Editors' Top Reads: News from Jones Road Beauty, Rheal, EX NIHILO and more...

Here are some of this week’s news and features highlights handpicked by TheIndustry.beauty team.

The Interview: Jones Road Beauty's Payal Patel Plofker talks launching new products and opening new stores

The NPD has been coming thick and fast from Bobbi Brown's Jones Road Beauty. This year alone we've had a new body range, a new foundation stick, eyeshadow sticks, lip recharge treatments, blush sticks and, just this week, skin illuminating drops. For what is still a relatively small brand on the global beauty stage, that is a fast-paced launch programme.

We had the opportunity to interview the six-year-old brand's senior director of brand marketing Payal Patel Plofker on how it prioritises launches and how each product must speak to the brand's strict criteria of multi-functionality and wide-scale appeal. We also quizzed her on its distribution strategy and whether or not we can hope for a dedicated store in the UK; the brand certainly has enough products to fill a store, so here's hoping...

You can read her responses here.

Lauretta Roberts, Co-founder, CEO and Editor-in-Chief.

The Interview: How Rheal’s founder created a modern wellness brand rooted in lived experience

Rheal is a British wellness brand founded in 2017 by Charlotte Ali and Sean Ali, driven by a shared mission to simplify nutrition through natural, wholefood-based supplements.

The idea for the brand emerged from Charlotte Ali’s personal health journey, which involved persistent fatigue, low immunity, and complications linked to coeliac disease — an autoimmune condition in which gluten damages the small intestine (my boyfriend has coeliac disease, so I know this topic all too well). These challenges prompted the couple to explore superfood-led approaches to nutrition and everyday wellbeing. As a result, they began developing products centred on real, functional ingredients, prioritising naturally derived nutrition over synthetic alternatives.

Since then, Rheal has expanded into a wider wellness range covering energy, digestion, hydration, and hormonal support, most recently including a prenatal line.

In this interview with TheIndustry.beauty, Ali discusses the inspiration behind Rheal, the brand’s evolution, the impact of the wellness boom on its growth, and her long-term vision for the business.

Read the full interview here.

Sophie Smith, News Editor & Senior Writer.

The Interview: EX NIHILO co-founder Sylvie Loday on redefining luxury fragrance through innovation and personalisation

Since its inception in 2013, EX NIHILO, which translates to “created from nothing”, has built its reputation on challenging the conventions of luxury perfumery.

Currently the best-selling fragrance brand at Harrods, Ex Nihilo has marked the launch of its latest scent, Lust in Paradise Extrait de Parfum, with an extended, large-scale pop-up at the luxury department store.

TheIndustry.beauty speaks with co-founder Sylvie Loday about how the Parisian fragrance house has carved out a distinctive position within the niche fragrance market.

Drawing on a background in engineering and science, Loday has helped shape the brand's innovation-led approach. The most tangible expression of this is the Osmologue, a high-precision personalisation technology that allows customers to create their own bespoke fragrance variations.

In this interview, she also discusses why she is intrigued by the potential of biotechnology and synthetic ingredients, the brand's "carte blanche"approach to collaborating with perfumers, and how the brand creates immersive retail experiences to build deeper connections with its customers.

Read the full interview here.

Camilla Rydzek, Senior News and Features Writer.