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After finding that most cleansers on the market were stringent and would strip skin, Kao founder Tomiro Nagase decided to develop a formula that wasn’t so stringent on the skin and wasn’t soap-based. This decision led to the launch of Bioré and the first non-soap based facial cleanser in Japan 32 years ago. It was a lot more gentler and a lot more effective, and that’s how the brand was conceived and it’s just grown from there,” reveals Australian brand manager Dora Ngov.
With heavy investment into the company’s R&D department, the brand has gone on to tout successes such as inventing and launching the nose pore strip, the first facial skincare wipe and being a world leader in foam technology. Avoiding the trend for producing product gimmicks as the latest and greatest thing” that only stick around for a short time, Kao is all about developing high quality, relevant and viable products that stay around for a long time. We don’t just launch and leave. Our strategy is to develop high-grade formulations that are relevant, reliable and ultimately work time and time again,” explains Ngov. This dedication to innovation for the long term has seen the Bioré team this year launch the Skin Purifying Technology after three to four years in the making.
Past packaging of Bioré.
A new global look
While new technology is obviously major news for a brand, this year there’s similarly huge news for the brand in Australia with the launch of new packaging and a new logo being rolled out right now. After featuring green packaging since launching Down Under 15 years ago, 2012 sees the brand changing over to blue and white packaging. With their biggest market – being Asia – predominately having blue and white packaging, the brand wanted to create a consistent global look. Bioré is a global super brand so regardless of where you shopped for us, we would be instantly recognisable to our customers,” says Ngov. It’s hard to find other brands that look different in different markets.”
So how did it happen that Australia was originally green and Asia blue and white? When Bioré was first launched in the US, the company felt the blue and white was a little too clinical and medicinal for that market. At the time, more of a ‘green movement’ and increasing environmental awareness was going on. The green was seen as unique with a minimal number of brands using green packaging,” explains Ngov. When the brand was later rolled out to Australia and the UK, they followed the US model and remained green. Since then, the brand has taken a lot more influence and direction from their Japanese owners.
But while having a consistent global look is the main reason for switching to blue and white, Ngov believes the brand was also due for a change. Having launched pore strips here in Australia 15 years ago and launching the wider skincare range six years ago, it was due for another refresh,” says Ngov. I think brands need to remain relevant and to continually inspire – so I think it was due for another big change and this was the opportune time to do all of that.”
Not only has the packaging aligned with the Asian market, but it now includes the brand’s Japanese conceived icon – the Burst of Joy logo. Japanese-inspired, Bioré have given it a more Western-feel in Australia by making it bolder and darker than what is found in Japan. It’s quite unique and you don’t see anything as floral as an icon or a logo from our competitors. We wanted to bring more femininity back to the category. We wanted to change skin care cleansing from being functional with heavy block colours and medicinal-like packaging, to inspiring and uplifting,” says Ngov.
This year has seen Bioré's packaging go from green to blue and white.
What will consumers think?
The expectation is that the new packaging will be positively accepted into the market and will create a lot of noise. The brand also expects they may lose some customers who are adverse to change. There’s going to be a bit of slippage, but I think there’s also going to be a big increase in the number of people who are going to be introduced new to the brand and those that prefer it,” reveals Ngov.
With 65 per cent of the product already rolled out into stores, the brand has already noticed a rise in sale in the grocery channels. We’ve seen an increase in sales and we’re really heartened by that considering our advertising hasn’t even kicked in yet. That’s not too far around the corner, and we’re expecting sales to increase even further,” says Ngov. The rise in sale has been pointed towards bringing in new people into the brand who have thought, What’s this new product?”
The new packaging.
Next up for Bioré…
The upcoming agenda for Bioré will see the brand extend its Skin Purifying Technology to other products in the range. With 60 per cent of sales coming from pore strips, the brand is also hoping to expand their pore strip range in Australia with added technology to be introduced over the next couple of years.
We know that we’re not going to be one of the super brands, but I think that we’re going to consistently be a very strong challenger brand,” surmises Ngov. We’re not the biggest brand in terms of dollars or the number of products, but we’re one of the hardest working brands out there. We have very strong turnover. We don’t take up a lot of space on the shelf, but we do deliver exceptional results.”