Encapsulated sunscreens, petrolatum on leather, lash boosters and more - episode 306

Perry Romanowski (0:00)

Hi, I'm Perry, and you're listening to The Beauty Brains.

Welcome to The Beauty Brains, a show where real cosmetic chemists answer your beauty product questions and give you an insider's look at the cosmetic industry. This is episode 306 I'm your host, Perry Romanowski, and with me today is the lovely Valerie George. Hello, Valerie.

Valerie George (0:30)

Hi, Perry.

Perry Romanowski (0:31)

You're up early today.

Valerie George (0:33)

I am. That's how dedicated, well, I'm up early every day. I'm an early bird, but.

Perry Romanowski (0:39)

Well, on today's show, we're going to answer questions about how the temporary hair color works. That's produced by Schwarzkopf. Whether a skin lotion ingredient can be used to protect your leather shoes. Is it worth spending money on an expensive flat iron? Does encapsulated sunscreen work? And what do we think of the ordinary peptide lash boosters?

Another lash booster question, huh?

Valerie George (1:03)

Yeah, another one. These must be surging in popularity.

Perry Romanowski (1:08)

They must be. But before we get to that, Valerie, you had a trip to San Francisco?

Valerie George (1:15)

I did. The Society of Cosmetic Chemists meeting was in San Francisco a couple of days ago, and I went up for the meeting.

Perry Romanowski (1:23)

They usually have those in LA, right? So, you know, for our international listeners, how far a drive is it to San Francisco from LA?

Valerie George (1:31)

Well, I feel like most people not from North America think, you know, it's New York, and then Texas, and then California. But California is pretty, you know, pretty isolated, but a pretty big state. When you drive, it's about six hours.

Without traffic.

Perry Romanowski (1:50)

Sure, sure.

Valerie George (1:51)

Yeah, not bad. It's a really nice trip through the valleys of California's irrigated farmland.

Perry Romanowski (1:57)

California is big, and it holds about a pretty sizable chunk of our country's population.

Valerie George (2:04)

Yeah, but the meeting was very good. I got the chance to meet one of our big time fans, Myra, who I was so surprised to see that I was there.

Perry Romanowski (2:13)

Well, that's fun.

Valerie George (2:14)

Yeah.

Perry Romanowski (2:15)

San Francisco's got all those big hills too, huh?

Valerie George (2:18)

They do, they do.

Perry Romanowski (2:19)

Was the meeting on the hill, or was it on like a nice low land?

Valerie George (2:23)

Well, you know, it was like in their downtown area. So it was, you know, pretty flat where I was at. And then, you know, the meeting was like on the rooftop bar. It was pretty cool.

Perry Romanowski (2:33)

It's one of those cities where you get tired walking up the street. It's pretty crazy.

Valerie George (2:39)

Yeah, but it's a good exercise to walk around there.

Perry Romanowski (2:43)

It is, and a fun town. All right, why don't we move on to Beauty Science News?

Valerie, did you see the news about Revlon?

Valerie George (2:58)

I did. They filed for bankruptcy.

What does that mean?

Perry Romanowski (3:03)

Well, it turns out, well, they're preparing to file for Chapter 11 here in the US because they have an upcoming debt repayment of 1.7 billion, and apparently they're operating, they're operating at a loss, so they're having a tough time to cover those bills.

The interesting thing to me about, you know, it's just a company and it goes bankrupt, but what does that really mean to all the fans of the Revlon products? Because, you know, maybe they're not selling a lot, but that's still a pretty big brand, right?

Valerie George (3:37)

Yeah. Well, when I think of, when I used to think of bankruptcy as a kid, you know, I thought that meant like businesses had to close, right? Like the bank comes and locks your doors and takes all your assets, and it turns out that's not really how it works.

But then the Toys R Us happened, and they disappeared, right?

Perry Romanowski (3:57)

Yeah. Lots of like Radio Shack disappeared. Like lots of places do disappear.

But I guess sometimes the brands will stick around.

Valerie George (4:07)

Yeah. How does that get determined?

Perry Romanowski (4:10)

Yeah. I wonder. I mean, I think you can sell off a brand. I know the company that bought Alberto Culver, where I worked, Unilever, they essentially bought the brands because they sold off all of the manufacturing. They sold off all the land that our company had, and they just bought the brands and the formula.

So I imagine that somebody could just buy the Revlon brand and then they'll start making it. And so they won't get all the debt. They'll just be able to make the product, sell the product and get the profit if they can make it profitable.