Global demand pressing Singaporean beauty brand RE:ERTH to expand internationally

The Singaporean-based skin care brand follows Japanese philosophies and principles of skin care – one of which is meticulous Japanese craftsmanship.

“Building a brand and good effective products takes time. Before we launched, we were working on it for about two years, a short time in my eyes for product development,” ​said CEO Shinji Yamasaki, whose family is in the skin and health business in Japan.

The brand was launched in 2017 but research on its hero-ingredient, Japanese White Turmeric, has been ongoing for around 18 years in partnership with Kindai University.

“We have been researching this turmeric for a very long time. We've done a lot of research, we know what are our turmerics are and we were able to patent it. It also only grows on our farm in Japan, so you literally cannot get it anywhere else in the world,” ​said Yamasaki.

The brand started out extracting the essential oils from the leaves of the Japanese White Turmeric and has now incorporated the roots of the plant.

Yamasaki stressed that the company was continuing to research Japanese White Turmeric because it hadn’t discovered the full potential of the ingredient.

Aside from this “untapped treasure”,​ RE:ERTH products also utilise Lipodisq, a patented, dermal delivery system that has been validated by top universities including Oxford University, Stockholm University and the Max Plank Institute.

Yamasaki elaborated: “It allows us to deliver these turmeric extracts into the skin where it’s most useful. This tech nano-encapsulates lipids into very small particles. It has the ability to encapsulate 10 to 15 nanometres in size – from our research, the smallest carrier in the world that we know of. It’s the key to our 10-second absorption rate.”​

Worldwide demand

Since it launched in Singapore, RE:ERTH has seen very promising growth, with repeat purchase rates that are “multiple times better”​ than the industry average and consumer demand from all over the world.

“When we started, we wanted to take it a step further by making them more user-friendly for Singaporeans. Turns out, what started out as localisation for Singapore is appreciated globally. Today we have customers all the way in Norway and Finland. We are very proud of the fact our products work anywhere,” ​said Yamasaki.

The company is looking to expand into new markets such as Malaysia and the US, which is the company’s second-largest market despite having no marketing in the region.

“We advertise mainly in Singapore, a bit in Malaysia but not in the US and it’s already our second-largest market,” ​said Yamasaki.

The firm also sees a lot of opportunity in South East Asia. “SEA as a whole is definitely a growing market, a market that is going to be driving global growth in the next several years and many years to come most likely,” ​Yamasaki said.

Yamasaki believes the brand’s minimalist skin care concept and product efficacy is what endears consumers to it.

“Our products are interesting for them and effective. They work with the skin; we are not putting ingredients and components into the skin to supplement anything but are trying to invigorate the skin from within so that it becomes healthier on its own.”​

More products on the way

Yamasaki revealed that the company had several new products in the pipeline, but added was is not in a  rush to push them out.

“We will have new products coming out on a steady basis. We don't want to push out products too quickly. I feel a lot of companies are just pumping out new products, we don’t want to do that because we put a lot of research and backing into one product, so it’s not possible for us to come up with a new product every month.”​

RE:ERTH’s latest product was launched last April and its next will be launched “sometime next year”, ​said Yamasaki.

He declined to reveal specific details about the product but hinted: “It's a segment we believe is very big in Asia but we've taken a different approach to it. It works as a standalone product but works very well in conjunction with our main product line as well.”​