BOF: The Business of Beauty Haul of Fame: Skincare’s Secret Weapon
Article featured in The Business of Fashion:
By FARAN KRENTCIL
Meet the tiny lab in Florida making the viral formulas you’ve been craving for the last four years — and those you’ll be craving tomorrow.
Included in today’s issue: Atmos, Beverly Nguyen, Dior, Divi, Dr. Few Skincare, ESW Beauty,
Face Foundrié, Florence by Mills, Harry Potter, Lele Sedoughi, Literie, Mooncat, Naturium,
Nars, Nudestix, Paume, Peter Thomas Roth, RéVive, SheGlam, Sofie Pavitt Face, Will
Smith, Ulta Beauty, and Young Jedi beauty influencer
But first…
There’s a tiny lab in Orlando, Florida that’s making most of the Extremely Online skincare you see
via TikTok and Instagram Reels. It’s called KKT and it creates ingredients for Rhode Skin,
Tower28, Goop and the vastly underrated JLo Beauty.(Beso Balm lip jars = magic.)
KKT was founded in 2020 by Dr. Krupa Koestline, a millennial cosmetic chemist and biomedical
engineer who, in her own words, thinks most skincare is “bullshit.” Koestline knows this from
experience: She “accidentally” supercharged the Clean Beauty movement of the early 2010s when
she took charge of the natural skincare brands Nutraceuticals and Aubrey Organics, which made
the kind of hippie-happy products that Montecito aunties kept on their vanities next to their Mario
Bodescu rose water spray. You get the vibe.
Koestline has also worked in research and development for Neutrogena, Estée Lauder, and the sex
care brand Bloomi. In 2020, she turned hertime in the “clean beauty”trenches into a seven-figu
business that launched a week before Covid was declared a national emergency. What first seem
like a curse became a boon.“Suddenly, everyone was staying home looking for new, ‘healthy’
skincare routines,” Koestline said.“It gave us a feeling of control.”
Krupa Koestline, cosmetic chemist and founder at KKT Innovation Labs. ( Photo Credit: ALISON WINTERROTH)
There are over 4,000 beauty manufacturing hubs in the United States, according to IBISWorld.
What sets KKT apart, says Koestline, is the ability to develop products faster and more efficien
than giant conglomerates — “when it comes to innovation, bigger brands can become immovable”
— along with something she noticed while working forthe largest cosmetics companies in the
world: When formulas were developed with storytelling in mind, they sold better.
“If you want to be a good formulator, you have to understand market trends and how the stories are
happening on social media and in magazines and newspapers,” she explained.“Everyone wants to
talk about ‘AI beauty’right now. So in ourlab, we use AI to isolate the peptides that work best for a
given result, whetherit’s fullerlips or a brighter complexion.”(Koestline is not able to discuss
specific formulations, but surely we know the sold-out lip peptide line and Hollywood pepti
serum that might be part of this origin story.)
Robot peptides may have been a stealth trend of 2024, but for next year, Koestline sees “organic
technology” as the new “clean beauty,” explaining how labs will harness the chemicalreactions that
occur daily in nature and amplify them for more intense results.“Fermented ingredients are a great
example,” she said,“because that’s basically just biotechnology. Fermentation happens in nature
through microorganisms like yeast, bacteria, fungus… If you modify the genetic sequences of that
bacteria orfungus, can you guess what happens?”
I guess a zombie apocalypse. She laughs at me.
“No, what happens is precision fermentation. We make better active ingredients for your skin with
less energy. You can do it with hyaluronic acid, too, or even growth factors.”“Growth factors” are
the compounds in skin that help itrebound from damage and volume loss; controlling and
harvesting them for human use is a Holy Grail situation. Koestline says biochemists are now
creating these growth factors inside oleosomes, which are protective capsules inside plant cells.
This is, essentially, a “Star Wars” plot that hasn’t happened yet, along with a literal definition
“plant-based” beauty. Koestline.“The formula and its story are aligned to deliver a standout
product.” And as “clean beauty” becomes a suspicious label for savvy customers — the “sustainable
cotton” of skincare — Koestline knows the credibility of cutting-edge science can help trusted
brand names like Goop retain both their credibility and their“nature heals all” philosophies.
One more thing to watch in 2025, according to Koestline: Niche hair care.“There are [new] studies
out that people who have had exposure to Covid are suffering from more hairloss than they’ve h
before. Anyone who has experienced a loss of smell during their Covid infection is also at a higher
risk for hairloss now. It’s a thing.” Shampoos, conditioners, and scalp serums that claim to boost
growth continue to be high on her watch list for viral potential.“You could also make an entire
menopause hair line,” she said.“It would do great.”
