The brand produces a range of crocodile oil-based beauty products developed by co-founder and director Josephine Robson.
Since its launch in 2018, the brand has been making strides in its home market and expanded into Asia and the travel retail channel.
However, since the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (COVID-19), the brand has lost a steady stream of income from its brick-and-mortar as well as duty-free channels.
“We were available in 25 duty-free stores and that was all lost. A lot of our monetary intake was from there… With Priceline, we are available online, but a lot of stores were shut, especially in Melbourne where we are in lockdown,” said Robson.
To replace the loss of that revenue, the company expanded into Hong Kong a month ago through La Puro, a local aesthetic clinic chain.
“The success that we are having has been unbelievable. We’ve been getting great feedback that our products are effective as an aftercare product for laser treatments and can help with skin conditions like eczema and psoriasis,” said Robson.
In addition to its new venture in Hong Kong, the company is also in talks to enter the Philippines positioned as a derma beauty brand for skin conditions.
In the meantime, the company intends to continue pursuing expansion into the Asian markets, including Macao, China, Thailand, Korea and Japan.
“Crocodile oil has been used for centuries and has a reputation, particularly among the Chinese. Overall, the brand is just an easier sell in Asia with animal products and Asians respond very well to our efforts in sustainability and conservation.”
A sensitive skin focus
Robson told CosmeticsDesign-Asia that the latest developments have driven the company to seriously rethink the brand’s positioning in the market.
She continued: “I feel that we were misguided in the beginning. The market we always wanted to be in was the medical beauty market because we know we have something that is really remarkable in the actual make-up for the crocodile oil.”
According to Robson, crocodile oil consists of large amounts of oleic acid and linoleic acid.
Furthermore, it contains naturally occurring anti-microbial peptides that allow wild crocodiles to heal their skin quickly even in unsanitary environments.
“This makes it incredible for wound-healing, which is why we’ve been getting such good feedback from people have skin conditions like eczema,” she said.
For the next 12-months, the company intends to focus on fine-tuning its branding and positioning in the market.
“The market is telling us exactly what we knew in the beginning. We should have always from the beginning marketed it as a sensitive skin care brand with a focus on its ability to help with medical skin conditions like eczema or psoriasis,” said Robson.
In addition to this, Robson reveals that the company is working on developing a crocodile oil supplement.
“The makeup of the oil is very similar to fish oil, even better than fish oil actually with all the omegas it has. We are looking to develop a soft gel capsule, that’s our major goal this year.”
In conjunction with this development, the company is aiming to find scientific partners to study the oil in detail to complement the anecdotal evidence it has observed.
Robson said the company was open to strategic investors that can help the brand to achieve its goals.