Choosing the right wholesale ingredients for your cosmetics brand is essential to build a successful business. 

Whether you’re formulating your cosmetics at home, or partnering with a lab, we understand that selecting your wholesale ingredients can be an overwhelming process.

That’s why we’ve put together this guide breaking down the six essential steps to finding the perfect wholesale cosmetics ingredients for your brand! 

Plus -  we also reveal an essential prep step that can make or break your wholesale cosmetics ingredients selection process. 

Essential Prep Step: Developing Your Business Strategy 

First, it’s a good idea to familiarize yourself with quality wholesale ingredients suppliers and the specific products they sell. We recommend looking through the TKB Trading, Making Cosmetics, and Lotion Crafter websites.

But before you place any orders, it’s important to develop a clear business strategy for the future. Planning in advance is essential as the types of cosmetics you will sell determines the ingredients that you will need.

• Creating a new anti-aging skin serum? Retinoid ingredients will be key for your formulas.

• Developing new cleansers for teenagers with acne? Willow bark extract should feature heavily in your range. (Read more about some of the benefits of willow bark extract here). 

Don’t go into the product selection process blindly. Your cosmetics should match your target market’s wants and needs to a tee and achieving this requires thorough market research. 

Industry reports provide insight into the current state of the cosmetics market while subreddits are a great way to familiarize yourself with your target demographic’s skincare and makeup struggles. Try r/makeupaddiction, r/skincareover30, r/45plusskincare, or r/acne to learn more about your niche. 

Understanding your target market’s dealbreakers is essential for the ingredient selection process:

• Do they avoid non-vegan cosmetics at all costs? 

• Are clean formulas essential for this group? 

Ultimately, you need to identify and study your audience and plan a product range specifically for that market before you move on to the wholesale ingredients stage. 

At Genie Supply, we carefully select our wholesale ingredients with your customers’ skincare goals and ethical values in mind. Learn more about our clean and high quality ingredients here.  

Identify The Right Wholesale Ingredients For Your Cosmetics Brand 

1. Study The Most Common Wholesale Ingredients In Your Niche 

Once you are clear on your target market and have a blueprint in place for your product range, it’s time to learn more about cosmetic ingredients. Youtube, Google Scholar, and cosmetics books are great resources to study the formulating process.

It’s easy to get overwhelmed by too much information at this stage - narrow down your list of resources to the most relevant ingredients for your brand’s specific products. 

If your range targets dry skin types, focus on the latest developments in skin care ingredients for dry skin. Don’t be discouraged if you find this process too much to handle on your own. Consider partnering with a professional lab instead!

Qualified chemists are experts at formulating and testing safe and effective skincare. Beauty manufacturers can help identify the best ingredients for your brand’s strategy and create products based on those ingredients that appeal directly to your target market. 

At Genie Supply, we’re specialists in formulating high quality skincare and color cosmetics for small home-to-lab brands like yours! Learn more about our bulk,  private label, custom product creation, custom formulating, and contract manufacturing services here. 

2. Understanding Ingredient Safety And Testing

Whether you formulate on your own or partner up with a professional manufacturer - safety always comes first. Absolutely everything customers put on their skin must be 100% safe and tested.

A safe formula starts with the ingredient selection process. This involves complying with the FDA’s rules but also understanding that ingredient regulations differ across the globe. As noted by EWG.org, certain colorants used in hair dyes and cosmetic ingredients like cyclotetrasiloxane, 2-(4-tert-butylbenzyl)propionaldehyde (lilial), and sodium borate are still used in the US but banned across the EU.

This mismatch in regulations could cause some potential issues if you plan to sell in the EU later down the line. Evaluate the regulations and rules for each wholesale ingredient closely and check if there are any restrictions on its use across the globe. 

At Genie Supply, we understand that adhering to all of the safety standards and FDA guidelines is daunting for small at-home formulators. Learn more about why it’s important to level up and work with a professional manufacturer here.

