168 - What I'm Reading: Week of October 25th.
An app for brands to talk to teens, a supplement tracker, your dog may talk to you soon, your brain on birth control, the holiday shopping outlook, the increasing rate of menopause diagnosis & more...
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⭐️ = What excites me most this week.
🗞 NEWS & PRODUCTS
WSJ: Ice-Cream tubs of tampons and sunscreen from a whipped-cream can — welcome to ‘chaos packaging’. Lesser-known brands try to grab shoppers’ attention with unexpected trappings
🇨🇳 Sixth Tone: The women living alone — and loving It — on Xiaohongshu
vlogs about the single life are popular on the app, sometimes referred to as “China’s Instagram,” but are their stars as free as they seem?
⭐️ 🗣️ Cafeteria connects teens to brands - providing feedback and valuable insights.
Dazed: Why don’t we have any sympathy for beauty addicts? The pressure to look perfect is stronger than ever, with many feeling like cosmetic work is their only option. But when that work is deemed ‘unsuccessful’, the online response can be cruel
Just for fun:
Spell your name in satellite images - thanks NASA.
🧴 Skin / Personal Care:
🇮🇳 Skin Elements — a personal care brand with intimate care washes for men & women as well as hair products & hygiene wipes [Instagram].
Sweet Chemistry - a skincare brand using ingredients from Xlyx bio, Matrikynes, that are meant to help with skin regeneration [Instagram].
HOMIE - a hygiene brand for men founded by creative director Rajiv Lahens [Instagram].
Purebble, a personal and pet care brand - using botanical and natural ingredients for better hygiene [Instagram].
🇨🇳 Jing Daily: Double 11 —Are luxury beauty brands sacrificing prestige for discounts? How long can luxury beauty brands continue to play the Singles’ Day discounting game without damaging their image?
🇨🇳 Jing Daily: China’s beauty slowdown — a setback, or opportunity? Despite declining sales and key brands exiting the market, global businesses like Estée Lauder continue to invest, eyeing future growth.
🇸🇦 Vogue Business: Unpacking the Gulf’s high-spend beauty market. There are significant opportunities for brands in the region, if they navigate its unique nuances.
👩🦱 Haircare:
Texture Crush: A line of textured haircare products from a former Revlon exec [Beauty Independent; Instagram].
💊 Supplements:
Happy Aging - a newly launched supplement startup offering NAD+ longevity supplement shots and a biological aging test, founded Martha Graeff and Dr. Daniel Yadegar. The shot includes resveratrol, nicotinamide riboside, alochol-free red wine powder, blood orange extract, spinach leaf juice powder, grape seed extract & ceramides [Instagram].
Sunny Within - avocado based supplements - with formulas meant to be ‘gentle on the stomach’ and optimized to be delivered in a fat-based product [Instagram].
⭐️ SuppCo - a new platform for optimizing and tracking supplements [True Ventures; Instagram]
🐕 Pet Care:
👩🔬 Femtech:
Healthcare Cost Institute: Data brief — menopause diagnosis steadily increased from 2018-2022…”Rates of menopause diagnosis are highest among people living in the "least vulnerable" areas, as categorized by the Minority Health Social Vulnerability Index (MH-SVI)” - so is this a result of self-advocating / education or access to physicians more likely to go the extra mile to diagnose/listen help.
Bloomberg: Biden aims to expand free birth control access as election nears.
Mira launched a menopause transition kit - to help monitor cycle changes.
Quest Diagnostics announced a self-collection option for a test that can diagnose vaginitis and similar genital tract infections such as chlamydia, gonorrhea, trichomoniasis and Mycoplasma genitalium.
🛍 Retail: DTC, Brick + Mortar, Social Commerce, and more...
BoF: Is Q-commerce the next big beauty opportunity in India? ‘Quick commerce’ apps that deliver products in just 10-20 minutes are already popular in Indian cities with experts predicting double-digit sales growth for the channel in the years ahead.
Egadget: Amazon is reportedly working on a low-cost storefront to rival Temu. I'll skip the $20 sofa, thanks.
🩺 Digital Health: Wearables, Smart Devices, and more...
🇨🇭 *aeon - a Swiss MRI preventative health startup [Instagram].
🛌 The Verge: Ozlo Sleepbuds hands-on — resurrected and I’ve slept so good.
WSJ: The science of why your body takes longer to bounce back after 40. Injuries, colds, restless nights and alcohol can hit harder when we get into midlife
⭐️ The Guardian: US startup charging couples to ‘screen embryos for IQ’
Heliospect’s services were marketed at up to $50,000 for 100 embryos, undercover footage shows.
TechCrunch: 23andMe faces an uncertain future — so does your genetic data.
🦻 TechCrunch: A closer look at the AirPods Pro’s new hearing aid features.
Becker’s Hospital Review — Why hundreds of US pharmacies are closing. Online and mail order options are taking over.
🗣 Social Media: News about TikTok, Meta, BeReal, Snapchat, X...
♻️ Sustainability: Sustainable Design⭐️ Daisyface - a beautiful sustainably designed skincare line founded by Daisy Schaffer [Instagram].
🇫🇷 TechCrunch: BaCta is using engineered bacteria to grow natural rubber and slash CO2 emissions.
Vox: We need $700 billion to save nature. Just a tiny fraction of the global GDP could help stave off ecological collapse.
The Verge: Amazon says it ditched plastic air pillows.
🔬RESEARCH
⭐️ 🧠 Nature: How does the brain react to birth control? A researcher scanned herself 75 times to find out. Extensive scans reveal rhythmic changes in the brain throughout the menstrual cycle and while on the pill.
👃 A new study demonstrated that individuals with anosmia (the inability to smell) exhibit different breathing patterns both while awake & asleep in comparison to their nose-smelling colleagues. The breath rate is the same but sniff-rates differ - and could be contributing to health issues those who experience anosmia experience [Nature].
🧐 REPORTS
🎁 Deloitte: 2024 holiday retail survey — Embracing a season of ‘doing’ and discounts (some quick stats - an 8%🔺 in Y0Y holiday spending, a 16% 🔺 YOY spending on experiences, a 9% 🔺 on non-gift purchases, a 3% 🔻 YoY in gift spending).
🎁 Bain & Co.: 2024 Holiday Shopping — Inside the Latest Retail Sales. US retail sales growth slowed in August and September, indicating a cautious holiday season.
Piper Sandler: Taking Stock With Teens®Survey, Fall 2024.
Beauty spending reached the highest level since Spring ‘18 at $342 (+6% Y/Y). All categories except for skincare (-4% Y/Y) grew Y/Y. Fragrance is growing the fastest at +25% Y/Y.
Ulta is No. 2 and 27% vs. 32% a year ago. Sephora (No. 1) lost one point of share Y/Y and Target (No. 3) gained 4 points Y/Y.
⭐️ BeautyMatter: Amazon Q3 2024 — Top 25 Beauty and Personal Care Products.
Business Insider: The biggest beauty industry trends you'll see in 2025.
🇨🇳 ChinaSkinny: Understanding diverging consumption trend in China
💡 Enjoy,
-Anne