Beauty on the Blockchain makes sense for 3 reasons.

Collaborations are crucial in the beauty and fashion industries. The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, for instance, has teamed up with numerous iconic beauty brands over the years, including the creation of a custom-designed Estée Lauder eyeshadow palette for the museum’s 150th birthday.

Collaborations in any industry help push boundaries, inspiring customers to try out new ideas and forms of self-expression. It’s no surprise that skincare and makeup brands are joining Web3 with the same aspirational energy that the beauty industry has always had.

Leading beauty companies hope to connect with Web3-native consumers, create meaningful experiences, and potentially improve their supply chain through the use of new digital artistry and cutting-edge technological innovation.

It helps brands expand to new audiences

Yann Joffredo, Global Brand President at NYX Professional Makeup, stated that the L’Oréal-owned cosmetics brand has always advocated for inclusivity through its partnerships with independent content creators, bloggers, and makeup artists. Joffredo views Web3 as the next step in this mission, with the added advantage of reaching new audiences.

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“As the brand continues to evolve, it is important to advocate for this same representation in Web3,” said Joffredo. “Additionally, we understood the untapped territory within beauty in the metaverse.”

In early 2023, NYX launched GORJS, the world’s first beauty-focused decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) to highlight creators building beauty experiences within the Web3 ecosystem.

“GORJS integrates Web3 artists and beauty enthusiasts to lead the cultural conversation around what digital makeup artistry will be in the metaverse and beyond,” Joffredo said.

It fosters meaningful opportunities for self-expression

Joffredo also stated that transparency and self-expression in the metaverse is a natural extension of NYX Professional Makeup’s brand values. Digital spaces provide beauty enthusiasts with unique ways to express themselves and interact with products.

Moreover, digital spaces can offer physical safety in a politically polarized physical world. Last year, NYX collaborated with inclusive avatar company People Of Crypto (POC) and The Sandbox, a user-generated virtual environment, to launch a week-long Pride Month celebration. The event featured gender non-conforming NFT avatars wearing makeup styled in a pixelated, or “voxelized,” fashion with colors representing the Progress Pride flag.

Maya Kosovalic, NYX vice president of digital innovation and e-commerce, spoke at a recent panel at the extended reality (XR) industry conference, AWE Live, about how the Pride event foreshadowed a more immersive digital future: “Self-expression is really the core tenant of future gaming platform experiences, which are no longer singular, solitary game loops but very immersive, engaging social experiences where younger generations can engage with their in-real-life friends.”

Celebrating one’s personality and identity through skins and digital goods, she added, is what makes Web3 so compelling for both beauty and fashion brands.

Agustina Sartori, senior innovation director at the American beauty store chain Ulta Beauty, was also on the panel. “Beauty is a way to be yourself and be who you want to be,” she said. “Why wouldn’t we care about the same thing in the digital world?”

According to Sartori, Ulta Beauty has been experimenting with digital activations on Roblox since 2022. Roblox is a popular user-generated gaming platform that does not utilize blockchain or cryptocurrency but nonetheless appeals to major brands interested in building virtual worlds for customers. Ulta’s virtual Roblox world is called the “Ultaverse.” In May, Ulta Beauty partnered with the cruelty-free eyeshadow brand Urban Decay to throw a virtual party inside the Ultaverse. Makeup influencers Emmy Combs, Leilani Green, and Manny MUA hosted the event, which attracted some 500,000 visitors to the platform, said Sartori.

Ulta Beauty was also one of the first beauty brands to announce its participation in the upcoming Metaverse Beauty Week, which will take place from June 12 to 16 in three different metaverse environments (Decentraland, Roblox, and Spatial). Interested participants can learn how to set up the necessary crypto wallets and create their first avatar by reading instructions on the event website.

It could solve trust issues

Blockchain technology offers potential solutions for one of the most consistent challenges faced by the beauty industry: greenwashing. Clean beauty brands have been under increased scrutiny in recent years due to market pressure to be cruelty-free, eco-friendly, and natural.

Consumers find it extremely difficult to track the sources of their favorite brands’ ingredients. However, blockchain technology has introduced many supply chain-related use cases, although most of them are still new. Clarins, a French luxury skincare company, has created a blockchain-based platform that enables customers to trace their products’ manufacturing journeys on the chain. By scanning a QR code on each package, people can trace the origins of ingredients and learn about how the product was made and even packaged.

Blockchain can also help to boost trust issues by eliminating counterfeit products, which is becoming an increasing problem in the world of “superfakes.” Luxury fashion giant LMVH launched a blockchain to help prove the authenticity of Louis Vuitton bags and Parfums Christian Dior.

Aside from supply chains, other blockchain experiments in the beauty industry include experimental bitcoin “cash-back” programs that incentivize consumers by rewarding them with satoshis for each purchase.

Blockchain-based beauty is exciting, but still experimental

As with all aspects of Web3, the beauty industry is still experimenting with how to most seamlessly use new technology to create a lasting impact among its existing and emerging customer base.

“This is a process and it will take time,” said Leya Kaufman, head of brand, publisher, and senior vice president of sales at media company Coveteur. “We will need to cultivate and engage audiences in this new arena while simultaneously maintaining our core consumer base,” she said.

Coveteur partnered with hair care company Wella Professionals and leading Web3 infrastructure provider MoonPay to launch The Wella Generator, a gamified digital sweepstakes hosted on the Ethereum blockchain.

“It was important for us to create a program that was seamless for existing and new Web3 users,” Kaufman said, adding that the partnership with MoonPay made this vision possible.

Despite the growing pains, as digital identity becomes an increasingly important factor in our lives and personalities, it makes sense that people want to feel good about how they look and shop, both on-chain and off, and it looks like blockchain is very on-trend for beauty brands in the future.

See Also: How Crypto Influencers Are Following the Beauty Playbook

Edited by Toby Leah Bochan.

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