Earth Rhythm was borne out of a mother’s desperation to find products that would not irritate her child’s sensitive skin. The necessity of making homemade products eventually evolved into a fully-fledged business that is looking to pull around $13m in revenue by the end of this year.
Speaking to CosmeticDesign-Asia, founder and CEO Harini Sivakumar said that her favourite part of the job was taking on product development
“Product development came very naturally to me. Because if you look at how the brand came into existence, it all started from me exploring the products, the ingredients, what I could use for my son,” said Sivakumar.
To take up this role, the former banker and mother of two went back to school to understand the chemistry of personal care in detail.
“The entire journey for me to ship has been beautiful in terms of our embrace the product as part of my core competency, I took over the ownership of making the products in the company. So right from the product development, to the NPD, to the R&D process at Earth Rhythm, everything is handled by me,” said Sivakumar.
She believes that her close involvement in the product development process is one of the brand’s biggest strengths.
“This is an ingredient-driven company where we give more emphasis on ingredients, formulations, testing parameters, and that's the biggest boon that Earth Rhythm has – that I have complete control over the product development and R&D.”
Sivakumar added that this was especially important as they are many misconceptions regarding ingredients in personal care.
“When I started studying chemistry, I was shocked to know that there wasn't a single report available to claim whether parabens really cause cancer or not – not a single report. But that's how the environment is today.”
Today, the company does not make any free-from claims and works with its external influencers and product endorsers to ensure they do not promote the products using fear-based marketing.
“I'm not trying to prove a point that chemicals are better, but I'm just trying to educate the consumers to understand that it's ultimately the consumers choice that should drive them to use the right kind of product but not the fear of anything,” said Sivakumar.
To find out more about Harini, Earth Rhythm and the brand’s product development process, listen to the episode above or on Spotify, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher and more.
