Beauty in mind with Hagen Döring: COSSMA

Hello, there you are again! Are you familiar with this situation? Sometimes, when I’m sitting with friends and we’re drinking a glass of beer or wine, sooner or later the question comes up “Hagen, what’s trending in cosmetics right now?” Or also popular: “Which cosmetics brand is better – the cheap private label in the drugstore or the expensive luxury care?”. At this moment, I’m on high alert and from now on only drinking non-alcoholic beverages. Because whatever I’m going to reply to this will eventually lead to the rethorical question: “But between us, it’s a lot of nonsense in cosmetics, isn’t it?”

Now the ambition seizes me, because I can’t accept to be seen as a fraud as a supplier of cosmetic products! Even my mother always said: “Of course cosmetics help to look better. Just look at 50-year-olds in the 1950s and compare them to the beautiful good-looking and vital 50-year-olds of today!”. She’s right on that point, even though of course many other parameters play a role here too (work, diet, etc.).

But where do these fundamental doubts about the seriousness of the cosmetics industry – especially skin care – actually come from? Some media certainly contribute their share, because whenever there is a critical topic, our cosmetics industry is always condemned first (see preservation, microplastics, etc.). It’s easy, because we do not defend ourselves. And if we actually try to set something right, this remains either unseen or they reply something like: “yes, but it’s not an expert talking, it is only an industry representative.“ But who do they see as an expert? – Maybe their preferred influencer on social media? Maybe also the exaggerated expectations of consumers play an important role in cosmetics‘ bad reputation. When the first deep wrinkles appear, of course this has nothing to do with years of sunbathing without effective sun protection. No, they appear because the skincare products were useless.

Or is it because advertising in our industry is almost exclusively emotional and rarely scientific? However – isn’t it the same with cars by now? Who still talks about horsepower (kW) or cw values when buying a car? And conversely, does that mean that emotional products can’t contain an insane amount of science?

I remember a visit to the IFSCC a few years ago. If you heard the presentations on new findings in skin biology or on new mechanisms of action of active ingredients, you know that applied technologies in cosmetics research are often the same as in the pharmaceutical field. But in the product advertising the claim is often just “moisturises the skin”. What a pity!

Perhaps it is time to think about the introduction of the category cosmeceuticals, also on a legal level. Because cosmetics can certainly do so much more than just moisturise.