Opulus
Beauty Labs
Currently, the global beauty industry is experiencing a surge in demand for skincare over cosmetic products, challenging brands to introduce disruptive technology to stand out from the crowded marketplace. The founder of Clarisonic, Dr. Robb Akridge, breaks new ground in starting his new company, Opulus Beauty Labs, where they’re launching an innovative system delivering high potency beauty treatments that are freshly activated on demand.
Because of our extensive relationship with Dr. Robb and Clarisonic, Opulus reached out to Tactile to help define user needs, envision the customer journey, exploring brand and product strategy, and product design of the patented Opulus Activator™ and Opoule™. This new product duo optimizes the most powerful active ingredients by removing the constraints of conventional packaging, formulation, and thinking.
Defining the Experience
With all things new there is always a learning curve for early adopters and trendsetters. Our mission was to make the curve easy and intuitive to minimize second-guessing or uncertainty while using the skincare system.
This was achieved through countless storyboards, UX flows, state diagrams, and UI mockups. Ultimately it came down to prototyping and only conveying essential information that makes this as easy as brushing your teeth.
A Fresh Opportunity
Understanding how this product can benefit customers and how they would potentially use it was the main challenge. Current skincare products consist of vitamins and minerals that the skin can absorb. Whether they’re for cleansing, moisturizing, or anti-aging, the success and effectiveness of these products depend on freshness or potency.
Opulus realized this void in the market and developed a skincare system that suspends active ingredients, keeping them fresh and ready-to-use to allow customers to get the most out of their skincare treatment.
Compact, Powerful, and Effortless
Bathroom vanities in many homes are prime real estate and oftentimes a sucker for clutter. By understanding the importance of the overall product footprint Opulus would have in a typical bathroom setting, we created a product that’s beautiful, small, and powerful to ensure users saw value in the product. Key drivers to the design were making the device easy-to-use, easy-to-clean, and portable. In addition to its size and beauty, another critical design feature of the Opulus system was creating the
perfect Opoule. In designing the size and shape of the Opoule, we had to understand the various constraints of the active ingredients: (a) amount needed to cover the skin, (b) picking up and handling the object/substance, (c) manufacturability, and (d) working across various chemistries. Once the Opoule is added to the Activator, it’s heated to an ideal temperature that optimizes treatment absorbance and performance while not being too hot to touch.
Breaking the Bottle
The Opulus system’s new approach to skincare treatment provides maximum freshness while offering a more sustainable option for beauty products, moving away from the everyday traditional bottle and container packaging. With just a touch of
a button, Opulus delivers active ingredients at peak potency and a heightened sensory experience. Launching in Fall 2020, Opulus will be initially available online or through select retail partners.
