K-STYLE SUPER BEAUTY
Korea’s cosmetic innovations sweep S.F. (and beyond).
Walking through the food court at Japan Center in Japantown, you could easily miss TheFaceShop, a Korean beauty brand that has 2,600 shops in 29 countries yet is virtually unknown in the U.S. The small space is packed with hundreds of vividly packaged beauty products, including a candycolored wall of individual sheet masks, ranging from $2 to $12, declaring active ingredients that run the gamut from broccoli and cucumbers to snail secretion and star fruit extract. Oh, and donkey milk. It’s having a moment right now.
While you may not be familiar with TheFaceShop, or be considering incorporating donkey milk into your skin care regimen, you’ve undoubtedly come across BB and CC creams, sleeping masks and possibly even sheet masks at your local makeup counter or drugstore. All of which have origins in Korea and are evidence of the Korean wave (known by Koreans as hallyu, a term describing the popularity of Korean culture abroad) heavily influencing American beauty sales, promising exotic ingredients and perfect skin.
“So many new innovations are coming from South Korea because it’s a young country with many young consumers who are beauty-obsessed,” says Florence Bernardin, general manager of Information & Inspiration, a market research firm specializing in Asian cosmetic markets. “Koreans have the longest beauty ritual in the world.”
The multistep skin care ritual Bernardin refers to includes anywhere from 10 to 15 products and typically includes two cleansers (oil and foam), toner, essence, ampoules or serums, a sheet mask, eye cream, face cream, sunscreen or sleeping pack, mist and exfoliation thrown in a few times a week.
The lengthy process is performed daily to achieve one vital goal: perfect skin. “The Korean ideal of fair, dewy skin is such an intrinsic part of their culture — not just in terms of skin care, but in terms of overall beauty and health,” says Hilary Burns-LaRiche, marketing manager for Sulwhasoo, a luxury Korean skin care company owned by AmorePacific, one of the largest cosmetics companies in Asia. “It’s an ideal that is embedded in their history. In ancient times women would bathe in white ginseng before their weddings to achieve the most fair, radiant skin possible. Ultimate health and beauty were perceived if you had a radiant glow visible from 10 steps away.”
Westerners got their opportunity to achieve the same glow when BB creams hit U.S. shelves in 2011 and quickly made plain old tinted moisturizers seem passé. After all, “beauty balms” or “blemish balms” are essentially tinted moisturizers, but with the added benefits of serums and sunscreen. The creams were originally created in Germany in the 1960s to treat and protect post-plastic-surgery skin, and in the 1980s BB creams became hugely popular in Korea (which is, by some estimates, the plastic surgery capital of the world). Today, famous Korean actresses such as Song Hye-Kyo and Im Yoona smile warmly from the colorful BB cream ads, attributing their flawless skin to the magical product.
North Carolina beauty blogger Kerry Thompson of www.skinand tonics.com, whose book with fellow blogger Coco Park of www.thebeauty wolf.com, “Korean Beauty Secrets: A Practical Guide to Cutting-Edge Skincare & Makeup,” comes out this fall, discovered her love of everything K-beauty in 2011 during the BB cream craze. Since then, Thompson has tried products containing snail mucin, bee venom, jellyfish extract and starfish extract, among other things.
“Not all of (the ingredients) were hits, but the exploration process is always exciting,” Thompson says. While she enjoys the experimental aspect of Korean beauty, Thompson credits the skin care ritual with making her such a huge fan. “Putting my skin first and applying that level of effort into my self care has become an indispensable part of my day,” she says. “The Korean style routine does wonders for my skin, but it also does wonders for my peace of mind.”
While BB creams may have taken more than 20 years to come stateside, their successors (including CC creams and sheet masks) have come fast and furious. The next big thing? Cushion compacts, also known as “air cushions.” The spongy compacts already account for 40 percent of Asia’s foundation category sales, according to Burns-LaRiche.
The cushion compact is basically a sponge saturated with an amped-up BB cream containing antiaging, brightening and hydrating ingredi-
“What’s great about Korea is that it becomes like a laboratory.”
Arnold Hur, head of operations in the Americas for Memebox
ents topped off with at least 30 SPF. The compact comes with a puff that distributes a thin veil of buildable product, allowing you to touch up your glow throughout the day — something traditionally unheard of with foundation.
AmorePacific’s Iope brand first launched the cushion compact in 2009 to help minimize the steps in a woman’s morning beauty routine. Now, the company offers 19 cushion products from 13 of its brands in more than 10 countries in Asia and North America, and the company says an Iope cushion compact sells in Asia every six seconds.
Developing the holy grail of radiant
glow products is big business for Korean beauty companies, and in such a competitive space, companies must invest heavily in research and development to keep up. To put it in perspective, market researcher Bernardin says that, on average, Western beauty companies launch 10-30 new products a year, while Korean beauty companies launch 20-30 products per month.
According to Esther Dong, senior vice president of sales and marketing at AmorePacific, the company invests more than $100 million a year in research and development. “Much of the research is in the delivery of technology, making sure the benefit of ingredients like green tea, bamboo sap and ginseng are delivered deeply into the skin,” Dong says.
Sheryll Donerson, author of lifestyle and beauty blog the Wanderlust Project, says she sees the results of such research. Donerson believes Korean cosmetics are gaining popularity in the U.S. because of their efficacy as well as affordability. “A popular Argan oil cleanser from Sephora is around $40. Nature Republic sells one that’s equally fantastic for $14. Korea has some of the best skin care technology in the world, and it really shows,” she says.
“What’s great about Korea is that it becomes like a laboratory,” says Arnold Hur, head of operations in the Americas for Memebox, a South Korean cosmetics e-commerce startup based in San Francisco. “They’re testing a bunch of these new products, and we’re able to marry the whole data aspect with the traditional beauty world.” Memebox — which sells curated boxes of products and has an online store with approximately 800 items and its own makeup line — also uses that data to translate trends by seeing, for example, which colors or influencers are on the rise.
Memebox’s private-label makeup palettes and sets are often collaborations with popular beauty bloggers. The company’s first collabora- tion was with Pony, a makeup artist vlogger whom Hur describes as the “Michelle Phan of Korea.” Pony’s eight-shade eyeshadow palette for Memebox set the record in Asia when it sold 20,000 units in its first 40 minutes on the market.
According to Hur, Memebox has experienced 400 percent growth year over year since its inception in 2012. In March, the company announced that it had raised $29.4 million in funding from major investors. Memebox is also the first Korean company and first beauty startup incubated in the Y-Combinator program.
“Asian beauty has always been a bellwether for the beauty industry, and Memebox, with more than 50 percent of sales through their mobile apps, is using mobile technology and global logistics to build the fastest growing company in this category,” Eric Kim, managing partner of Goodwater Capital, one of Memebox’s investors, said via e-mail.
It’s that rapid growth and consumer interest that tells Hur that the Korean wave undulating through the U.S. and European cosmetics markets will continue to swell. “In Korea, Sulwhasoo is a household name,” Burns-LaRiche says. “Women do not need an explanation of which products to use in what order, or why there are so many different collections, or why extra steps like sheet masks, sleeping packs, finishers, etc. are necessary — Korean women just intuitively know.” Soon, American customers may, too.