Record demand for new Boots anti-ageing cream boosts Yorkshire firm

The waiting list for Boots No7 Advanced Retinol 1.5% Complex Night Concentrate is its longest ever for a new product.

Snaith-based FTSE 100 firm Croda, which also counts Unilever, Procter & Gamble and L’Oreal as customers, will supply a key ingredient for the new Boots No7 range.

Its patented Matrixyl 3000 peptides are one of two key ingredients featured prominently on the new product’s front label.

The scientists behind Boots’ new own label skin cream said it hits the “sweet spot” to reduce lines and give older skin “bounce”.

It added that the new product visibly reduces the appearance of fine lines, wrinkles and pigmentation. It refines pores, evens skin tone and texture and maintains skin’s ‘bounce’, resilience and youthful lustre.

Analyst Adam Collins at Liberum said: “The news is significant beyond being a growth driver for Croda’s personal care business because it shows the enduring consumer interest in anti-ageing, anti-wrinkle skincare, the scope for these products to sell online and Croda’s position as a leader in the skincare actives business.”

Some 48,000 people registered for early access to the new Boots No 7 skin cream before its launch on Thursday. The list now stands at 99,719 people - the longest in its history for a new product. Mr Collins said demand will almost certainly go much higher as the beauty media run the story.

Mr Collins said: “The development team behind Boots’ new cream claim to have created a formula that delivers retinol, an ingredient derived from vitamin A, in a more effective form with a lower dosage.”

The new cream has a 0.3 per cent concentration of retinol instead of the 1 per cent that is favoured by the beauty market, but which can cause redness, peeling and discomfort.

Mr Collins said dermatologists have used retinoic acid for treating acne since the 1960s, but it has become very popular as an anti-ageing ingredient.

The new £34 skin cream claims to reduce the appearance of wrinkles and restore skin-tone lost with age or exposure to the sun.

“As in all the other Boots No7 creams, it includes a healthy dose of Croda’s Matrixyl peptides for skin cell regeneration,” said Mr Collins.

“In fact Croda’s Matrixyl features prominently on the product label of the new product, illustrating how in many respects it is an ingredient known to discerning skincare consumers.

“The new development illustrates that Croda’s peptides are found in many mass and premium skincare products sometimes as the most prominently marketed active ingredient, sometimes in a supporting role as in the case here, where breakthroughs in the retinol formulation seem to be attracting the headlines.”

Boots said the new product is “a supercharged and powerfully regenerative cocktail” that combines two of the most effective age-defying ingredients, Croda’s Matrixyl 3000 peptides and retinol.

The firm said it has combined retinol with Croda’s Matrixyl 3000 peptides “for 360° age-defying results”.