Today, Fusion Brands America, the owner of makeup brand Fusion Beauty and the Clean fragrance line, is rebranding as Clean Beauty Collective. It’s an attempt for the company to refocus its business around its strongest asset, the Clean fragrance division.
The clean beauty movement, which includes organic, natural and green, has become a mainstay in the beauty world. Legacy brands with any clean ties are increasingly trying to align themselves closer to the trend in order to stay relevant — such as Origins and Physicians Formula.
Fusion Brands America, formed in 2003, has experienced double-digit growth for the last five years and currently sees $75 million in retail sales globally, led by its Clean fragrances, which have been a part of the portfolio from the beginning. Fusion Brands America products are sold at Macy’s, Bloomingdale’s and Ulta, but the majority of its business comes from Sephora. That growth, coupled with its valuable ownership of the “Clean” name and cleanbeauty.com, positions the parent company with a ripe opportunity.
“We’ve seen clean beauty continue to grow and evolve, and we want to make sure we are getting credit for everything we have been doing for the past 15 years,” said Gregory Black, president of Clean Beauty Collective. The company has been steadily debuting new perfumes within the Clean brand, such as the launch of its luxury perfume, Clean Reserve in 2015.
Internally, Clean Beauty Collection has been repositioning for a while. It has slowly been discontinuing Fusion Beauty within the last 12 months by allowing products to run out. The company’s rebranding continues over the next several months in phases: First, there is the immediate migration of all current Fusion Brand social handles to Clean Beauty Collective as of Monday. Customer education around the rebrand through its social media platforms will follow suit over the next few months.
“We want to get people comfortable with the fragrance collection as a brand and our definition of clean beauty,” Black said.
Although the company has been in the clean beauty space since it began, now is the right time to rebrand due to market trends. Overall, the global natural and organic beauty market is expected to reach $21.8 billion by 2024, according to Statista.
To help with the repositioning, Clean Beauty Collective has also formed a new digital team of six people to focus on brand and digital marketing, product development and education training.
“Our digital platform will be our key voice and where consumers can go to check on ingredients and learn more,” Black said. “In today’s world with social and digital really being the arbiter and voice of a brand, we have to be authentic and true.”
To tell its story on social and digital, Clean Beauty Collective will re-launch its website in the first quarter of 2019 with an emphasis on it’s “no-no” ingredient list, which includes gluten and formaldehyde, as well as stories around the company’s corporate responsibility initiatives with the farmers in its supply chain. By focusing on ingredient transparency and corporate social responsibility, the company is magnifying the ethos that it markets — it hopes this will be attractive not only to customers but also in the recruitment of millennials internally.
Clean Beauty Collective also has big plans for brand and product expansion. It is actively looking at the home fragrances, bath and body, and hair-care categories, as well as exploring the skin-care, makeup and baby-products categories. The company also aims to expand its distribution of these new categories into other specialty and premium beauty retailers, outside of Sephora.
“In order to be a relevant brand in the prestige beauty world, you have to be authentic. Focusing strictly on our Clean franchise will provide a better return on investment,” said Black.
