When we first conceived of Goldn, it was in response to a problem in the current cosmetics product value chain: The industry is still operating with analog communication and tools, while the rest of the world has gone digital.

And while it’s nice to go analog in some aspects of life – when taking a walk in the woods, for example, when it comes to doing almost any kind of business, analog systems are inconvenient, frustrating, and time-consuming.

Data & digital market intelligence is just as powerful in B2B markets as it already is in B2C e-commerce environments. By analyzing relevant numbers of successful as well as failed projects, machine learning models can be created and trained and finally applied to optimize your next big product initiative.

If you’re a new or experienced cosmetic product creator or Beauty Brand, ask yourself these questions:

• Is it currently easy for me to find a supplier for a specific component of a new product idea?
• Is it convenient for me to scroll through a list of hundreds of ingredients in order to find the ones that satisfy a quality I want in my product?
• If I want to avoid certain chemicals in my product packaging, can I easily communicate this to prospective vendors?
• Do I have a resource for keeping current on emerging trends that might be relevant to my next product launch?

The answer to at least one of these questions – and quite possibly all of them – is probably “no.” And that’s because of what’s missing from the cosmetic product creation chain:

• Streamlined communications
• A collaborative environment
• Current, easily accessible data

Imagine having a standardized, digitized ecosystem for creating one or more beauty products. Here are just a few ways it can work:

• Your specifications and needs could be directly communicated to vendors, which in turn got selected and recommended according to these data points. Vendors can directly answer back to you with an offer or an alternative solution for your needs.
• You could get intelligent recommendations on how to improve your idea – maybe with new or additional ingredients – based on the latest trends or innovations.
• Negative chemical side effects in your proposed formula could get flagged.
• You could have a clear idea, well in advance, of just how much your preferred packaging materials will cost you, including as you scale up production.

All this could happen in a secure environment that protects your IP – and your idea – and transmits data only as needed for a specific order or next step.

These are just some of the benefits of a secure, streamlined digital environment for communicating with product development partners and moving ideas forward. It reduces time to time to market, increases market fit and product quality, improves your likelihood and degree of success, and streamlines the transactions on the vendor side.

The three pillars of the Goldn product development concept are:

1. Ideation, including search and discovery functions
2. Intelligent, targeted matchmaking through data crunching
3. Collaboration with ease and transparency

These pillars are the foundation for our powerful digital platform that’s set to revolutionize the personal care product development value chain.