FORMULATING
Seven steps for formulating on a budget
Lou Graydon, Katherine Goodwin, Martha Stagg – Aston Chemicals
In times of financial hardship, consumers continue to purchase smaller, more affordable luxuries. This is known as the lipstick effect, a trend identified by Professor Juliet Schor in 1998 and later supported by claims from Estée Lauder’s Leonard Lauder, who noted that their lipstick sales had increased in line with recessions triggered by the 9/11 attacks and the 2008 financial crash.1,2 The trend is also seen across eyeliner,
mascara, and other relatively inexpensive treats,3
but not across personal care as a whole.
Mintel have reported that 54% of consumers are reducing their spend on beauty products, and 25% are ‘trading down’ by buying cheaper versions of products and services.4
At the same
time, the cost of raw materials, packaging and production is also increasing, leading many brands to reduce the costs of their formulation. Replacing expensive materials with cheaper
alternatives is a popular way to reduce the cost, but this also comes at a price. Cheap alternatives are often less refined and may contain more impurities, which can wreak havoc with the stability of the formulation. For example, cheaper natural oils and butters may initially work well in existing formulations, but will oxidise more quickly than more refined products. This could cause discolouration, rancidity, and instability, leading to consumer complaints and, ultimately, damage to brand reputation. Reducing the cost of formulations is best
tackled in a more holistic way, by analysing the whole development and manufacturing process to identify areas of potential cost saving. Below is a summary of ways in which this could be achieved.
1. Simplification of formulations Formulations often contain several ingredients which are not integral to the formulation, such as extracts, fragrances and solubilisers. Some of these ingredients can be reduced or removed and replaced with water or a cheaper raw material, in order to lower costs, while still maintaining the function of the product. Formulators often add ingredients such
as extracts and fragrances to support the claims that the brand wants to make on pack, for example ‘contains rose extract’ or similar. However, completely removing these products may result in no difference to the performance of the product at all! In order to reduce the cost of an existing product, the first step is
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to look at the formulation and identify the function of each ingredient. Is it key to the formulation? Is a claim made based on the ingredient? If there are ingredients for which the function is unclear and they do not support the claims, a knockout experiment can be conducted to determine whether they are necessary to include. This involves using the same formulation and process but removing one ingredient at a time, replacing with water or a base oil, and testing against the original formulation to assess skin feel, stability and overall performance. Ingredients deemed unnecessary can be removed or reduced, resulting in a lower cost formulation.5 When formulating new products, it is
important to start with a formulation which is as simple as possible. For example, in a blooming bath oil, only two ingredients are required – an oil and a surfactant. Dermol SLLC-L (by Alzo) is suitable for this application, as it solubilises easily into oils to give a transparent product, has excellent cleansing properties and blooms on addition to water. Any base oil can be used, but it is worth considering the desired properties of the product, and to choose a base oil that imparts these benefits, to avoid the need for additional oils.
Lipex SheaClear (by AAK Personal Care) is
suitable for clear oil formulations, providing the moisturising and softening benefits of Shea Butter in a transparent, liquid format. Ensuring that the minimum number of products are used at the development stage not only helps you to reduce costs of buying materials, but also helps to streamline the production process and potentially the energy costs of production.
2. Embracing the cold This brings us on to the next section – cold and mild processing. The heating and cooling steps required in traditional processing methods add significant costs to the final product, due to the energy required to heat the phases to temperatures as high as 80-90°C, the water required to heat and cool, as well as production time. Cold and mild processing methods reduce and eliminate some of these expensive procedures, and reduce the time needed in each vessel. All of this translates into overall reduction in
costs and energy consumption. This gives the added benefit of lower CO2
the impact on the environment – an aspect which could also be used in the marketing of the product to justify the value to the consumer.6
May 2023 PERSONAL CARE emissions, reducing
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