087 - What I'm Reading: Week of March 24th.
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⭐️ = What excites me most this week.
***Many of the research headlines this week could be summed up as alarming (hormonal birth control contributing to breast cancer, forever chemicals impacting fertility, forever chemicals seeping into food via labels, microplastics impeding embryo development…). Much of it pointing towards how external factors are greatly impacting our overall health. What is clear is everything we consume, breathe, and put on our body interacts in some way. Clean labelling had been used as a way to delineate ‘safe’ from non-safe products’ but over the past few years, given the lack of regulation and inconsistency in the definition of this marketing term, ‘clean’ has come under fire. Hormone University, is setting a new standard and has developed a new endocrine free disruptor seal. Through their certification process products (vitamins and supplements, beauty and skincare, period care, home, food and beverage, & fertility) are stringently screened to ensure they are free of ingredients that could be potential endocrine disruptors in a hope to set a new standard for the products we use.***
💭 This week: Walmart is getting deeper into beauty (with a new accelerator class & clean beauty section), The Unpublishable goes in on the growing popularity of ‘science of skincare’, an exciting breastfeeding platform, the challenge of selling sustainable beauty, a cool new 3D printed insole to measure what is really going on with your feet, an exciting sustainable package solution, and great reports on femtech, marketplaces, wellness, and more.
🗞 NEWS & PRODUCTS
Gizmodo: It sure seems like Amazon is making a new web browser.
This is Beauty, a new beauty publication with intentions to launch a sustainable beauty shop that is ‘tackling waste.’
Walmart Start - Walmart’s beauty brand accelerator is taking applications for their second cohort.
XRC’s newest cohort.
Just for fun:
🧴 Skin / Personal Care:
Skin Dossier is a new personalized ‘health advisor’ SaaS play - using lifestyle factors, 3D imaging, geolocation, health data, & an optional blood test to provide an in-depth skin report and recommendations [BeautyMatter].
Nair is now offering a facial hair removal product with skincare benefits akin to derma-planing for ultra smooth skin.
Aire Health - a B2B platform for dermatologists to use in order to recommend drugstore / cosmetic products to their patients founded by Dhaval Bhanusali [Beauty Independent].
🇨🇦 1HR-A - (1 Hour After), a personal care brand offering body and hair products designed to be used directly after a workout for better recovery [Instagram].
Luc Otto - fresh pressed makeup remover/ cleanser [Instagram].
Beauty Independent: “Skincare should evolve as science does”: Regimen Lab keeps testing ingredients and reformulating products.
🇨🇳 Jing Daily: China’s cosmetics & beauty sales rebound for the first time since July.
⭐️ The Unpublishable: The ‘Science of Skincare’ Isn’t Science or Care. A really great piece hitting on the difference between understanding the true science of skin and the twisting of ingredient stories. All is not lost to marketing - there are companies out there truly going deep on the science of skin and hair - I can vouch Unilever does this (and its competitors) as well as a handful of biotech startups. Some of these biotech startups like Cybele Microbiome and Phylabiotics are taking a deep understanding of the microbiome to develop targeted technologies. These technologies may specifically ‘feed the skin’ i.e. make your skin produce more of a component (such as collagen or ceramides) or can attack a bad bacteria - while keeping the good bacteria that should be on the skin plentiful. This type of effort takes considerable time and money, versus approaching a third party manufacturer and creating a cute brand.
👩🦱 Haircare:
Ocoa Beauty - a new curl-care brand from sisters Cory Varona-Corniel & Nicol Varona Cancelmo. The line designed by two Latina women from the Dominican Republic is meant to honor the Latina women’s curly hair [Instagram].
💊 Supplements:
✈️ Fly Water - a beverage meant to elevate the flying experience.
♀ Micropause - a new line of supplements targeted to help with the symptoms at all stages of the ‘menopause journey’. The two supplements rely on adaptogenic ingredients [Beauty Independent].
U-Earth, known for its biotech driven air-purification technology, launched a supplement ‘Hyper-U’, designed to improve performance, mindfulness, productivity, & energy. Formulated with spirulina, rhodiola, and phycocyanin claiming to use ingredients with significantly higher bioavailability [PR Newswire].
