Beraca ‘a perfect fit’ for new owner Clariant

2 Sep 2021 --- The Swiss multinational speciality chemicals company Clariant recently announced it would be taking full operational ownership of Beraca’s portfolio of natural ingredients in a bid to strengthen its personal care business. More specifically, Clariant also hopes that its acquisition of the company will meet growing customer demand for sustainable and ethically sourced materials.

“For Clariant, the acquisition of Beraca is an important step in strengthening the sustainable development of the company,” says Christian Vang, Head of Business Unit Industrial and Consumer Specialties, Clariant, outlining what the company’s goals are in the beauty and personal care (BPC) industry, in both the short and long term.

Click to EnlargeBeraca uses natural and organic ingredients sourced from the immense biodiversity of Brazil.Clariant has signed an agreement to acquire the remaining 70% of the Brazilian personal care brand from its founding Sabará family. Clariant has held a 30% stake in the company since 2015. The acquisition is subject to regulatory approvals and is expected to close by the end of 2021.

Since 2015, Beraca has invested considerable resources into growing its research and innovation, as well as steadily increasing production capacity. In 2020, the family-run business, which has approximately 90 employees, generated US$15m in sales.

Beraca strives to bring together nature and beauty through the use of natural and organic certified active ingredients that are sustainably drawn from the country’s biodiversity. Clariant hopes to build upon Beraca’s vision, to set a benchmark in innovative, high-performance and sustainable products and services for the global cosmetics, pharmaceutical and personal care industries.

“Beraca is a small company, but excellent in terms of its objectives, organization, and performance, and it is a perfect fit for Clariant,” shares Vang. “With its outstanding performance and skilled workforce Beraca will make valuable contributions to the development of our personal care business. With the remaining 70% stake, Beraca will become a consolidated company with a full impact in top line in Clariant sales. Clariant will build on Beraca’s outstanding expertise in natural and organic certified ingredients e.g., butters, oils and botanicals.”

Beraca provides inter alia fats, oils and botanicals to the personal care sector. The company highlights how these ingredients are all collected and extracted in an environmentally sustainable production process. Located in the Amazon region, Beraca is dedicated to sustainability and fair trade processes, promoting the development of communities and making them part of its personal care business on a global scale. Clariant will continue Beraca’s contributions to the social and economic development of local communities.

“With its focus on sustainable products and processes, Beraca fits perfectly into Clariant's portfolio,” highlights Conrad Keijzer, CEO of Clariant. “We gain valuable access to natural materials based on the biodiversity of the Brazilian rainforest. This opens up great opportunities for high-quality growth for our Care Chemicals business.” 

Brazilians value natural products

When compared to the global average, Brazilian consumers are more confident in the reliability of sustainability claims. The Innova Beauty and Personal Care Survey 2020 shows that 13% of Brazilian BPC shoppers strongly agree with the statement, “sustainability claims on a product are generally trustworthy”, compared to the global average of 8%. Furthermore, a significant 45% agree with the statement, compared to a global average of 34%.

In addition, when asked to consider their agreeability with the statement, “I am confident that I can judge the overall sustainability of a product”, 42% of Brazilian consumers agreed with this statement compared to 31% of global consumers, on average. Some 14% of Brazilian consumers strongly agreed with their ability to evaluate a product’s overall sustainability, compared to 9% of the global average.

“There is an increasing demand for ethically produced products on the world market, which we can meet even better with this acquisition,” says Vang. This mirrors the dominant attitude of Brazilian consumers who reported the highest affinity to natural products than any other nation’s respondents surveyed by Innova. The environmental conscience of Brazilian consumers stretches across the beauty and personal care range, including skin care, cosmetics and fragrance products. 

With an amazingly biodiverse environment on its doorstep, and an ecologically-aware local population, the Beraca deal appears a clear signifier of the future direction Clariant is set on.

By Natasha Spencer-Jolliffe, BPC Insights Senior Journalist