Belo group mulls venturing into organic beauty products

CEBU, Philippines - The increasing popularity of health-friendly beauty care products prompted Belo-led Intelligent Skin Care Inc., (ISCI) to venture into providing organically-developed products in the next few years.

ISCI marketing manager Lerms Sta. Cruz-Mendoza announced that the company is currently considering making organic beauty products, although this can not be done in the short term.

According to Mendoza providing organic beauty products is part of the company’s long term plan, as soon as the market is ‘ready for it.”

At present, the mainstream market in the Philippines is not yet ready to embrace the “still expensive” organic-made beauty products or skin care, as raw materials are still scarce.

“Now it’s not yet profitable to venture into organic skin care products, the mainstream market also is not yet ready because of its affordability,” Mendoza said.

Currently, she said organic beauty product market is still a “niche” and shared by growing names in both international and local makers.

However, ISCI will be introducing more product lines in the next few months, after it already launched different categories of its beauty care lines, including Belo Men, Nutraceutical, among others.

With a combined term for “nutrition” and “pharmaceutical”, Belo Nutraceuticals offers the key benefits of glutathione plus collagen.

To complement with the beauty supplement, the company has also simultaneously introduced the SunExpert or Sunblock products considering the threat of the extreme heat and sun exposure especially in the tropical country like the Philippines.

The company believes that wearing sun-block everyday is no longer a “vanity” thing, but it becomes a health-protection necessity. It is for this reason, that the company has purposely developed the Sun Expert products to provide Filipinos affordable and reliable sun protection beauty care, not to depend solely on imported products.

“The market of beauty care is continuously growing,” said ISCI chief operations officer (COO) in an earlier interview adding that amid the financial constraints among mainstream Filipino consumers, beauty and wellness still part of one’s daily budget.

“Socially active people who want to be physically attractive and presentable are always willing to spend a portion of their hard-earned money for reliable beauty products,” Henares said.

Henares said the company is continuously putting on significant investments on its Research and Development (R&D) and market intelligence efforts to provide the demand of the mainstream market in the Philippines, in terms of promoting beauty and wellness.

ISCI, a subsidiary of Belo Medical Group, has only been in the market for over three years. It is continually formulating programs to intensify branding patronage especially in the whitening lines, including face cream, toner, including the beauty and dietary supplements.

ISCI introduced its initial line of beauty products in second quarter of 2007. It easily achieved 48 percent growth a year after, reaping close a billion pesos sales performance.

Well known cosmetic dermatologist Vicki Belo decided to launch the lines of whitening products because in her 17 years of clinical experience, skin whitening has always been the most requested procedure. (FREEMAN)