“I’m a recovering hypocrite really because I’ve worked for big beauty brands and pushed product for so long,” says Anna Priadka, former global artist for Nars in the United Kingdom and regional makeup artist for Dior. “In my personal life, I live a low-impact life. I’m not the sort of person that needs loads of stuff to make me happy. I shopped eBay before eBay was a thing. I’ve always shopped in vintage and refillable stores. I’ve always been conscious of waste and, working in the beauty industry, it didn’t match up with what I was doing on a day-to-day basis.”
Priadka’s recovery from the occupational hazard of eco-unfriendly beauty product profligacy comes in form of Fiils, a new sustainable brand that’s driven to turn refills into a standard step in people’s personal care routines. For 40 pounds or $55 at the current exchange rate, customers receive a starter kit with four refill pouches of their choice—shampoo, conditioner, hand wash and body wash are available—and four aluminum bottles to store the formulas. Once they’re finished pouring the formulas into the bottles, they send the refill pouches back to Fiils in the cardboard box they arrived in for free to ensure every element of them is recycled.
“We call ourselves sustainability optimists because we believe it’s the smaller changes that make a difference. If you tell the customer that you have to completely shift to soap and shampoo bars, they won’t do it. They don’t like doing that. They aren’t familiar with them. It’s only making them feel worse,” says Priadka. “Our idea is making sustainability an easy and fun thing to do. I think our branding at Fiils personifies that.”
After originally launching the brand as The Conscious Beauty Co. last year with 79,000 pounds or about $108,000 in pre-seed investment, Priadka realized the direct-to-consumer player wasn’t standing out on the screen. She hired the agency Childish to inject it with pizazz while still maintaining its environmental positioning. Rechristened as Fiils, the brand’s vibrant-hued pouches have logos that can’t be missed, and its aluminum bottles are sold in copper, rose gold and silver varieties to be keepsakes customers will be thrilled to retain.
“In London, people are displaying cupboards of refillable containers on Instagram. The same is true with beauty products. I think people like to show off that they’re doing something good for the environment, and Fiils definitely is a brand that speaks to that now,” says Priadka. “We have customizable bottles that look amazing with whatever bathroom color scheme you have. The bright and poppy colors you wouldn’t associate with a sustainable brand, but we have that mission that shines through as well.”
“We call ourselves sustainability optimists because we believe it’s the smaller changes that make a difference.”
Priadka acknowledges Fiils isn’t a perfect brand in terms of its environmental footprint. Its refill pouches are constructed from aluminum laminate, which is fine layers of plastic and aluminum put together. Still, Priadka shares estimates that, compared to conventional shampoos, Fiils’ shampoo reduces carbon emissions by over 30%. Its shampoo is 68% lighter than customary shampoos. And one of the most important factors is that Fiils’ customers are buying into its program. Around 80% of customers so far have returned refill pouches for recycling.
“Educating is a big part of what we do. A lot of the questions initially are about, ‘Why is this better than a regular shampoo? It still contains plastic,’” says Priadka. “The answer to that is No. 1 because our packaging is more efficient. It’s a lot more lightweight because it uses less material. No. 2, we offer free recycling services because we know there’s a problem with the recycling infrastructure.”
She notes Fiils’ core customers aren’t eco warriors ardently dedicated to zero-waste existences regardless of any sacrifices, but beauty customers beginning to wake up to the environmental impacts of their choices. For them, Fiils’ formulas feature 90% natural and organic ingredients, and 75% pure plant extracts that provide what Priadka describes as “zingy” fragrances in the shower or bath for energizing experiences. She mentions that, this year, Fiils’ goal is to onboard 12,500 customers. As The Conscious Beauty Co., the brand generated 80,000 pounds or $110,000 in revenues last year, but that was in its minimum viable product (MVP) phase.
Although the refill pouch recycling is free to Fiils’ customers, it’s not to Fiils. Priadka figures it’s responsible for 10% to 15% of the brand’s cost of goods. As she pursues funding, she reports some investors have trouble understanding Fiils’ margins due to the recycling component. “It’s funny because, in speaking to other founders in this arena trying to do similar things, an open thing we talk about is that trying to offer a super competitive price to the end customer is difficult. When you take those numbers out, the margins of all a sudden look so much healthier, but these brands have to start somewhere,” she says. “There has to be more purpose over profit.”
“I want to be a leader in refillable beauty.”
The recycling costs certainly haven’t scared away all investors. At the moment, Fiils is raising a seed round that’s roughly 40% committed. “Our investment strategy is to bring in angel investors at this stage and, later on, we would look for larger funds,” says Priadka. “What I seem to notice is that the U.K. and U.S. investment landscapes are so different. In the U.S., they raise millions and millions. We are raising 500,000 pounds, and we think raising smaller amounts at various points in our journey is a more sustainable way to go.”
The brand isn’t ready to enter retail, according to Priadka, but she’s interested in retail distribution eventually. She has to sort through the margin scenario and nail down a relationship with the right retailer. In the U.S., Priadka envisions Credo and Ulta Beauty as possibly being ideal retail fits for Fiils. “We just need to be very mindful of who we distribute with,” she emphasizes. “I see it as being a very attractive proposition for distribution. These retailers now want to make sustainable changes, so I think bringing in brands already championing that is, in the long term, what they are going to be looking for.”
Priadka details Fiils has a “simple product roadmap” that includes boosting its scent portfolio and adding to its body care repertoire. For next year, Fiils has a cleansing skincare product in its pipeline. Priadka says, “I don’t want to create products based on trends because that’s how we have created so much waste is by constantly creating beauty products for trends.”
Instead of loading the product development pipeline, Priadka is focusing on continually improving Fiils’ packaging and recycling model. “I want to be a leader in refillable beauty,” says Priadka. “I think we can definitely get there, for sure. For me, it’s about getting the products into as many people’s hands as possible and changing people’s idea of how to live more sustainably and incorporate more sustainable practices into their beauty routines.”
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