Craign Dubitsky founded Hello Products in 2012 and Lauri Kien Kotcher joined the brand at the start of 2015 as CEO. Since early 2013 the brand has been financed by Tenth Avenue Holdings (and its that firm which sold the business to Colgate).
While terms of the acquisition were not made public; both Dubitsky and Kien Kotcher are staying on to lead Hello Products as Colgate President and CEO Noel Wallace alludes to in his recent remarks to the press: “We are excited to welcome Hello to the Colgate family and are especially pleased that Craig and Lauri will continue in their leadership roles.”
“We have great respect for the Hello team and their impressive product line, and value the strong connection they have made with younger consumers,” says Wallace. “With its distinct on-trend positioning, Hello is a terrific complement to our Colgate and Tom’s of Maine brands and we look forward to supporting its continued growth and success.”
A forward-looking brand
Like many personal care and beauty brands preparing to launch products formulated with CBD and other cannabinoids, Hello Products first launched a hemp seed oil collection. In October of 2019, the brand debuted toothpastes, mouthwash, and dental floss made with hemp seed oil.
And while the ingredient is nothing new in personal care, these sorts of product lines give brands the opportunity to connect with, educate, and engage with the CBD consumer; to carve out future shelf space, as it were.
This forward-looking strategy continues to be part of the Hello Products approach to R&D. “We see huge growth potential for hello,” says Kien Kotcher, is the media release announcing the brand’s new CBD collection.
“Our new, ground-breaking launches, along with the continued success with our retail partners,” she says, “has encouraged us to think big and accelerate the rapid growth of our personal care assortment, with several more exciting innovations to follow later this year.”
An oral care line for the contemporary moment
This month Hello Products launched its CBD product line, a collection of oral care products that include both a fluoride and a fluoride-free tooth paste as well as a fluoride-free charcoal toothpaste, CBD mouthwash with and without charcoal, and CBD lip balms too.
In his comments to the press, Dubitsky says, “At hello we are proud to thoughtfully source innovative ingredients that our brushers seek, and deliver them in ways that continue to surprise and delight. It's an incredibly exciting time for hello, and this new collection is a really fun and engaging way to expand our product portfolio.”
“What started as an oral care line,” he says “is now evolving into a naturally friendly personal care company. We're confident we can provide a wide range of delicious tasting, highly effective, naturally-friendly products that our retail partners and their shoppers can fall in love with, and that elevate the everyday.”
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Deanna Utroske is a leading voice in the cosmetics and personal care industry as well as in the indie beauty movement. As Editor of CosmeticsDesign.com, she writes daily news about the business of beauty in the Americas region and regularly produces video interviews with cosmetics, fragrance, personal care, and packaging experts as well as with indie brand founders.
Deanna will be traveling next to the Personal Care Product Council’s annual meeting; if you’ll be there too and have beauty business news to share, feel free to contact her at deanna.utroske@wrbm.com