Packaging trends in makeup by Monia Merabet – WeOutWow

While there was a shift in demand from makeup to skincare and hybrid beauty during the peak of the crisis, the colour cosmetic segment is coming back in full force, especially for the eye and lip categories. Consumers have adopted new habits and have different expectations for the makeup products they want to buy. Sustainability is, of course, a major topic for the makeup industry, and packaging innovation brings many interesting solutions. Other trends in packaging are worth looking at, such as flexible containers and design.

THE ENVIRONMENT FIRST  

The beauty industry is looking for sustainable options in terms of formulations but also regarding packaging, and the makeup segment is no stranger to the effort. Refillable products are on the rise and brands like Hermès, La Bouche Rouge or, more recently, Fenty offer refillable lipsticks. Less common are refillable mascaras. US brand Izzy Beauty offers a refillable mascara system where they use tubes made from medical-grade stainless steel and designed to be cleaned and refilled over 10,000 times. Izzy mascara comes with no outer packaging and is shipped in reusable mailers manufactured from upcycled materials. On the recyclable side, innovations focus on reaching the 100% recycling mark, such as the plantable eyeliner and brow liner, by Sprout, that once used and buried in soil turns into bee-friendly wildflowers.

NEW SHAPES

Partly because of its eco-friendly aspect but also for its sensory appeal, consumers are becoming more sensitive to flexible packaging. Not very common in makeup, it is steadily growing thanks to a popular material : aluminium, which is loved for its recyclability and light weight, and also because it lowers shipping costs. The Unseen, a UK brand known for its eyeshadow Spectra (a light-reflective and colour-transforming eye cream that reacts to bright light such as a phone camera’s flash), packaged its product in a recyclable aluminium tube with a biodegradable vacuum pouch for the outer packaging. Flexible pouches for makeup are also becoming popular. Companies such as About Face with its Fractal Collection or Japanese brand Tiny Tiny, both introduced lipsticks and eyeshadows in small pouches with a lid-equipped brush.

DESIGN TRENDS

With a growing number of gender-fluid brands in makeup, packaging design has been impacted and it can go in two opposite directions. It can take a minimalist, fits-all approach with clean designs that appeal to both women and men, without any gender bias. For example, South Korean brand Laka opted for a simple black on white packaging while French company Estampe developed a cork case. Both want to make sure their design can be to anyone’s taste. On the other side of the spectrum, colourful and exuberant packaging designs, from brands like Fluide Beauty or Krash Cosmetics, want to make ‘beauty for all’ a celebration. These latter attract for their fun design and also fit into a bigger consumer trend that is very popular this year, Y2K (a nostalgia for the aesthetic of years circa 2000). 

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