The awards included the Beauty Organic Award, the Emerging Brand award, the Niche Brand Award, the Jury’s Favourite award, and new for 2010, the Beauty Pharma Award.
Winners were selected by an panel of 40 experts from retailers including Nocibe, Sephora and Galerie Lafayette.
“The Beauty Challenger Awards competition continues to be a popular event,” said David Bondi, CEO of event organiser ITEC France. “This year we decided to create a Beauty Pharma Award because pharmacies are an important selective distribution network that generate strong sales, and it is important to give visibility to OTC products,” he told CosmeticsDesign-Europe.com.
Award winners
The winner of the Beauty Pharma award, selected by a jury from the pharmacy and paraparmacy distribution channels, was Pomarium, with an Ecocert-certified range of skin care products that uses ingredients derived from fruits including apples, apricots and cherries. The brand was also awarded the Beauty Blog Favourite award from the Beyond Beauty blog.
Continuing the organic theme, the Beauty Organic award was won by 66°30. The best niche brand award was given to Myeko an organic treatment line from Portugal-based Lio, and the Jury’s Favourite prize was picked up by organic brand Pulpe de Vie.
Canada-based Functionalab won the prize for best emerging brand with its range of food supplements that target areas such as weight management and hair and nail health.
Awards label a guarantee of quality
According to competition director Valerie Vanier, winners can look forward to increased exposure, with some previous winners even surpassing more established brands.
“A winner of the Beauty Challenger awards or Beauty Organic awards label is now a real guarantee of trust that reassures buyers. Consumers have also started recognising this label because the mainstream press and bloggers have shown interest in them,” she said.
Beauty Alliance competition narrows down further
Also unveiled at the Beauty Challenger Awards were the finalists for the Innovation Award from the German distributor Beauty Alliance.
The five finalists, Qiriness, Novexpert, Erborian, Functionalab and Une, are invited to Germany where an overall winner will be announced on 30 September 2010, a brand which will then be integrated into Beauty Alliance’s distribution portfolio in a move that aims to facilitate the entry of the brand into the German market.