A ‘Real Naturelle’ Alternative to Skincare

BY: KABRENA ROBINSON 

What started off as a personal venture for Alayna Allen to find the most ideal skincare products that had natural yet simple ingredients, flourished into a fruitful business that has now been crafted into a fulltime passion project and career.

Real Naturelle is the name of Allen’s skincare line. A business that caters to providing handmade natural oil-based hair, body, and face products designed for all skin and hair types for everyday and seasonal use.

“My main goal when I started was just to find products that were more natural and smelled good”, said Allen”

“I was really shifting away from using store bought lotion and things like that because I noticed that among myself and some of my peers that there were more and more skin conditions happening that I didn’t remember hearing about, so I decided I was going to make a conscious effort to not use products that were water based.”

This led her to her first skin care project, which was creating the ideal replacement for regular body lotions that were not only healthy and natural but could be used on a daily basis. She then started doing a lot of research and went through many trial periods with incorporating different natural ingredients to reach her goal of finding the perfect end result.

“I started creating my own combinations with fragrance oils or essential oils that hit the target aromas that I was looking for but still were not water-based, so no filler added preservatives or anything like that was exactly what I was going for.”

Allen went on making her personalized body oils for two years until close friends and family members who noticed the difference in her skin appearance and how well her product worked for her began to make their own request for her body oil. It all began from there.

Not long after, Allen started receiving orders for her product from people outside of her immediate circle. It was then that she had to decide whether or not she wanted to turn this new-found personal interest into a full-time lucrative business. She officially branded her business in August 2017 and the growth she has experienced from then has been impressive. For Allen, venturing into the business of crafting and selling natural skin care products was never an initial goal but shared that her prized trait of being a problem solver was what really led her to become a full-time entrepreneur.

“I found that a lot of people shared the same frustration I had with regular skin care products but many were not taking the initiative to do something about it and that’s where it began for me when I decided to mix and make my own products”, she said.

After entering the market, Allen soon discovered that making products for a wide variety of people would mean catering to different skin types and the different skin care issues experienced by people who were now requesting her products. With this in mind, she started to expand her product line from just making body oils that were essential for her own personal use to body butter for extremely dry skin and baby oils for more sensitive skin types, as well as facial oil and hair oils.

This expansion has allowed the business to reach a wide range of people who Allen says provides a customer base of mostly repeat customers and new ones as she progresses.

“The reception I have received is what has allowed me to continue because starting your own business, especially as a start-up when you fund it yourself, is hard and some days you are not sure if it’s worth it but since I officially launched, I have received really good reception from customers.”

Allen also added that having over 15 years of customer service experience has made her very keen to this area becoming something that she prides herself on incorporating into her business.

The market for skincare products is a very broad one with natural product lines becoming more popular and accessible as the need for it grows. Allen says that this actualization was an initial challenge for her that she is gradually learning to navigate through.

“I think the sense that I carry about my products is what makes me different from many of those other natural skincare lines”, said Allen.

Unlike most 100% natural skincare lines, Allen places a lot of emphasis on making her products with scents that people can enjoy and “be excited to put on.”

“I was very fond of Bath & Body Works and those type of fruity scented skin care products and most natural skin care lines only use essential oils because they want to be 100% natural and for me that was not the end all be all with my products, it was more than they didn’t have preservatives or water in it but more so being a product that people would be happy to wear and not just for the sake of not having dry skin.” Allen added that as early as 2019, she hopes to expand her business beyond Canada to the U.S with hopes of creating more products to suit the needs of different customers.

“I believe if you are a business owner and you want to succeed you have to have a certain drive and excitement,” said Allen

“In my spare time I find myself working on stuff that is related to my business like looking at ways to improve the business and make it grow and I appreciate all the current support that I have gotten whether it be from a small note or feedback on your products because sometimes as a small business owner you don’t get to have that type of interaction with your customers, so I greatly appreciate the fact that I do.”