Beauty cream

First it did it with Actimel, then it did it with Activia, and now it's doing it again with Essensis. By going where others fear to tread and launching beauty yoghurt Essensis into several European countries, including France, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Belgium and Malta, intrepid dairy giant Danone is single-handedly creating a new dairy sub-category.

It's a bold move, but if it pays off, as Danone's track record suggests, it will yield generous dividends.

"I don't see any reason why Essensis couldn't become a E100M retail sales brand in four or five European countries," says Julian Mellentin, executive director of the Centre for Food and Health Studies and a consultant on functional foods. "The Benecol cholesterol lowering yoghurt has reached E100M and that's a niche - I expect beauty foods will reach the same levels or do even better."

The so-called 'beauty foods' phenomenon stems from a growing obsession with how we look, what we eat and what we can do to look '10 years younger'.

"We are all looking for the elixir of youth and many consumers are willing to spend more time and money on beauty treatments. Younger women are fearing the early signs of ageing and the average age of the skincare consumer is beginning to fall," says Joy Thomas, technical sales manager with raw materials supplier Cornelius Health and Food.

From pharmaceuticals to food

Industry has responded with new 'internal' skincare products that form a natural extension of our love affair with anti-ageing cosmetics. These started as food supplements, tablets and capsules, such as Boots Skin Perfection and Vitabiotics Perfectil Platinum Skin Radiance. Then they moved into drinks, like Borba Skin Balance Water, sold in the US, and Love Body, a drink made by Coca-Cola for the Japanese market. Most recently, Essensis, and several other beauty foods, such as Parmalat Jeunesse - beauty enhancing juice drinks and yoghurts with CoQ10, sold in Italy - signalled their arrival in foods. And most industry pundits agree that going forwards, dairy will remain a fertile breeding ground for beauty food innovation.

"Dairy products are the ideal canvas for beauty foods," says Thomas. "There is already a range of functional foods within the dairy arena promising healthy digestion, cholesterol lowering, immune enhancing etc, so we can easily see this expanding to the cosmeceutical area."

It's a view that's shared by Lakshmi Prakash of Sabinsa Corporation, who says: "The concept of 'beauty from within' is becoming increasingly popular and dairy products, with their natural content of vitamins A and D, carotenoids and other vital minerals, as well as proteins, peptides and immune system modulators, are the natural choice as delivery systems."

But while there's consensus that beauty foods are coming to the dairy category, the extent to which they will take off in the UK is not yet known. The UK is conspicuous in its absence from the list of countries that Danone has targeted with Essensis, and Danone refused to comment on any future plans for launching the beauty yoghurt into the UK.

Mellentin has a plausible explanation for this. "There are strong cultural reasons why beauty foods will do well in some countries and just okay in others. They will do really well in France, Spain, Italy and Japan, where women spend more on their appearance. I think the UK is one of those countries where they will do okay - it will be a niche, but it won't be on the same scale."

When the first beauty product does début in the UK, it's not likely to be from a British dairy either, according to Mellentin. "If you look at the history of functional dairy products, UK manufacturers play no part in it - all functional dairy products originate from non-British companies. UK dairies lack the marketing ability and budgets to launch these products, so it will be a subsidiary of a multi-national."

Credible claims

Besides needing a bottomless marketing budget, there are other barriers to launching a beauty food, according to Gillian Berry, marketing manager with ingredient supplier S Black, including the legality of the claims made. "All products that offer this type of claim must have proof they work. Currently there are a few supplements that support beauty claims with clinical data. However, there are more beauty foods without any real substantiation. These tend to rely on the claims that can be made for the ingredient rather than the finished product. That said, products are moving from general wellbeing claims to actual skin care claims supported by clinical studies for the product."

The ingredients that can be incorporated into dairy products to enable beauty claims range from green tea to lutein, omega-3s and coenzyme Q10 - some with stronger supporting evidence than others.

Floraglo lutein from Kemin Health Europe has been the subject of specific studies to support beauty claims. A clinical trial conducted at the University of Naples evaluated the effects of oral, topical and combined oral and topical administration of Floraglo lutein on four parameters associated with the skin (skin hydration, skin elasticity, lipid peroxidation and photoprotection). The findings affirmed that lutein's antioxidant action had a positive impact on skin health.

Pedro Vieira, marketing manager at Kemin, says this has opened up new application channels for lutein, which is traditionally used as an eye care supplement for preventing age related macular degeneration. Kemin claims three food companies are working on prototypes with lutein, one of which is in the dairy industry.

Omega-3 fatty acids are another group of ingredients which could see dairy products taken for a beautifying role. Although better known for their brain and heart health benefits, they are being studied for possible skin health benefits, according to Cognis Nutrition & Health, producer of Omevital high purity omega-3 fish oils.

"One leading French manufacturer is focusing on sensitive skin which it says is a problem reported by more than 50% of women," says Sybille Buchwald-Werner, technical department manager for nutrition and health, and global scouting manager nutrition and health. "According to the company, the condition is related mainly to dietary lipid inadequacies that can be broadly summarised as insufficient omega-3 fatty acids and too much omega-6. Importantly, these inadequacies cannot be put right with topical applications - essential fatty acids must be obtained from the diet."

Also offering interesting possibilities for dairy beauty foods are plant extracts, says Cognis. Its Plantalin range, which includes ginseng, green tea, lemon balm and rooibos, is suitable for anti-ageing products.

Of all plant extracts, green tea is a particularly attractive ingredient for beauty foods, according to S Black. Its beneficial effects are attributed to a group of compounds called polyphenols and their subgroup, catechins. A catechin called epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) has been shown to inhibit collagen-destroying enzymes in the skin. S Black's offering here is Catekan green tea extract from OmniActives.

Since last year, DSM Nutritional Products has also marketed EGCG, under its Teamgo brand. DSM says as well as being a radical catcher, it is anti-inflammatory, contributes to skin recovery and may reduce the risk of skin tumours.

DSM is also pushing its ALL-Q CoQ10 for dairy applications. CoQ10 is a natural, vitamin-like compound found in most cells in the body. It plays a fundamental role in the production of energy in the mitochondria - the powerhouse of the cells - and protects mitochondria from free radical damage. This means that CoQ10 may delay skin ageing by maintaining skin energy metabolism.

There is also the opportunity for positioning dairy products containing probiotics as contributing to skin health, according to Sabinsa Corporation, maker of the LactoSpore probiotic culture.

It says a recent study showed that probiotics were helpful in healing burns in a clinical setting, and similarly, probiotic supplementation during pregnancy and then for infants after they are born is reported to reduce the incidence of eczema. FM