BOLOGNA, Italy — Cosmoprof organizer Sogecos reshuffled the schedule this year to give packaging suppliers their day in the spotlight, and they weren’t shy about stepping up to the mike.
The show’s packaging component, called Cosmopack, opened the day before the main Cosmoprof show. The debut was underscored by a panel discussion of nine executives who focused on the supply world’s dilemma of maintaining quality while continually pressed by customer demands and trying to stave off the encroaching competitive threat of China.
Dieter Bakic talked about the power of experience in building the necessary know-how over several decades to be able to conceive of brands for today and tomorrow’s consumer. “You have to start in the past to get in the present and move into the future,” he said. Bakic was talking in part about his product museum in Munich, which houses beauty innovations going back to the Seventies. He pointed out that the Japanese for years created brands that never left the home islands, but the experience set the stage for later advances.
After the meeting, Bakic painted a glowing picture of the future of Russia, saying the present market infrastructure there reminded him of Germany in 1955. “The Russians have the taste and they like to show off beauty,” he said, predicting, “in five to 10 years, they will be leaders.”
Bakic was one of several suppliers who have taken the daring step of offering completely realized product concepts to customers.
During the fair, Schwan-Stabilo Cosmetics, of Heroldsberg, Germany, showed a fully conceived makeup and skin care line for women over 50 called Evolution.
HCT Packaging, based in London, is offering turnkey products, such as a flexible Surlyn holder for liquid lipstick or gloss and a lipstick tube with a swivel top. “We’re doing more that’s proactive,” said Rebecca Goswell, group creative director. “The product-to-market time has accelerated over the past three to four years.”
Ulrich Nebe, managing director of Heinz Holding, said that to cut lead times from 18 to 20 weeks to 12 to 14 weeks, suppliers must create overcapacity, which Heinz has done to the tune of $160 million in the past five years.
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Even though he pointed out the problem of coping with customers who “ask for Germany quality and Chinese prices,” Nebe spoke warmly of the Chinese, who are “hungry” to learn.
Another tactic is for suppliers to band together to offer a complete Chinese menu of services. Renato Ancorotti, president and chief executive officer of Gamma Croma, Crema, Italy, is leading a group of 40 local companies that can complement each other in creating beauty products. Gamma Croma is partnering with another Italian company to produce and fill mascara.
Ancorotti picked up a theme pressed by a number of other suppliers complaining of their innovations being copied by Asian competitors. He insisted that it isn’t a matter of enforcing patent law. “Europe needs to be stronger,” he said.
Perhaps one of the more startling innovations on display was the do-it-yourself product-customization tubes being offered by Versadial, based in New York. It’s a pairing of two tubes in which exact amounts of active substances can be dialed out and mixed in different degrees of strength or color. The company is headed by Geoffrey Donaldson, a Revlon veteran, who is the ceo of the start-up. Versadial packaging will be brought to market by three major beauty groups next spring. The product now may be used for liquid or viscous products, and there are plans in the works for aerosol dispension.