(Beauty)
"Unprecedented" is a word that comes up regularly these days, but it means something different to every industry. To beauty, it means brands producing hand sanitizer to donate to medical personnel and authorities.
As coronavirus continues to weave its path of destruction across the world, global shortages of hand sanitizer are making it even more difficult to get the pandemic under control. Companies that have the means to produce hydrochloric gel have received encouragement — if not pleads — to do so by the American Food and Drug Administration.
So while couturiers have turned their attention to making masks and hospital gowns in mass quantities, perfumiers and skincare brands are addressing the need for hand sanitizer in these health facilities. The movement is led by luxury goods conglomerate LVMH—parent company of Dior and Givenchy — who announced on March 15 that it would temporarily use its fragrance facilities to mass produce sanitizer for the French authorities.
It wasn't long before huge companies like Estée Lauder, L'Oréal, and Coty Inc. followed its lead. Even smaller beauty brands like Cirem and Tan-Luxe are pitching in. Ahead, eight companies that are producing hand sanitizer and donating it to those in need.
Tan-Luxe
Tan-Luxe has temporarily halted production of its beloved self-tanning products to manufacture 10,000 bottles of Hand-Luxe, a hyaluronic hand sanitizer, and that's just the first batch. All of it will be donated to medical personnel and healthcare workers. The brand has even posted an Instagram call for people who might be in need of it.
CHI Haircare
CHI Haircare has not only begun selling two different kinds of aloe vera-infused sanitizers to customers— CHI Organic Gardens Moisturizing Hand Sanitizer and another variation from BioSilk—but the brand also just donated $1 million worth of the products to salons and hospitals in its home cities of Houston and Tomball, Texas.
Estée Lauder
Estée Lauder Companies (including MAC and Too Faced) are using their Melville, New York, production facilities to make an estimated 50,000 bottles of hand sanitizer to high-need groups. The parent company also donated $2 million to Doctors Without Borders and announced on Instagram in March that it also contributed 2 million face masks to healthcare professionals.
Cirem
Instead of creating luxe serums, California-based skincare brand Cirem will focus on creating 70 percent alcohol sanitizer, which it will include in self-care packages to frontline workers. According to a press release from the brand, the packages will also include "social distancing symbols" from give space Peach.
L’Oréal
Overseeing brands like Maybelline and Urban Decay, L'Oréal is the largest cosmetics company in the world. Its various production facilities have banded together to address the hand sanitizer shortage, with the ones in Little Rock, Arkansas, and Franklin, New Jersey, also donating their supply of face masks to local hospitals. L'Oréal has also donated $250,000 to Feeding America and $1 million worth of personal care products to Feed the Children in light of the pandemic.
Clarins
The French beauty brand Clarins has already donated 14,500 bottles of house-made hand sanitizer to hospitals throughout France, and it continues to produce more at its facilities in Pontoise, Strasbourg, and Amiens.
Coty Inc.
On March 25, Coty Inc., parent company of CoverGirl and OPI, announced that it planned to make "tens of thousands of" hydro-alcoholic hand gel products per week, starting with its U.S. and Monaco facilities (with more beginning production within days). The products will be delivered for free to medical and emergency services staff.
Kylie Cosmetics
Kylie and mom Kris Jenner were quick to join forces with Coty Inc., a stakeholder in Kylie Skin and Kylie Cosmetics, announcing on March 31 that they were custom making sanitizer with Coty and distributing it to hospitals around southern California.
If you think you’re showing symptoms of coronavirus, which include fever, shortness of breath, and cough, call your doctor before going to get tested. If you’re anxious about the virus’s spread in your community, visit the CDC for up-to-date information and resources, or seek out mental health support.
