‘Drive their own trends’: Native Extracts outlines ambitions to establish Indian hub to develop ‘I-beauty’ ingredients

Recently, the Australian outfit partnered with India-based ingredient distributor, United Descaler, to bring its range of Australian botanical cellular extracts to the local market.

This was a part of the natural progression as the firm “executes our growth strategy and broadens our global footprint”,​ said Native Extracts CEO Lisa Carroll.

Carroll told CosmeticsDesign-Asia ​that the firm was keen to tap into India’s long cultural history of relying on botanical solutions, particularly, traditional Ayurvedic medicine.

Carroll revealed that the firm is set to launch a range of India-inspired plant extracts and oil infusions for “India’s brands to drive their own trends based on their botanicals.”​

“It is our goal to provide India with a new look at what can be harnessed from some of their popular traditional plant extracts – giving India’s brands the opportunity to refresh existing formulation to meet the NPD (new product developments) that showcases new plant extract innovations.”​

The firm’s grand ambition is to cultivate a base in India, where it can work with the local industry and help develop new products inspired by the region.

"We are working with distributors to build an India Collection that we can establish relationships directly with growers, and later build a Native Extracts hub in India. One of our goals is to create a True to Nature India Collection that reflects what India’s brands are looking for in a tool kit to showcase what is unique about their region and supplied by their region – this will also provide opportunities for our global brands to learn new species and profiles from the region to incorporate into their stories,"​ said Carroll.

She highlighted that this was similar to the Indigenous Entrepreneurship and STEM pathways programmes it has helped to develop for South Australia’s Riverland’s region.

“We are in discussions with one of our partners with an Indian heritage and philanthropic enterprise, to help us explore networks and how we can work with remote women-owned growing groups as potential supply chain relationships that could support better regional socio-economic outcomes. It also means we can contract extract for these regional areas if they want to diversify beyond their crops.”​

Aside from advancing native botanicals, the company also aims to tap into the rising demand for Australian products in India.

"India has a huge appetite for advanced natural ingredients and emerging technologies and processes that offer transparency, and traceability to source, strong eco-conscious manufacturing practices and new botanical sources.”​

According to Carroll, the firm has experienced an accelerated demand for its products from India in the past 18 months.

“​We tick all the boxes for the region which is moving away from synthetic standardised and purified plant extracts and looking for new natural tools that deliver a species’ natural compounds in their entourage,” ​said Carroll.

At present, the company will be focusing on promoting its cosmetics portfolio, before pushing its nutraceutical offerings.