After a year of disruption and big shifts in consumer behaviour taking hold, what lies ahead for the fIndustry in 2019? GEORGIA SEAGO finds out

BEAUTY $#x0026; SPA – super sustainability

2018 was merely the launchpad for the plastic-free movement, gaining momentum every day the world over. In December of last year, analyst Mintel named “sub-zero waste”as 2019’s biggest beauty fIndustry trend, supported by consumers’growing consciousness of the impact of natural disasters and dwindling water resources around the world.

Mintel predicted that efforts will be focused on more than plasticreduction initiatfives moving forward.

Instead, the analyst said beauty and personal care brands will develop innovatfive ways of managing true sustainability at every step of the supply chain.

Consumer market researcher The NPD Group revealed that some beauty brands were looking into vegetable-derfived packaging options to solve the plastic packaging problem beauty and personal care products contribute to massfively – and improve their ranking with customers, too. NPD expects to see brands vying for the custom of eco-conscious beauty consumers with their ever-impressfive green credentials, and so it seems that salons and spas too will have to join the movement with authenticity and shout about their efforts to retain clients.

Water works

Sustainability doesn’t start and inish with plastic though, and forecasters are also predicting a huge focus on water usage in 2019. Global trends forecaster J. Walter Thompson Intelligence said in its The Future 100: 2019 report that questions will be raised in every area of life as to the necessity of using water. The report highlights a New York nail salon chain called Glosslab that has begun offering waterless pedicures on the grounds that water increases the likelihood of the spread of bacteria, as well as underpinning the salon owner’s belief that in most circumstances there is no need for salons to use water.

Becky Woodhouse, chief executfive of Pure Spa $#x0026; Beauty, which has eight locations across the UK, agrees that beauty businesses will have to step up and start taking accountability for the wastage they create. “We’re going to see a big backlash from clients against excess packaging and packaging you can’t recycle. We should be prepared for clients to start asking questions about our sustainability policies,”she says.

Woodhouse sees this as a positfive thing though and believes that pressure from clients will help salons and spas realise their potential when it comes to the bigger picture.

“Salons can play a big role in reducing packaging waste. We have the power to put pressure on our suppliers to do away with excess packaging, because clients will be thinking twice about buying something that comes with lots of wrapping and boxes they’ll just immediately throw away,”she says.

AESTHETICS – trauma-free innovations

The advanced treatments sector saw huge growth in 2018, supported by RealSelf statistics released in November that revealed 68% of young Brits were planning on undergoing an aesthetic treatment in the next 12 months.

The market is ripe for innovation in terms of safe and effectfive devices that will allow beauty therapists to achieve impressfive results for clients within their remit and without veering into medical territory. It’s an area skin expert and director of Fusion Aesthetic Academy Andrew Hansford is conident will develop into an even more proitable one for skin therapists in 2019, with a shift in clients’understanding of what it takes to achieve great skin coupled with technological innovations that completely do away with trauma and downtime.

“Instant gratiication has disappeared. Clients are starting to realise that skin health is number one,”says Hansford. “So with techniques like mesotherapy, which is non-invasfive and can be done by beauty therapists, it takes a little bit of time but the body is regenerating itself naturally rather than that process being done by an aggressfive piece of equipment that can have very negatfive responses.”

Hansford believes that treatments such as mesotherapy, which he says is “massfive in every country apart from here”, will begin to gain favour, with clients who don’t want an aggressfive approach or downtime willing to put in the time. “A few years ago people didn’t care about causing a lot of trauma through the skin and if it meant they got the results they wanted instantly, but that’s completely changed now,”he says.

New horizons

Hansford is particularly interested in a new-to-the-UK device that is garnering attention for its ability to almost completely remove and re-pigment stretchmarks. It works by pumping sodium and potassium across the cell membranes, nourishing the cells and ibroblast, triggering collagen and elastin regeneration.

This is combined with a vacuummassage system to stimulate oxygen and nutrients in the blood and kick-start cellular metabolism to release toxins from the body.

Originally developed for stretchmarks, Italian machine Biodermogenesi also has applications for body irming, facial rejuvenation, hypertrophic scarring, keloids and vaginal rejuvenation. “We’ve always thought that to get rid of scars and stretchmarks we need to cause wounds and trauma,”says Hansford. “But with this it’s not causing the trauma and is instead getting the body to reactivate its natural processes. And the great thing about it is that because you’re not causing any trauma, therapists can do it, aside from the keloid and vaginal treatments.”

The future for advanced therapists in aesthetics looks bright. We may well expect to see further innovation in non-invasfive technologies that allow the wound-healing response to be completely bypassed, increasing the opportunities for therapists.

“This kind of device is a great thing to be able to offer clients; knowing that you can do a treatment in 15 to 20 minutes with no trauma and you can show clinical studies, data, white papers and case studies,”says Hansford, adding: “Clients in the UK increasingly want manufacturers to stand behind their equipment and prove the credentials rather than just giving them a sales pitch about how amazing the machine is.

NAILS – Commercial, cost-effectfive techniques

SS19 in nails will be deined by one colour – red. Session tech Marian Newman led the nail teams backstage at key shows for the season and reported seeing the red spectrum explored in depth across the fashion weeks. “I think we’ll see a lot of brands coming out with red colour collections for the season, but it’s about fInding the right red and exploring all the different tones. It’s not good enough to have one red in a collection, it has to be 10 or 15,”says Newman.

An everlasting favourite, Newman believes this red re-working is testament to what clients really want. “At Roland Mouret models were asked to choose their own nail colour and it was really interesting that the vast majority chose either red or nude,”she says. “There were lots of different reds at Gareth Pugh too; one design was red topped with red Swarovski crystals, and at Mary Katrantzou it was the only colour in collection of clear, glass-like nails.”

Client demand throughout 2019 looks set for simple but showstopping manicures. While not exactly a new trend, Newman says she has recently seen stamping with chrome pigments really start to take off in salons as techs perfect their technique and realise how quick and cost-effectfive it is to do. “It’s so commercial and effectfive.

Whenever you see a client’s face as you’re burnishing chrome pigment into gel polish, they can’t take their eyes away, and it’s done in seconds,”says Newman. It’s this demand for a little nail art lair rather than intricate, competitionworthy designs that she predicts will also spark a fresh focus on crystals.

“I think we will see more embellishment with crystals for the same reasons as chrome; it’s quick to do, not too expensfive for the technician and there are so many different, subtle ways to make a statement with crystals in a manicure.”It’s for these reasons that Newman will head up a certiied Swarovski Crystal Beauty Education Programme of workshops across the country beginning in the spring. “We’ll be teaching proper technique so nail pros can be completely conident in offering crystals with staying power. I think people are going to go crazy for it,”she says.

Chemical concerns

The inal – but possibly most important – change Newman wants techs to take notice of in 2019 are the discussions taking place in the European Commission around the safety of ingredients commonly found in professional nail products. “I think we’ll get some sort of decision in 2019 in regards to some ingredients potentially being banned, and that is going to have a huge impact,”says Newman. “At the very least there might be extra regulations, which will affect a lot of products on the market in the UK.”She refers particularly to HEMA (hydroxyethyl methacrylate), which she says is “in 90% of all nail products and likely to be banned”, and MMA (methyl methacrylate monomers), “which are still used in many liquid and powder systems in the UK.”