Lab To Lotion

The quest for the 'real' stuff is leading to a rise of the Indian pharmacy market, but experts have their concerns

- KONIKA DATTA

The Internet-era capitalism has catapulted skincare into the billion-dollar industry it is today. Aesthetic packaging, exquisite ingredients like snail mucin, and even the social message behind a brand-all are marketing tools that lead to more consumption than necessary. So when Korean beauty and French pharmacy brands made their place on the skincare shelves of India's beauty junkies, it wasn't unexpected. What came as a surprise, though, is how the sleepy sector of Indian pharmacy skincare woke up, and started to creep up the ladder too.

The crux of Indian pharmacy's appeal is its ability to provide potent, highly effective formulas at a much cheaper rate, which your mainstream beauty brands could never - and many of these pharma moisturisers, creams, and lotions are now being presented on the Internet as something that can rival luxurious products. How is this once-quiet market grabbing the attention of the beauty and skincare audience?

SETTING PRIORITIES STRAIGHT

With mainstream skincare brands, their formulations feature a minimum concentration of active ingredients that can suit most skin types. However, these products sell at a higher rate because of their investment in packaging and marketing campaigns. In the case of pharmacy skincare, however, priorities are different. "These products are generally prescribed by dermatologists since they have higher concentrations of ingredients in a purer form. Hence, they must be FDA approved for skin safety," elaborates Dr. Madhuri Agarwal, dermatologist and founder of Yavana Aesthetic clinic, Mumbai.