by Five years ago, every beauty brand wanted to take advantage of cannabis, now, not so much. What happened?
In 2018, after the Farm Bill, hemp was legalized, allowing brands to create products with CBD and they proved they did. At the time, a large number of brands and retailers came up with missions focused entirely on the ingredient. However, with brands now dissolving or pivoting, lazy retailers and confused customers, CBD has lost its luster, but experts say it could be reawakening.
More from WWD
In 2019, the CBD beauty craze really took off with a number of brands gaining traction including Saint Jane and Lord Jones, while existing brands such as Milk Makeup also used versions of the ingredient for its anti-inflammatory benefits. intended.
“CBD as an ingredient is one of the biggest because it attacks inflammation at its core, inside and out,” said Nicole Ostoya, beauty industry veteran and founder of the mushroom-infused skincare brand Neon Hippie. “Typically, inflammation in the skin makes it age faster, it makes it irritated, it creates rosacea, and CBD is one of the few ingredients that really gets rid of it. [it].”
Retailers were also bullish on the category at the time.
“A lot of the retailers were really interested in it, they wanted to get it on the shelves as soon as possible,” said Casey Georgeson, founder and chief executive officer of the now active floral skincare brand Saint Jane. “Sephora sent us and Lord Jones and Prima, and felt that CBD was the pretty girl at the dance.”
Additionally, there were retailers like Standard Dose (which seemed to quietly close last year) that were keeping variations around the ingredient alone.
The hype looked very promising, especially for the topical and irresistible CBD brand Lord Jones, which Cronos Group quickly snapped up for $300 million in 2020. Since then, the brand has dissolved its product line and it’s all going on THC with Canada-. looking for one for now. Experts say it was the bombardment of brands that hit the aisles and customer confusion that caused the category to lose steam.
“We started seeing CBD being used in gas stations and yoga and turkey gravy and things that didn’t make sense,” Georgeson said. “The education required for most consumers and clients was more than most brands could support… The market was saturated [and] the sales were not there to support the number of brands.”
Ostoya added: “When the Farm Bill happened, it was a million [products] and it was in the grocery store and the formulas were crap and you could buy it on Amazon. It was not standard, [such] that the rush to market was going to destroy the ingredient. People didn’t understand it. There was so much information [and] wrong information about it. People couldn’t get over that it won’t get you high.”
In addition to increased competition and consumer confusion, CBD products have been extremely difficult to sell. Each state had its own regulations, and large payment processing platforms could not process payments.
“Regulation is the hardest part” said Georgeson, adding that Saint Jane still has several CBD infusion stock holding units. Due to regulations that are still evolving today, there are some states where the brand has stopped selling its CBD products entirely.
With the COVID-19 pandemic and total confusion in the category, the wellness ingredient could not hold its own in 2020 and the landscape began to change rapidly, leaving brands with nothing or the need to with new strategies. For Saint Jane, who was bullish on CBD to begin with, a pivot was critical to survival.
“We made the deliberate decision to pivot from CBD to more of our active flowers,” Georgeson said.
This strategy has also helped the brand, as retailers are becoming reluctant to enter the category again. Some, like Goop, have rejected the ingredient altogether, sources said.
However, CBD has not completely disappeared. Some companies have succeeded, like Uncle Bud’s, which is available in more than 15,000 retail doors. At the same time, beauty brands are still reaping the benefits of it, even though they are not building their entire mission around it. For example, Dieux’s fan favorite Deliverance, $69, available at Sephora, employs a cannabinoid complex to soothe the skin. Experts suggest that in the future, as the stigma around the ingredient continues to worsen, more clinical data comes out and regulations change, brands will think about it as they would any other ingredient.
“Formulators are going to CBD when they want a great relaxing ingredient story for the product but you’re not going to see CBD brands,” Georgeson said, adding that more clinical evidence of the ingredient’s efficacy will help bring it back.
Additionally, industry sources said they have seen a high level of interest in the ingredient from the spa channel. For example, places like Chillhouse and Westin’s Heavenly Spa offer hemp and CBD experiences and supplements.
“They are a captive audience. The listener or service provider says, ‘Would you like a CBD supplement? It is extra relaxing. It’ll help with inflammation’ and they’re like, ‘Sure, okay,’” Georgeson said, noting that people are willing to pay top dollar for these service arrangements. “That’s where the renaissance of CBD could be.”
Additionally, there may be an opportunity for wellness, especially when CBD is combined with hemp-derived THC, which can be sold when the concentration is at or below .03 percent dry weight/volume. This movement has been represented by micro-inflammable formats, such as Cann’s THC-infused drinks or gummy packs of Sweedies Mood Ring snacks. Both brands employ low levels of THC and CBD to achieve a light buzz during a cultural moment where many people are looking for an alcohol replacement.
Additionally, brands like Sweedies, founded by industry veterans Olivia Sheehan and Rachel Richman, are opting for a beauty-focused strategy.
“Our product feels to me like a direct delivery on the promise of beauty,” said Sheehan. “It’s an obvious way you can wake up looking hotter. You can reduce alcohol consumption or completely replace alcohol consumption. You can improve your sleep. Those are obvious ways it can be part of the beauty routine.”
Although CBD certainly faces challenges, experts agree that the ingredient is powerful and still has potential across beauty and wellness, but in different forms: spas, singular products or THC-centric alcohol replacement brands. In addition, clinical evidence over anecdotal could help the category come back. “It’s definitely not over,” Georgeson said.
