A Halifax-based skincare company recently launched a number of products with Sephora in Canada and the U.S., opening its doors to more international business.
Amy Risley, CEO of Skinfix, said the new partnership with the skincare and makeup retailer is a huge step for her company.
“It’s huge. I think the team here is super excited. They’ve put in a lot of hard work to get us to this point,” said Risley.
“For us, it’s just kind of rewarding to be chosen to them. They’re very strict, they don’t choose a lot of brands, and they have very high standards, so we feel incredibly grateful and proud to be chosen.”
As part of the retailer’s Clean at Sephora brand, six of Skinfix’s collections are now available online at Sephora.com and Sephora.ca:
- Eczema+, which helps treat eczema flare-ups;
- Resurface+, which targets keratosis pilaris and rough, bumpy skin;
- Redness Recovery+, which treats redness and symptoms of rosacea-prone skin;
- Barrier+, which helps restore the skin’s vital lipids;
- Remedy+, which helps calm dry skin;
- Inked+, which protects tattoos as they heal.
And later this month, the company’s Eczema+ collection and its Inked+ Tattoo Aftercare Balm will be launching at Sephora’s 70 Canadian stores.
Risley said Skinfix prides itself on its ingredient list.
“We are a clean skincare brand, which means we avoid a very long list of ingredients that are toxic, or thought to be irritating, or known to be allergens by the dermatologist community,” she said.
“Skinfix has always been clean, and we’ve always been focused on skin concerns and solving them.”
She said the company has three dermatologists on its scientific advisory board, and it works with more than 2,000 across North America who either use Skinfix products in their clinics or have written or spoken about them before.
Risley said the company has repackaged and rebranded some of its products for its new partnership with Sephora.
“We have an opportunity to launch with a new retailer, so it’s great to have the chance to reset,” she said.
“We wanted to upgrade the communication on the packaging to talk about some of the higher-technology ingredients we use that we weren’t really taking credit for, and we renamed the collection so they’d be more identifiable so you can really find the product to suit your needs more easily and quickly.”
She said each collection is colour-coded and has clear information about which skin problems the products target.
“The Sephora brand team loved that as well, because for the staff and the beauty advisors in store, it would really help them direct their customers to the <QL>right solution for their needs,” said Risley.
The products are produced in third-party contract facilities, with most of them being made just outside of Toronto. Skinfix employs about 15 people in Halifax, four people across the U.S., and one in Ontario.
The company first caught Sephora’s eye as a frequently-featured product on QVN, an American shopping network. After Skinfix impressed members of Sephora’s merchant team during a speech at a beauty conference, the two companies decided to do business together.
“We have been a brand that has had a real cult following since the very beginning,” said Risley. “I think they had sort of seen us, and knew about us. We were certainly on their radar.”
Risley said there are no concrete plans to sell Skinfix products in brick-and-mortar Sephora stores in the U.S., but she there will be “bigger plans” in the fall that she can’t divulge now.
She added that she was excited to see the partnership potentially launch Skinfix into the global marketplace.
“The team here is extremely excited about this opportunity because Sephora, obviously, has an international scope well beyond North America,” she said, adding that the company has so far been “an amazing retail partner” to work with.
“To be able to access Sephora as a retailer gives you such a great platform to expand globally.”
