QA Flashcards
How did you two meet? P
I was living in Mumbai and teaching at the American School. One summer holiday I decided it was time to overcome my fear of the ocean by signing up for a scuba diving course in Thailand - and Med was my instructor! Not only did I learn to dive, but I’m now a certified rescue diver, which I’m really proud of, and a really amazing husband and business partner.
How do you find it being a husband and wife team? P
We have really complimentary skill sets, which means for the most part, everything runs really well! There have been challenges…when we first met, we were used to having the income and freedom to travel. When launched Bloomtown we put all our time and energy into the business. But it’s started to pay off - in January we were able to take our first holiday in 2 years!
So, how did you get started doing this - do you have a background in beauty / formulating? P / M
Preya: No, but I come from a family business background, and business is in my blood. I was a teacher for 9 years in prestigious international schools. I’ve always been passionate about creating my own scent blends, and I started making natural soaps while living in Bali.I spent years experimenting and tweaking my formulations, giving them to family and colleagues and the feedback I got was, why doesn’t this exist? Please do this! They weren’t just being nice, they would fight over my products because they said they simply couldn’t have eco-friendly products that felt so good on their skin.
Med: So many people have said our soap was the only product that helped their eczema and psoriarias. That feedback and the passionate responses we got was what filled us with the confidence to launch Bloomtown.
Why Bloomtown - sounds like a florist! P
We wanted a name that was fun and memorable - and that evokes flowers and plants, which are the inspiration behind our products and scent range
Are you still selling on moonpig? Why haven’t they reordered? M
Moonpig ordered 950 sets and they are still selling.
Why not more?
More premium than other offerings…
What is your production capacity? P
In the last 12 months, we produced approx 20000 units a month, we feel we could now double it.
So who does what in the business? P
I take care of all the formulations, design, customer service and online operations, whereas Medwin does all on the on the ground work - packing orders, organising stock and managing our staff, we each have clearly different but complementary roles.
What about sustainable palm oil? P
We’re all for sustainable palm oil, but many experts believe that as long as demand for palm oil keeps increasing, there can be no truly sustainable palm oil and virgin forest will continue to be cleared, so we just want help lower overall demand by offering palm oil-free alternatives. We believe when the buying stops, the deforestation will stop. We want to offer consumers a clear choice..
How big is the market for these products? How many vegans are there in the UK? Too niche? P
The beauty global beauty market is worth 300 billion pounds
UK beauty market is worth 17 billion projected to grow by 20% in the next ten years
thank There are 3.5 million vegans in the UK alone, and it’s one of the fastest growing lifestyle movements, but we’ve also found that vegan and cruelty-free cosmetics appealj to a many people who simply care about the provenance of ingredients, which is often very difficult in cosmetics. Everyone wants to be more eco-friendly, everyone wants to shop more sustainably, we’re making it easier to do so. population much more aware of their social responsibility
So is all your packaging recyclable? M
Everything except the label, which is something we want to change - technically it is recyclable, but not every council accepts poly propylene at the moment. That’s one of the things we’d like to use your investment for - sourcing bio-degradable labels or printing directly onto the glass - then absolutely everything we use will be fully eco, down the starch based packing peanuts, biodegradable bubble wrap and paper tape that we use.
Are your products organic? P
Our washes use a certified organic liquid soap base, and we use organic ingredients such as organic avocado oil and cocoa butter in our lip balms… as we lower our production costs, we would like to continue to expand our organic range.
Why aren’t you 100% organic? P
When a product is made with multiple ingredients, even the best known organic skincare brands in the UK are not actually 100% organic, as it’s not possible to certify water or salt, for example. .
Last ditch:
LAST DITCH: Deborah, we know organic is important to you, it’s important to us too. We’ve seen small batch producers go organic from the get-go and price themselves out of the market - we didn’t want to do that. We were hoping you would see us as company who is trying to do the right thing and wants to expand our organic range - we continue to incorporate organic ingredients and so that still can have a range of organic products that aren’t prohibitively expensive.
What is your USP, how are you different? Does what you do already exist? P
Well, in addition to being certified cruelty-free and vegan, We are UK’s first and to date only certified palm oil-free company, with our entire range certified.
There are brands who are free from, and there are brands against animal testing, but we’re the only brand in the UK offering all those things in addition to being certified palm oil free. The other things that set us apart are our ethical credentials, award-winning formulations, unique scent range, avoidance of single-use plastics, and the fact that we donate 10% of our profits to charity, if selling in the UK, committed to selling in the UK
This is not affordable - this is expensive - it’s a luxury product M
There’s a growing market for personal grooming and self-care, and consumers understand that there’s no such thing as cheap products - they’re willing to pay a bit more for products that are skin-friendly and environmentally friendly.
The beauty market - it’s quite saturated - how do you plan to carve out a market share? M
Huge, growing market, 20% in the next 10 years, more and more people looking for eco and free from products, It’s true that the beauty market is crowded, but we are beginning to find a foothold within the fastest growing sector of that market, and competing with some of the well established eco-luxe brands.
We have 25,000 followers on social media and 500 five-star reviews.
