Working with cosmetics laboratories is the biggest game changer for small at-home beauty brands. 

But when you are accustomed to formulating from your kitchen, and the costs of working with a lab are higher, how do you know if the step up to professional products is worth the risks? 

Genie Supply is here to help. 

Our in-depth guide below outlines the four biggest impacts on your business of working with cosmetics laboratories. Plus, we discuss why you don’t need to forego many of the benefits of formulating at home when you move to a lab! 

Work With A Lab While Retaining The Benefits Of Formulating At Home 

As a supplier for small home-to-lab beauty brands, we understand why manufacturing cosmetics at home is so appealing at the early stages of business. 

It’s not just about cost savings! 

First off, how often have you heard a cosmetic brand story that goes something like this?:

Many successful beauty brand owners began as hobbyists who simply wanted to test out a DIY lipstick or skin care recipe, and this creates a compelling brand story that resonates with their target audience.

Not only does it convey authenticity, but it also helps humanize the person behind the business – in stark contrast with the big box brands’ nameless and faceless owners.  

While formulating at home is a risky and potentially dangerous process (more on that later), there’s no denying that it helps brand owners learn key information about common cosmetic ingredients and the formulation process.

This knowledge becomes a valuable asset when it’s time to develop products with laboratories or market your cosmetics range. Plus, thanks to online beauty business communities, there is tons of great information available on how to get started at home on a budget. 

If you are the type of person who learns by doing, trying your hand at some DIY cosmetics is worthwhile as a beauty brand owner. 

But here’s the caveat to all that praise - choosing to work with a lab doesn't mean you need to give up any of the benefits listed above! 

Why not formulate from home and decide to never sell your handmade products to customers? 

Researching and testing the manufacturing process firsthand provides valuable insights as a brand owner, and helps develop your brand story, but without any of the downsides of selling products made directly from your kitchen to customers. 

Or if you’re the type of brand owner who is all about business and less interested in the product creation side, let your manufacturer do all the heavy lifting for you! 

Working with a professional cosmetic laboratory is about delivering high-quality, innovative, safe, and effective formulas to your customers - not about sacrificing your learning stages as a brand owner or doing away with a compelling origin story.   

Need guidance on developing your brand? At Genie Supply, our new Build Your Own Brand course provides guidance on cosmetics business development from start to finish - even for complete beginners! Learn more about our BYOB course here. 

1. Hiring Cosmetics Laboratories Results In Safer Formulas 

Partnering with a professional cosmetics laboratory is not merely about freeing up time to focus on marketing your business, it’s about delivering a higher quality - and critically - safer product to market.

The reality is cosmetic formulation is a scientific process that requires some advanced scientific knowledge to anticipate and correct all of the potential safety risks involved in creating the products. 

Imagine this: you create (what appears to be) a winning formula. After testing it yourself, and allowing friends and family to test over a month or so, you bring it to market. 

Everything is going great, until suddenly, around the 6-month mark of selling, your business is overwhelmed with complaints of your formula going bad well before the use-by date. 

This is the case for too many small at-home brands that do not take the necessary steps to manage the risk of microbiological contamination at the formulation stage.

It’s not just about the product becoming unusable – these contaminants can present serious health risks that have real legal consequences for you personally and your business. 

As noted in a 2023 academic review, researchers have discovered harmful bacteria growing in cosmetics, such as Streptococcus and E. coli, along with fungi like Penicillium and Candida.

We can’t emphasize enough how dangerous a poorly formulated cosmetic can be for your customers’ health — especially if the proper steps to avoid contamination were not followed during the formulation process. Learn more about the potential dangers of formulating from home in our full blog post here. 

Partnering with a lab helps ease anxiety about putting your customer’s health on the line and experiencing a reputation-ruining product contamination scandal. 

At Genie Supply, we believe safety protocols and proper safety and batch testing are the bare minimum for delivering quality products to market. Learn more about our extensive testing processes here.  

2. Professional Manufacturers Deliver More Innovative Formulas 

Safety is the most important motivation for moving from home-to-lab, but working with cosmetics laboratories isn’t just about safer formulas, it’s also about releasing significantly better products to your customers. 

Have a crazy idea for a hybrid product or something completely unique that the market has never seen before? 

If you’re a small brand owner formulating from home, the chances of pulling off a high-quality, 100% original formula all on your own are slim. 

But a team of professional cosmetic chemists who work on new research and development projects every day? 

Not only can they provide expert insight into the feasibility of your formulation ideas, but they can also develop completely new formula concepts that are 100% tailored to your brand — and bring them to life.  

At Genie Supply, we’re experts at formulating new-to-market concepts and product formats, novel chemical research, hybrid products, and clean beauty. Learn more about our custom formulating capabilities here.

Prefer preformulated products? Check out our full range of manufacturing methods and find the right one for you here. 

3. Cosmetics Laboratories Provide Assistance With Regulation Compliance 

The US is generally considered more lax with regulations compared to other territories, however this is rapidly changing.

The recent Modernization of Cosmetics Regulation Act (MoCRA) provides a vision for the future where the US government takes every measure possible to ensure only safe products hit the shelves. Learn more about the impact of MoCRA on your small business in our full blog post here. 

While it’s your responsibility as a brand owner to ensure your products meet all legal standards, quality cosmetics laboratories will support you through the compliance process.

Good cosmetic suppliers will engage in extensive formula testing and conduct batch testing on every new product batch to ensure it’s legally compliant and performs consistently for your customers. 

Batch consistency is one of the hardest parts of scaling a beauty business from home – thorough batch testing by a professional laboratory will help put your mind at ease.

At Genie Supply, we offer extensive consulting services to give you peace of mind and help make the correct legal decisions for your brand. Learn more about our consulting services here. 

4. Scaling Is Much Easier When You Collaborate With A Lab

Having your brand take off overnight may seem like the best-case scenario for your business, but if you formulate from home, it could unfortunately be the worst.

It’s much harder to capitalize on a viral moment and keep the momentum going if you hand-make your products and have no real experience of scaling up production. 

Rushing to try to fulfill that new higher demand by yourself will only lead to mistakes, inevitable delays, and disgruntled customers - resulting in permanent damage to your reputation. 

On the other hand, professional labs have the capability to scale up production much faster. 

Although it won't happen overnight, professional cosmetics laboratories can give you a realistic timeline for creating extra stock, allowing you to offer pre-orders with a guaranteed delivery date - along with the comfort of safely manufactured products that are 100% consistent at scale.  

In sum, the four biggest benefits of working with cosmetics laboratories are as follows: 

• Hiring cosmetics laboratories results in safer formulas 

• Professional manufacturers deliver more innovative products 

• Cosmetics laboratories provide assistance with regulation compliance 

• Scaling is much easier when you collaborate with a lab

Looking for the best cosmetics laboratories for your small beauty business? Genie Supply would love to collaborate with your brand! Get in touch to learn more by emailing: customerservice@geniesupply.com or calling: (812) 329-1105.