The new facility is located in Parkhaven, Boksburg, in South Africa, and joins its list of other laboratories offering formulation and efficacy support in the UK, USA, France, Singapore and Mexico.
Speaking of the decision to locate the hub in South Africa, the chemical supplier says it was ‘an obvious candidate to invest further in’, as anticipated rising disposable incomes and the demand for more sophisticated and solution-oriented products are expected to support continued growth.
Meeting demands
Roy Gardiner, The treasurer of COSCHEM speaking at the opening said: “Marketing demands are intense when it comes to product claims, which is why scientific substantiation is key.”
“Beauty products are expected to prove their efficacy beyond label claims requiring statistical valid data from technical teams like Croda,” he added, saying that it will have a beneficial impact on the Personal Care industry in Africa.
The technical team at the new Centre of Excellence will be supporting product claims for both the skin and hair care markets, and this will involve local consumers in panel testing so that the data generated is highly relevant and valuable to local customers and brands.
Tech specs
The Efficacy Laboratory in the facility consists of a Hair Salon, designed to test hair product efficacy on global hair types but will focus predominantly on black ethnic hair, and a temperature controlled skin and hair testing laboratory.
Croda says the team will look to support the hair care formulator to select ingredients that can meet challenging briefs from mild relaxer solutions to scalp wellness deep treatments.
For skin care, testing protocols will be conducted using state of the art equipment to generate consumer-appealing claims such as moisturisation, oil control, skin barrier function repair, shine reduction, radiance, elasticity, skin lightening and firming.
To visualise the benefits to customers, the Centre of Excellence is equipped with skin imaging software that is used to evaluate the condition of the skin.