👩🔬 Femtech:
⭐️ Undark: Inside the Post-Roe scramble to count abortions.
⭐️ Swehl is a new breastfeeding platform & brand offering resources to make breastfeeding more accessible in the U.S.
🛍 Retail: DTC, Brick + Mortar, Social Commerce, and more.
♻️ Modern Retail looks at the flattening sales at The Honest Company & Grove Collaborative…and what that means about the sustainable consumer.
🤦♀️ Walmart launches clean beauty: affordable, accessible and transparent [Clean Beauty].
eMarketer: A perfect storm of factors fueled increased returns during the 2022 holiday season.
eMarketer: Discount stores have no plans to slow their breakneck expansion pace.
apptopia: Temu hits 50 million installs, but does it matter?
The RealReal is leaving the beauty business [WWD].
🩺 Digital Health: Wearables, Smart Devices, and More...
LabPulse.com: Becton Dickinson nabs FDA clearance for infectious vaginitis molecular test.
🪦 Google is putting Google Glass to rest.
Fast Company: How simple sound and light are treating Alzheimer’s Disease.
🗣 Social Media: News about TikTok, Meta, BeReal, Snapchat, Twitter...
🇨🇳 Rest of World: Xiaohongshu is teaching young Chinese women how to buy the perfect life.
The Hustle: Even more than usual, all eyes are on TikTok today.
WWD: The top-performing beauty brands on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
AdAge: DTC Brands on TikTok are preparing for the app’s possible ban.
In other TikTok news…Charli & Dixie D’Amelio’s dad wants to buy TikTok amid ban threats.
♻️ Sustainability: Sustainable Design⭐️ 🇬🇧 😍 KANKAN, the London based personal care brand designed with sustainability has rebranded and got an upgrade to its packaging. From the start the brand has cleverly packaged their body cleansers & hand washes in aluminum soda cans. Previously users had to transfer the contents of the can into a glass pump jar. Now, they have designed with Morrama a cool new attachable pump system that can be placed directly on the can. No product transfer required.
🇩🇪 Liloomi, a sustainable home & personal care brand out of Germany.
🇩🇪 Luup - a reusable, traceable, redesignable synthetic from Isa-Traesko.
💸 M&A, IPOs, SPACs, Closings...
The latest on the Aesop acquisition speculation.
🔬RESEARCH
⭐️ 🇬🇧 A study conducted in the UK has shown a 20% increased incidence of breast cancer and progesterone-only birth control. This is similar to prior findings of mixed (estrogen & progesterone) birth control use [PLOS Medicine].
Nanoplastics were linked to major defects in developing chicken embryos [Environmental International].
⭐️ Forever chemicals are linked to significantly reduced fertility rates in women [Science of the Total Environment].
🇨🇦 A team out of UBC developed a method for removing PFAS from drinking water - through an electrochemical and photochemical techniques [Chemosphere].
🇨🇦 BPS which replaced hormone-disrupting BPA - and commonly used in food labels is now being linked to also be hormone-disrupting and migrates through the label and into the food (barcodes, price tags, stickers - use a heat process to print the label and have high levels of BPS) [ACS - Ecotoxicology & Public Health].
Researchers identified a set of biomarkers predictive of atopic dermatitis in infants at two months old [The Journal of Allergy & Clinical Immunology].
⭐️ 🇨🇭 🦶 ETH Zurich developed a 3D printed insole capable of measuring sole pressure. Pressure can be measured during activities which will help assess athlete and patient performance [Nature Scientific Report].
🧐 REPORTS
Spate: TikTok Makeup Trends.
Trendhunter: Wellness Evolution Trend Report.
Provenance: Skin Deep Beauty Shopper expectations and the truth behind sustainability claims.
⭐️ LuxuryNSight: Global Luxury Brand Analysis.
⭐️ a16z: Marketplace 100.
⭐️ Femhealth Insights: 2022 Femtech Landscape.
💡 Enjoy,
-Anne