Image Credit: Russel Baer @russell.baer
Today we’d like to introduce you to Alessandro Varotto.
Alessandro, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
My parents gave me a chemistry kit for my 5th birthday and I’ve been hooked ever since. I just always loved mixing stuff to make new ones. I would make batteries (or try to!) with every household products I could find in the house, and sometimes caused small explosions. I think my mom was scared I was going to become a pyromaniac! But fast forward to today: not surprisingly, I ended up studying chemistry in grad school. I worked in a few different sectors, and recently I launched a skincare brand, which falls right at the intersection of my three biggest passions: the science of natural products, sustainability, and health & beauty. I started playing around with some skincare formulations many years ago, just for fun. I was intrigued by the different varieties of plants found in different countries (think of sauvignon blanc from California versus New Zealand), and I was amazed how tiny differences in their molecular compositions would yield big differences in their properties. I would visit some farms and, slowly, I started developing real personal relationships with farmers from all over the world, in Australia, Italy, and of course US as well. Back at that stage, I was not even close to be thinking about my brand. It happened a few years later while I was working on a consulting project for a huge brand. I did an in depth market research, and I realized that many of the products marketed as ‘natural’ would not actually pass the smoke test. I think the light bulb lit up there. I called a patent attorney friend of mine, submitted the first application, and started the company.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
I think the main challenge for everybody in this industry is differentiation because the market is really saturated! Consumers are bombarded by skincare ads every day and they only spend few seconds deciding if they like something or not. My biggest struggle was to learn how to deal with branding and marketing because my focus was all into making a high-quality product that fulfilled my values. Once I gathered enough data from users to feel confident to launch the line, I thought it was going to be smooth sailing. But I did not know challenging it would have been to translate that into a brand and ultimately marketing communications. Luckily, at that point I had a stellar team, Giesa Di Bianca and Jill Paider, who were able to capture the essence of all my work. But my naiveness was also a blessing. The fact that I was not thinking about the business in the product development phase freed me completely from any constraint dictated by market trends. I just wanted to make an amazing product, using science and passion. I was not thinking about sales forecast and profits.
Please tell us about DR.AV Skincare.
DR.AV is a skincare brand. We offer a minimalist line of cutting edge products made exclusively with raw and unrefined botanical extracts of the utmost quality. We go beyond just using natural extracts -which should be a moral imperative in the world we live in today- we also select those that are more sustainable and we only work with farmers that practice ethical businesses. In my opinion, it doesn’t even matter if some artificial ingredients used in skincare are “considered safe” for humans. We should avoid them altogether because it’s the overall production supply chain that is unsafe for everybody: people, animals, plants, and our planet. We pay attention to every little detail in the development of each product: from using solvent-free cold press extraction processes to prepare the products in small batches to guarantee the highest quality. Most of my partners and collaborators are PhD scientists as well so we believe in science.
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
It’s such a tough question! Of course, when you look back at the path you took you might see routes that you explored that were pointless and sidetracked you. But they’re just part of the process of getting you where you are in the present. I’m going to say that there is nothing ‘yet’ that I would have done differently. In terms of lesson learned, if I were to start a new brand, knowing what I know now, I would be less concerned about the path not being linear (or different than anticipated) and more ready to adjust the aim!
Contact Info:
- Website: www.dravskincare.com
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dravskincare/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/dravskincare/
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