Celebrate the Standard for Beauty: It’s Lipstick Day!

Lipstick—it’s the standard for glamour, for style, or simply for looking and feeling pulled together. It is like no other cosmetic for communicating the personal style of the wearer. The finer points of lipstick formulations are as individual as those who wear it, but some basics stay true, like the use of waxes for structure and coordinating emollients as well as safe color ingredients for use on the delicate skin of the lips. With a renewed attention this year to full-face makeup, the beauty of lovely lips has come back into focus.

This is a fantastic time to be formulating lipstick. There is a brilliant diversity of fashions right now. The high style look of deep, dark shades and matte texture is holding sway at the same time that glossy shades, made neutral to create a monochrome look, is inspiring consumers to get their smile on. Lipstick can both create and reflect a mood, and gives wearers the opportunity to change at a whim.

Your brand’s formulas can take your clientele to the edge of fashion and fun, from the sharp, power reds, to the season’s strong wines, out on the town in the neon colors that say day-to-night fun or bring subtlety to their palette with shades of nude, latté, and mauve. 2022 is a year for getting out and trying something new, and the vast range of colors that are on-trend really reflects this moment.

Beyond fashion, this year’s burgeoning trend for multi-beneficial lipstick formulations opens the door to show off products with even wider appeal. When creating a fabulous look you can also highlight your responsible sourcing, upcycled ingredients, efforts to support the environment and overall sustainability! Using ingredients that are natural, renewable and sourced responsibly lifts your product line from looking good to creating a good look for you and your customers.

Lipstick depends on the right waxes for the right performance. Koster Keunen understands waxes and the creative ways they can be used to formulate systems to achieve the results you really want. We offer you sample formulations here that show some of the possibilities.

Formula#: 2/19-10000/258/188-1

Emphasizing the combination of a subtle, monochrome palette, and socially aware formulas, this lipstick packs a real multi-benefit punch. An all-natural lipstick packs emollience and luxurious texture, keeping your lips smooth and hydrated, while meeting market demands for vegan and clean beauty products.

Formula #: 11/19-10030/484/258-2

Natural and sustainable ingredients again make a statement, but this time in a silky stick. One-swipe application shows off how well emollient-rich formulations perform with rich color.

Formula #: 2/19-864/10000/154-11

Fancy featuring a glossier formula? Our Metallic Liquid Lip combines the all-important coverage and shine with the comfortable wear that is much harder to achieve. Increasing product flexibility, this formulation also features a vegan option.

Formulating lipstick requires a base structure that will carry the color and texture that create the desired look. Creating the best combinations to meet your brand’s needs can be challenging. Koster Keunen has long experience formulating systems take advantage of the flexibility and benefits of various combinations. We offer the structuring waxes and carrier oils that get Phase A off to a great start, ready to take the color of choice, with the texture you are looking for. Our blog article, Creating the Perfect Lip Balm, offers some insight into putting these options together. Whether you are structuring a stick to give both strength and glide, or creating a gloss with staying power, the ingredients you choose can make this signature cosmetic shine.

As summer simmers toward fall, be sure that your lipstick lines shine. Koster Keunen knows formulation with waxes that make lipstick as we know it possible. If you are ready to meet the trend for cosmetics being more than beauty, we are ready to help. Contact us to discuss your ideas for sustainable beauty with our formulation experts.