Wella Company, an innovative global leader in the $100 billion hair and nail segment of the beauty industry, and its namesake brand Wella Professionals, the No. 1 Salon Color Brand in the world[i], have introduced a revamped and more sustainable version of its WELLOXON PERFECT salon color developer. This new product line was designed with sustainability top-of-mind, from formula, to packaging materials, to transportation, to in-salon use – while also delivering the top-quality predictable color results that professional hairstylists expect from the Wella brand.
This innovation advances Wella Company’s strategy to use more sustainable ingredients, formulations, and packaging across the company’s portfolio of professional and retail hair color and care, nails and beauty tech brands. Key examples of WELLOXON PERFECT salon color developer’s improved environmental impact include:
More Sustainable Formula: WELLOXON PERFECT’s upgraded formula is now vegan and is formulated without any ingredients derived from animals. It is also free of mineral oil, which is derived from non-renewable fossil fuels. In addition, WELLOXON PERFECT is the first product in the beauty/cosmetics industry to use carbon-reduced hydrogen peroxide created by Evonik, one of the world’s leading specialty chemicals companies, in partnership with Wella Company. This ingredient is certified[ii] to reduce carbon emissions, compared with the hydrogen peroxide used in the previous formula.
More Sustainable Packaging: WELLOXON PERFECT’s new bottle design features an innovative multi-layer molding technology which enables replacing virgin plastic with up to 70% of post-consumer recycled plastic. This packaging furthers Wella Company’s material circularity efforts and can save approximately 90 metric tons of plastic per year compared to the previous product. With an eye to the end-of-product lifecycle, the bottle is designed to be 100% recyclable, except for safety seal, in countries where a recycling system is established.
More Sustainable Transportation: Thanks to the newly optimized bottle shape, more bottles can now fit on a transport pallet, which can reduce the number of trucks needed for distribution by approximately 25%.
More Sustainable Use In-Salon: Wella’s R&D stylists and Education team developed and are sharing a new easy rinsing technique for professional stylists which the company estimates can potentially save up to 6 liters of water for every color service in which this rinsing technique is used[iii].
Salons can now offer their clients a vegan and more sustainable permanent hair color service by pairing the new WELLOXON PERFECT developer with Wella Professionals vegan color lines Koleston Perfect[iv], Illumina Color, and Blondorplex, the first two of which are a color crème packaged in 100% recycled aluminum tubes. Stylists can finish the service by using vegan haircare products such as Wella Ultimate Repair or Wella Elements to shampoo, condition and protect the hair.
Wella Company’s Research & Development team at the Darmstadt Innovation Center in Germany designed this product and packaging with sustainability in mind. During the development process, the Wella team engaged third-party sustainability experts[v] to conduct a multi-criteria whole life-cycle assessment of the product – from sourcing to manufacturing to distribution to use in salon. This assessment[vi] found that the new WELLOXON PERFECT salon color developer achieves up to 18% impact reduction on climate change and water scarcity, based on a combination of all the improvements.
“Wella Company is committed to improving sustainability and pursuing a comprehensive approach focusing on all aspects of our product offerings from A-Z: packaging and recycling, manufacturing and distribution, the use phase, and of course, ingredients. We continuously work across our supplier network for new solutions to drive positive change,” said Peter Coles, Chief Scientific Officer at Wella Company.
The new WELLOXON PERFECT helps further Wella Company’s ESI ambitions and is an important step in the company’s ongoing journey towards positive impact on the planet and through our products.
WELLOXON PERFECT is being launched globally beginning in April 2024 in markets across Europe, North America, Australia and New Zealand.
[i] Based on Wella Master Brand USD sales on the 2022 Salon Hair Care Study for the hair coloring products category published by Kline.
[ii] According to an April 11, 2024 press release by Evonik, the approach and calculation have been independently audited, monitored, and certified by rigorous testing expert TÜV Rheinland.
[iii] Based on a 2022 Wella Company water consumption study with 60 models.
[iv] Excluding Koleston Perfect Special Blonde.
[v] According to Quantis France and Wella Company: “Screening Comparative Life Cycle Assessment – Welloxon Perfect” study, June 14, 2023.
[vi] According to Quantis France and Wella Company: “Screening Comparative Life Cycle Assessment – Welloxon Perfect” study, June 14, 2023.