Identifying the right wholesale cosmetic ingredients also requires foresight for the testing stage. Be aware of the testing requirements for each ingredient. For example, if you choose to include water in your formula, your products will require Preservative Efficacy Testing (PET). Learn more about Genie Supply’s testing processes here.

3. Prioritizing Effectiveness: Vivid Color Pay-Off And Real Skin Care Results 

The goal is to formulate the absolute best cosmetics imaginable.

Every beauty business owner dreams of building a successful brand raking in millions in sales each year. Success on this level requires a loyal fan base to repurchase your products over and over. The only way to achieve this is to develop skincare and makeup that actually makes a noticeable difference on the skin. 

As such, efficacy should be one of the main criteria when choosing between potential wholesale cosmetics ingredients.

How can you tell if an ingredient is effective or not?

Evaluating the latest cosmetics research is the best way to objectively identify the best ingredients for your brand. Google Scholar is a great resource to access the latest research on the effectiveness of various cosmetic ingredients.

For example, a 2021 academic paper provides a review of the latest research into topical retinoids. 

4. Understanding Ingredient (In)Compatibility

While effectiveness is key, it’s not the case that you can take all of the best ingredients for treating a particular skin issue and just mix them all into one super effective concoction. Formulating cosmetics is a science - and not all chemicals mix well together.  

All ingredients in your formula need to be compatible. 

Vitamin C and retinoids are gold standard ingredients for anti-aging. However, a medically reviewed article in Byrdie notes that vitamin C and retinol can cause skin irritation when used together. Additionally, the article notes that mixing AHAs and retinoids irritates the skin and even results in ingredient deactivation - defeating the entire purpose of a skincare routine.  

It’s not just about understanding ingredient incompatibility, you also need to consider which wholesale ingredients truly combine the best together to make the most effective cosmetics possible.

For example, a 2013 study found products formulated with silicone oil, glycerin, and hyaluronic acid are more effective than single ingredient alternatives at hydrating the skin.

Avoid incompatibility headaches and create products with winning ingredient combinations by working with a beauty manufacturer. Learn more about our custom formulating service here. 

5. Evaluate The Quality Of Each Supplier’s Wholesale Cosmetic Ingredients 

Once all of the ingredients on your shortlist have passed the safety, efficacy, and compatibility test, it’s time to turn your attention to quality.

Before you place an order, always evaluate any customer reviews on a supplier’s website. Order plenty of samples and take the time to thoroughly test each lab’s private label products to assess the quality of their ingredients. 

At Genie Supply we use quality ingredients across all of our budget-friendly and luxury private label/bulk product ranges. Learn more in our latest product catalog. Quality clean formulas are also a key priority across our customized manufacturing services.

6. Formulate Cosmetics Using High Quality Wholesale Ingredients

Following the sample testing stage, it’s time to take the biggest step and select your favorite ingredients to make your new cosmetics formulas.

Formulating from home is common at the initial stages of your business. However this should be temporary. Once you have perfected your formulations, it’s time to level up and work with a professional beauty lab.

When you’re ready to take that leap, Genie Supply is here to help! We will walk you through the steps of moving from home to the lab - including professional testing, the costs, and necessary paperwork. Learn more about moving from home manufacturing to the lab here.

In sum, the key steps to identify the right wholesale ingredients for your cosmetics brand include: 

• Learning About The Most Common Wholesale Ingredients In Your Niche 

• Understanding Ingredient Safety And Testing

• Prioritizing Effectiveness: Vivid Color Pay-Off And Real Skin Care Results 

• Understanding Ingredient (In)Compatibility

• Evaluating The Quality Of Each Supplier’s Wholesale Cosmetic Ingredients 

• Formulate Cosmetics Using High Quality Wholesale Ingredients

Are you ready to partner with a lab that prioritizes quality and clean ingredients above all else? At Genie Supply we’d love to work with your brand! Get in touch via email: customerservice@geniesupply.com or call: (812)3291105.