Two companies have come together to provide insight into some of the most searched ingredients, concerns, and questions that pop up in the beauty industry.
Spate, a consumer insights and trends company, has partnered with Deciem, the Estée Lauder-owned parent company of brands including NIOD, Hylamide, and The Ordinary, to discover what concerns consumers have about the safety of cosmetic ingredients.
Spate was founded by two ex-Googlers Yarden Horwitz and Olivier Zimmer who started Google’s Trendspotting division and spotted trends such as face masks, turmeric and cold brew.
Deciem was founded in 2013 by Iranian-Canadian computer scientist and cosmetics entrepreneur Brandon Truaxe, known as “the beauty world’s most exciting disrupter”, who unfortunately died after falling from a building in Toronto two years ago.
The report, titled ‘Deciem x Spate: Misconceptions Across Ingredients’ analyses more than 20 billion search signals in the US to uncover the top concerns that consumers are searching.
The report uncovers a list of ingredients that consumers are searching alongside words such as “toxic” and “unsafe”.
It also shows the overall growth and search volume of an ingredient, including zinc, hyaluronic acid, silicone, retinol, and vitamin C, along with the growth and volume of the ingredient searched with the relevant safety concern.
The Deciem Lab provides perspective on why consumers may be concerned, and whether there is reason to be concerned when using these ingredients in skincare.
It also reviews the top ingredients that US consumers are searching with skincare concerns such as “sensitive skin”, “irritation”, and “inflammation”.
The Deciem Lab provides intel on why these reactions are occurring, and how to best avoid them.
Prudvi Kaka, Deciem’s Chief Scientific Officer, said: “As brands and retailers continue to promote clean beauty, new misconceptions across chemical ingredients are arising. The purpose of this report is to explore the negative associations that consumers have when it comes to beauty-related chemicals.”