OLIVIA S STELMASZCZYK
Euromonitor International, Chicago, USA

Abstract

Today’s beauty consumer is smarter than ever, diving deeper into research before committing to a product purchase. With the pandemic bringing wellness, health and safety to the forefront, ingredients have emerged as another influential tool in consumers’ research path to purchase.
This article provides a perspective on the current state of ingredient led searches in the beauty industry, and how they could evolve in the future. It encourages people to rethink the growing influence of up and coming educational sources, like social media and influencers, uncovering necessary strategies to keep up with everchanging consumer demands.

WHAT ARE THE CONSUMER MOTIVATIONS BEHIND INGREDIENT LED BEAUTY SEARCHES?
Ingredient led beauty searches could be partially motivated by the high number of clean brands and claims like “natural” in the US. Euromonitor Product Claims and Positioning found that “natural” claims in online SKUs of skin care products in the US rose 8% in 2020 and 11% in 2021. On the consumer end however, the number of US respondents looking for natural or organic in skin care fell from 14% in 2020 to 13% in 2021 (Euromonitor Voice of the Consumer: Beauty Survey, fielded June to July 2021), suggesting a disconnect between what companies and what consumers perceive to be “natural”. The definition of “natural” is quite varied, and consumer interpretations could range from being organic, vegan, or cruelty-free, to using plant-based or botanical ingredients, to being free of synthetics or fragrances, and even to “feeling” natural in terms of packaging or sensory textures. Since “natural” is an unstandardized claim, this “clean washing” can sometimes contribute to a level of mistrust surrounding the ingredient safety of products, which may explain decelera ...