April showers bring more than May flowers. This month the beauty industry blossomed with five new beauty innovations, bringing both first-to-market products and sampling programs. Laura Geller, who is celebrating her 20th anniversary this year with forthcoming products in June, still found time to release a separate item, her new Filter Fix Baked Correcting Setting Powder. PCA Skin invested in a deep, penetrating Hyaluronic Acid Boosting Serum. AmorePacific’s The Essential Creme Fluid and Supergoop’s Super Power Sunscreen Mousse SPF 50 both created first-to-market products, while Clove + Hallow go all-natural and non-harmful with Lip Glaze.


Laura Geller Filter Fix Baked Correcting Setting Powder
Executive Credit: Laura Geller, the company’s owner and founder

How it works: The make-up setting powder has Ultra HD Perfecting Pigments and skin-brightening apricot pigments to blur away imperfections, while the whisper-weight formula aims to regulate excess shine.
Waitlist Worthy: The formula leaves skin with a flawless, enhanced finish and sets make-up in place so selfie filters are unnecessary.

Marketing Plan: “Filter Fix Baked Correcting Setting Powder will be supported across various channels including social media, QVC and retail,” said Laura.“The product will appear in magazines starting mid-May and receive a dedicated week of social media takeovers, including fresh photography and new video animations.”
New Strategy: The brand looks to introduce a setting powder into their product assortment that offers a universal shade that works for all skin tones – apricot.

Get It: Available at Ulta Beauty, UltaBeauty.com, LauraGeller.com, QVC and QVC.com. It retails for $33.


PCA Skin Hyaluronic Acid Boosting Serum


Executive Credit: Chris Payne, Chief Marketing Officer, PCA Skin
How it works: Hyaluronic Acid Boosting Serum works with three distinct hyaluronic acid actions to create a newer, deeper approach to HA performance, while providing superior hydration and anti-aging benefits.

Waitlist Worthy: “Most unique in our HA-Pro Complex is a proprietary blend of ingredients which penetrates even deeper into the skin and helps your body increase its own natural production of hyaluronic acid,” said Chris.

Marketing Plan: As a purely professional skin care brand, the primary goal is reaching out to the company’s professional distribution network – dermatologists, plastic surgeons and certified aestheticians. “We will conduct national and regional education seminars highlighting this product, and how it works into an overall anti-aging treatment plan that incorporates our chemical peels,” he added. “We will also reach out directly to consumers through social media, various CRM programs (which allows businesses to manage business relationships and the data and information associated with them)—and most importantly, we will sample this product,” he said.

New Strategy: The brand will leverage targeted sampling with key opinion leader mailings, which are sent to the company’s top dermatologists, and to consumers.

Get It: Available at select dermatologists, plastic surgeons, medspas and Pcaskin.com. It retails for $115.

AmorePacific The Essential Creme Fluid


Executive Credit: Giovanna Coluccio, Senior Marketing Manager, AmorePacific
How it works: Each bottle contains 150 antioxidant-rich, baby green tea leaves cultivated from AmorePacific’s green tea gardens on Jeju Island. The product’s Neutra-Melting Emulsion Technology lets the active components of the formula quickly penetrate the skin to moisturize “from within” without stickiness.

Waitlist Worthy: The Essential Creme Fluid is an ideal prep-step before applying makeup because it’s lightweight and fast absorbing. It was created as an exclusive with Sephora for the Sephora consumer, and introduces an entirely new category of moisturizer and texture.

Marketing Plan: New packaging paired with a redesign is just a starting point. The launch coincides with the brand’s redesign at Sephora as well, all with the goal to share the product’s positioning, storytelling and execution. “We’ve invested extensively in training, working with Sephora cast members and a strong network of celebrity makeup artists who love our brand to really celebrate this multi-tasking innovation,” said Giovanna. “From a brand marketing perspective, our focus has been primarily on digital—we’ll utilize social in a big way: PR campaigns, influencer outreach, partnerships and collaborations.”

New Strategy: “This is a unique opportunity to launch an innovative product, continue to lead the K-beauty conversation, and strategically broaden the reach of our consumer base by tapping into a new audience,” she added. “We’ve had a lot of fun planning this launch and have really been able to leverage it to tell our unique brand story in a big way. As a brand, this standalone product also brings huge opportunity to continue to expand and speak to a potential new generation who might be discovering us for the first time.”

Get It: Sold exclusively at Sephora and Sephora.com and at us.amorepacific.com. It will retail for $98 for a 90-ml pump bottle.

Clove + Hallow Lip Glaze


Executive Credit: Sarah Biggers, CEO

How it works: Clove + Hallowis an affordable line of clean, cruelty-free and vegan cosmetics offered in bold and diverse shades made with 15 or fewer safe ingredients.

Waitlist Worthy: Clean cosmetics have a bad reputation for being sheer, limited in staying power and offering an underwhelming shade range. Housed in edgy modern packaging, Lip Glazes offer full pigmentation and rich textures in six bold, diverse shades.

Marketing Plan:

“We will be doing traditional media features, social media advertisements and influencer programs. By securing features in well-known print and digital publications, we will develop brand recognition and a unique level of credibility that will distinguish us in an industry known for being saturated with small-scale indie brands,” said Sarah. “Across social platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, we will get our brand in front of consumers by running ads targeted to specific demographics and cross-over segments, like mothers, vegans, holistic health lifestyle practitioners, etc.” The brand will also send 50-plus beauty and lifestyle influencers PR packages with an assortment of products for them to review and feature on their channels.
New Strategy: “While this strategy is popular with conventional beauty, it has not taken off in the green beauty space,” she added. “Because word-of-mouth is still king when it comes to beauty purchases, we are going to create an affiliate program for everyday women by offering them free product, discounts or commissions based on purchases made with their unique affiliate code.” The company will also offer a return program and a trial program.

Where will it be sold: Launching on www.cloveandhallow.com. It will retail for $13.


Supergoop! Super Power Sunscreen Mousse SPF 50

Executive Credit: Amanda Baldwin, President of Supergoop!

How it works: This is a first-to-market innovative texture mousse with a non-aerosol formula that absorbs easily and offers antioxidants and hydration.

Waitlist Worthy: The goal was to remove the annoyance of applying sunscreen while giving the consumer a fun experience. Unlike other brands, the mousse offers beneficial ingredients, such as blue sea kale, shea butter, olive and avocado oils.

Marketing Plan: “This launch is a multi-prong approach,” said Amanda. “We’ll focus on integrated digital content in order to raise awareness, connect with content partners and reach out to over 100 influencers.  We will also be using the #DontMousseOut! hashtag.”

New Strategy: “This summer is the first time the brand will have the opportunity for a significant, 360-degree marketing investment,” said Amanda. “Eighty percent of our marketing goes towards this time of year, which includes this launch as well as other exciting innovations. We’ve never invested in digital and influencers before.”

Get It: Sold exclusively at Sephora (where the brand just doubled its shelf space), Sephora.com and Supergoop.com. It will retail for $19 for 3.4 oz. and $34 for 7.1 oz.