Carbonnique Launches Online Platform Carbonnique Studio With Fitness Classes Featuring Its Skincare Device

Why separate your skincare and fitness routines if you could do them together?

The luxury skincare device brand Carbonnique has launched online wellness platform Carbonnique Studio with videos integrating its signature facial roller into lymphatic drainage techniques in tandem with yoga flows, core exercises and more. There are seven categories of videos on Carbonnique Studio, and the videos run from four to 40 minutes. Access to the platform is $6 a month or $59 a year, but Carbonnique’s customers can receive free access for 30 days upon buying its roller.

Carbonnique co-founder Marta Pichlak-Miarka says Carbonnique Studio’s online classes are different from facial workouts from companies the likes of FaceGym and Facercise “because we want to incorporate the roller into people’s fitness and wellness routines that they already follow, so it’s an organic experience. Other brands take a face-focused approach. For us, it was important for it to be total-body experience.”

Carbonnique hit the market in December of last year, and its roller promptly sold out in three months. Developed with Chiara Orlandini, previously a footwear designer at Calvin Klein and Emporio Armani, the device has two removable grooved ceramic balls for lifting and contouring the face and neck that attach to a walnut wood handle. After it sold out, Pichlak-Miarka and her Carbonnnique co-founder and dermatologist Monika Konczalska collected feedback from customers in order to refine the roller and created Carbonnique Studio. Konczalska and her husband, vein surgeon Jacek Konczalski, devised the lymphatic drainage techniques featured in Carbonnique Studio’s videos.

“The message we are bringing is all about skincare as a practice. We feel that skincare is not about just what you put on your skin. It’s so much more about what you actually do,” says Pichlak-Miarka. “There is a lot of proof that practices in the form of massage and breathwork are actually very effective ways of helping your skin. That is what we are currently focusing on to make sure customers benefit from the platform.”

Carbonnique fan and makeup artist Jessie Butterfield connected the brand to ballerina Katie Boren, who teaches one of Carbonnique Studio’s classes. Boren joined meditation authority Kathrin Werderitsch; marathon runner, yoga instructor and well-being coach Jas Kirk; and aesthetician and lymphatic drainage therapist Jordan Ortega in teaching the classes. “When incorporating lymphatic treatments into your practice, you can lessen inflammation and bloating,” says Kirk in an introductory video for Carbonnique Studio. “It calms your nervous system, promotes healing and feels rejuvenating.”

“The message we are bringing is all about skincare as a practice.”

For Carbonnique Studio participants, Pichlak-Miarka says the classes are “me-time.” While she acknowledges not everyone has spare minutes to devote to them, she reports a group of Carbonnique’s customers are interested in skincare device-related content that goes beyond seconds-long tutorials. Since Carbonnique Studio debuted on Nov. 20, 30% of people buying Carbonnique’s roller have signed up for it. “We need to be showing up for our customers with these type of formats,” says Pichlak-Miarka. “I felt the need to give our customers a much better experience, something where they can log off from their phones.”

Pichlak-Miarka describes Carbonnique Studio’s production as pretty scrappy. Carbonnique worked with director Richard DeLigter’s company Real Productions on it, and the videos were shot in a day at Pichlak-Miarka’s apartment. She estimates they cost less than $5,000 to make, but their value is considerably higher. Carbonnique Studio’s classes are available via streaming service Vimeo OTT. Starting in the second quarter of next year, Pichlak-Miarka says Carbonnique plans to expand Carbonnique Studio’s content by one to two classes.

She elaborates, “We are hoping this will be an additional source of revenue for Carbonnique, and people will be willing to pay for it and keep coming back to it the way they are coming back to their favorite aesthetician. It is a bit of a replacement for that visit they have to the aesthetician.” Pichlak-Miarka points out the videos address consumer concerns that they’ll buy a facial device and not use it consistently. “We are minimizing that barrier for the customer,” she says. “We are giving you beautiful content that will make your routine more interesting and fun.”

Carbonnique’s revised roller premiered last month along with Carbonnique Studio. Its rolling ball mechanism has been improved to smooth the rolling action, and the device is now easier to clean. Due increased shipping rates, the price of the roller has increased by $10 to $139. To kick off, Carbonnique began retailing exclusively at Onda Beauty in the United States. It entered Green Soul Cosmetics in Italy, too.

This month, the brand arrived at Showfields in New York for a six-month stint. In February, Carbonnique will break into Equinox’s selection. Pichlak-Miarka’s objective is to get its device included in Equinox’s classes. Another objective is to spread Carbonnique at spas and aestheticians’ offices. It’s already in six of them.

Next year, Carbonnique expects to head to $100,000 in revenues. The brand has further devices such as an LED device and various versions of its current device in the pipeline. Early on, it envisioned a sensitive skin version of its roller balls with fewer grooves for a lighter massage. However, Pichlak-Miarka shares that the brand has discovered its customers, typically women above 30 years old, are intrigued by the possibility of a roller that delivers a deeper rather than lighter massage. A version of the roller for the body is a possibility as well.

Meanwhile, Carbonnique is closely watching customer involvement in its Carbonnique Studio platform. “We are a device business. So, of course our goal is to sell rollers and that will always be the case, but we also think about Carbonnique as more of a holistic ecosystem, a brand that is selling devices, but also the experience,” says Pichlak-Miarka. “I feel the content helps us sell rollers, but it also helps keep our customers engaged. We hope they will keep coming back to us.”