Whether this is positive or negative depends on the individual's preference. At the same time, the average number of steps in that beauty routine during the early years was eight, but it increased to 27 during the period of 2006 to 2016. As underlined in the study of Superdrug, a UK health and beauty retailer, it is now getting much worse. This post from Geng is just part of an avalanche of various viral videos that portray complex combinations of hair, scalp, and body routines thriving long after the face.
Such detractors would argue that these highly convoluted routines are yet another sign of overconsumption. But as beauty became saturated and slowed, brands started exploring new areas like body and scalp serum to differentiate themselves and grow quickly.
The Hair and Body Care Frontier
Mintel's Global New Products Database found that out of every 100 beauty product launches between January and May this year, only 46 percent were genuinely new. This is the lowest number on record in the past ten years.
Dove and Pantene's new scalp and hair serums can be found alongside a niacinamide-boosted body serum from Victoria's Secret at the very largest mass body-care brands—the skinification of everything is now reachable.
"What we were before was mostly, 'Oh, something's new here,'" said Michelle Miller, Chief Marketing Officer for the biotech haircare brand K18. One of Unilever's recently acquired assets—by less than three years after its launch in 2020—is the brand K18, whose flagship product, the Leave-in Molecular Repair Hair Mask, rode the waves of success. The line has grown to include seven more products like hair oil.
Markenson said, "At one point, it came down to coming in for your color, getting your cut, and getting a blowout." But really framing anything that relates to the scalp as an electronic treatment has a way of making multiple-step processes feel more like self-care and less like work.
"I don't sell the product," said Akash Mehta, co-founder of Fable and Mane and current chief executive. "I sell rituals." His haircare routine is about eight steps—using the brand's serums and hair oil while also performing breathing exercises and massaging his scalp.
"We think about using these different senses to help to encourage people to adopt these new routines," said Zhou.
Yet some such brands also believe that widening their product lines can make consumers' routine habits shorter. Meanwhile, influencers like Yung integrate K18 into their seven-step hair routine, but Miller, CMO of the brand, stressed that this could be used as a substitute conditioner. "There are a ton of steps that are offered to the customer every day," said Miller. "For us, that insight was, 'How can we shorten that?'" Founders argue that it is really that simple because most successful launches involve avoiding being caught in the constant pressure for something new.
New products have "to be serving a real need, rather than merely adding something for the sake of the product pipeline," according to Mehta, who predicts that hair routes in the future will not include 10 steps. "That's the beauty of hair. It's not that complicated," he said.