will be using the document as a reference and coming back to it often, you’ll need to make sure to include information that will help all involved stakeholders get their jobs done. Also keep in mind that it’s never too early to involve your compliance specialists—creating products to be compliant by design is the best practice to avoid unfortunate surprises down the line.
Now it’s time to let the creative minds in your research and development department do what they do best—iterate on the formula, fine-tune ingredient levels and determine the best processes for manufacturing according to product specifications. They’ll have the outline provided by the brief to get them started but should be given freedom to explore the possibilities.
A purpose-built PLM platform can truly empower your R&D team, giving them a single source of truth for product information and allowing them to digitally record the materials, concentrations and creation methods behind the prototypes they make. An advanced solution like Aptean’s PLM for personal care and cosmetics businesses can also flag allergen and other compliance concerns so that they’re apparent early on and can be addressed.
Once the product formula has been determined and spelled out in precise detail, you’re ready to start shopping around for the raw materials you’ll need not only to produce your new offering, but also those necessary to package it for retail. While cost will always be a factor to consider, keep in mind the importance of sustainability we mentioned at the outset as you evaluate various vendors.
In order to make sure you’ve got the right fit and are working with sources you can trust, it’s a good idea to get a number of suppliers to submit proposals complete with not only pricing but also information on origin and their own internal sustainability practices. Once you’ve found the partners you prefer, your PLM software can store and maintain all of their critical information for future reference.
Considering the fact that product packaging has a profound impact on perception given that it forms shoppers’ first impressions, that element can be almost as important as the item itself. Your marketing and art departments must convey a variety of different concepts in what is typically a fairly minimal space, but make sure they cover as much as possible, from use cases and appearance to any necessary health and safety disclosures.
A good PLM solution should offer a set of tools specifically for this step to help your highly qualified staff to leverage their intuitive artistic sense to choose the ideal font, colors and graphics. What’s more, a solid system will also let them share their ideas and concepts with others involved in the NPD process to get feedback and build out the best approach.
You want every experience your customers have with your brand to be positive, so at this point you need to test the quality of the finished goods in your initial production runs rigorously and tweak manufacturing processes accordingly to get consistent results. Also, for compliance, you’ll need to conduct microbiological, toxicology, stability and potentially other assessments to confirm that your product is entirely fit for consumer use.
Keep in mind that legislation on cosmetic product compliance varies from region to region and country to country, so make sure your professionals conduct the proper research and know the relevant laws pertaining to both the category of the item and the materials used in its manufacture. This is also the time to complete necessary documentation, including the Product Information File (PIF), Safety Data Sheet, Cosmetic Notification Form and more, as necessary.
Thankfully, Aptean’s PLM can automate that sometimes tedious portion of this stage and even translate the documents to different languages as the situation calls for it.
Finally, we come to the last step, which is the official validation of the product and the completion of all required internal and external approvals. You’ll want to go back to the original product brief and make sure that what has been created still aligns with the goals you set out to accomplish, comparing your latest prototypes to the concepts laid out at the start.
While it’s not likely that you’ll need to make changes at this point, remain flexible and remember that preserving the hard work of everyone involved in the NPD process is of utmost importance. It’s better to be safe than sorry when it comes to putting out new cosmetic goods, as shoppers have plenty of choices on the market and you want to create loyal brand supporters and repeat customers by offering nothing but the best.
With International Makeup Day nearly upon us and the cosmetics and personal care industries evolving in dynamic and fascinating ways, now is a great time to jumpstart your digital transformation and prepare for the future by putting a PLM system in place. There are several reasons you should trust Aptean and our full suite of business solutions for your company’s needs.
First, there’s our decades of collective experience and in-depth knowledge of best practices, which we’ve put to use in developing our industry-specific, best-in-class PLM software. We understand the challenges that cosmetics and personal care product manufacturers face and have carefully crafted the features that you’ll need to effectively clear those hurdles.
Of course, there are also the benefits that our PLM platform offers—namely, faster time to market, better collaboration between the various departments involved in NPD and the International Nomenclature Cosmetic Ingredient (INCI) database built-in, ensuring you always use proper ingredient names and automatically generate your quali-quanti formula.
