R HAIR CARE 69
Collagen and hair care: a modern fairy tale
Florencia Moreno Torres - Rousselot
From reducing frizz to boosting shine, thickness and fullness, today’s hair care brands have to contend with a number of tangled demands from a wide range of shoppers. With so many searching for solutions to their hair care worries, nutricosmetics brands need a reliable ally to help them tap into this expanding market opportunity. Anyone close to the health and beauty industries has likely heard of collagen and its many benefits. Particularly in the nutricosmetics space, collagen has long been recognized as a key ingredient in promoting skin beauty but in the last decade, a growing bank of scientific evidence also points to a beneficial connection between collagen and hair health – opening the way for it to become a ‘mythical’ solution for many beauty supplements alongside more established ingredients such as zinc and biotin. In this article, Florencia Moreno Torres,
Rousselot’s health & nutrition global business development manager, explores the fairytale potential of collagen as the next-generation ingredient for the hair care segment, including how it empowers manufacturers to differentiate their beauty from within products and helps consumers live ‘happily ever-after’ with their hair.
Hair-raising consumer concerns First, let us discuss the issues that have hair care shoppers tied in knots. Hair loss has typically been seen as an age-related issue particularly affecting men, but the picture is shifting. Throughout their lives, approximately 85% of men and 33% of women will face hair loss,1
suggesting
hair-related concerns have a far wider reach than previously assumed. At the same time, attention is turning to preserving hair strength from the effects of ageing as well as reducing hair loss.2 Women are also starting to feel empowered
to talk about hair loss. In mature women, for instance, low oestrogen levels due to peri/ menopause may lead to increased hair loss, thinning, breakage, and slow growth.3,4
For new
mothers too, hormonal changes after pregnancy are a known cause of excessive hair shedding,5,6 driving the demand for solutions to recover hair beauty.
www.personalcaremagazine.com
In a similar vein to the skincare sector,
hair care products are gaining popularity with younger demographics, like Gen Z, Millennial, and younger Gen X women who want to maintain or enhance hair beauty attributes, such as strength, thickness, shine, volume, and prevent hair damage. According to Euromonitor, explanations for
this shift range from the stresses of the pandemic and current economic context, to increased awareness of perceived flaws due to being ‘chronically online’ or simply expanded access to good hair care information and strategies.7 Regardless of the specific motivations, there is an undeniable opportunity for nutricosmetic and hair care brands. This is also confirmed by the number of global product SKUs aimed at ‘treating hair loss’ which increased by 31% between 2021-2022, suggesting a real appetite for age-positive hair care across multiple consumer groups.8 Multiple demographics are clearly looking
for a hero product or brand to swoop in and save them from their hair woes, and this is where collagen finds its ‘time to shine’.
Case study: demonstrating the positive effects of collagen An essential protein that helps maintain the integrity of virtually every connective tissue,
collagen is found throughout the human body in skin, bones, muscles and joints. As we age, our capacity for collagen production diminishes, contributing to skin ageing, joint stiffness, or decreased mobility. For this reason, products based on collagen
peptides – the highly bioavailable and digestible form of collagen – have become increasingly popular across different health segments thanks to their multiple benefits.9-12 However, while consumers are getting
familiar with collagen peptides as a holistic ingredient for their general health and well- being, its success is still largely driven by the cosmetics and nutricosmetics sectors. As mentioned above, this may be due to a growing body of clinical research that shows that collagen peptides – such as Rousselot’s flagship solution Peptan® – deliver beauty benefits, contributing for example to skin hydration and collagen density increase in the dermis. One of the latest studies to demonstrate
this, recently published in the Wiley Journal of Cosmetic Dermatology, investigated the influence of Rousselot’s collagen peptides supplementation on visible signs of skin beauty and ageing in East Asian women aged 40-65. The trial, involving 85 participants who took 5g of Rousselot’s collagen peptide daily for 12 weeks, showed significant improvements
August 2025 PERSONAL CARE
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