Finally, there’s our reputation for acting as a partner to our clients—guiding them through the implementation process and providing advice on other solutions that can bolster your modernization and digital transformation efforts.
We’re here to help your business get to the next level and meet the changing demands of the cosmetics and personal care industry. So, if you’re eager to learn more about Aptean’s PLM for cosmetic and personal care companies, contact us today. You can also request a personalized demo at your convenience to see the software in action.
Brands and manufacturers in the growing personal care and cosmetics market must constantly produce and innovate. There’s a huge market shift with people demanding for natural products. Due to seasonal limits and rapidly changing consumer needs, collection turnover is decreasing. Businesses must cut product time to market and costs while remaining inventive in order to meet changing demand.
A cosmetics company’s entire purpose is to create and sell products. How do brands accomplish this?
Everything begins with a concept. The customer wishes to create an entirely new type of cosmetic. Where should they start, and what should they consider from the beginning?
Step 1: Marketing Brief.
The very first step is to create the marketing brief.
The marketing brief is crucial when establishing a new product because it serves as the beginning point for all projects. The more specific it is, the more straightforward it will be to use. The product and packaging requirements, such as the product category, desired function, colour, odour, texture, and size, are all included in the marketing brief.
Natural seed oils such as castor oil and its derivatives, oat oils, vegetable extracts and Nordic natural ingredients are of great interest to both cosmetics manufacturers and consumers today. In addition, sustainability is also an important concern.
It can be shared with other departments to begin product development once it has been approved. It will be used by the R&D team to develop the formula and product prototype.
The packaging team chooses the product pack based on the brief’s criteria. The first stage is crucial; it will decide the success of the entire procedure and product.
Marketing’s job is to figure out what customers want or need and how to position it in the market. They could be looking to reverse engineer a competitor’s product, leverage an emerging trend, or even create a new shade of a current product offering.
Step 2: Research, Development and Formulation.
Ideas can also come from research and development. Cosmetic chemists can experiment with their ideas in the lab and come up with new and exciting ones. Raw material suppliers like castor oil suppliers, can visit and share the new materials they are developing that will help in creating great new products.
Then comes the product formulation part. Scientists work on the cosmetic product formulation based on the marketing brief’s needs. Each claim is examined, and multiple prototypes for comparison are constructed. Concentration, allergies, chemical reactions, and prices are all reviewed to ensure that the product meets the standards and is safe.
Step 3: Substantiating Raw Materials and Packaging.
Following the establishment of the formula, the teams must choose raw materials and packaging suppliers. A list of specifications, including the function of the material, allergies, size, colour, odour, and so on, is provided to multiple providers for comparison. After that, quality, cost, and function are examined for final approval. The recipe is finalised and the prototype is made as soon as the raw ingredients are accepted.
Step 4: Package Designing.
Once the raw materials and product formulation are finalised, teams start working on the artwork design when you’ve chosen your package suppliers. These teams design the outside packaging of the product. Consumers will notice and read about the product first through its packaging. Text, colours, and graphics are all precisely picked in accordance with the exterior packaging and marketing brief requirements.
Step 5: Quality Testing.
Then comes the quality testing part. A product must be safe to use and adhere to the regulations of the country in which it will be sold. To ensure product safety, several quality tests must be performed, including microbiological, toxicological, and stability studies.
Furthermore, all product components, including chemical substances and packaging, must be inspected and verified to be compliant with the country of commercialization. The Product Information File, Safety Data Sheet, Cosmetic Notification Form, and other documents and information about the product that are required by country legislation must be gathered by compliance teams.
Step 6: Product Approval.
It’s time for a check once each step of the new product development has been examined and approved. The final product is examined to ensure that it adheres to the original marketing brief. Production can begin if the prototype passes the final tests. After then, the product will be commercialised, and teams will begin development on the next one.
The Final Take.
The processes for developing new products range from one company to the next. How product development is implemented is determined by the product kind, company size, and strategy. However, they will all agree that settling is time-consuming and difficult. Sourcing the right raw materials is how you can ace your product development. If you’re looking for castor oil-based cosmetics, visit Ambuja Solvex, India’s premier castor oil manufacturer and the largest castor oil supplier in the Indian cosmetics market, and browse our castor oil product list.
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