Hey,
Hope you are doing great & keeping safe. In case you were/are down with COVID, we are praying for your speedy recovery so that you are back in action super soon!
Last week, for the very first time, one of our early adopters (Raj) wrote the Sunday letter and it was a huge success! So many of you replied appreciating this candidness and initiative. Thank you for the encouraging words and your unparalleled support!.
If you have been a part of this community for some time, you know we take product launches very, very seriously. And if you have joined recently, welcome to the Perfora Club :)
The reason we take product launches so seriously is that there is a lot of thought that goes into developing a product - right from going deep into how we can address the consumers' needs better, what will the product composition be, how can we create something phenomenal, etc, etc.
Today is a very, very special day because we are truly becoming a holistic oral care brand, something that has been our vision from day zero. As most people believe, unless an oral brand has toothpaste as a part of its portfolio, it really isn’t an oral care brand.
The journey of introducing the Perfora Toothpaste range has been an extremely long one and it took us months of hard work, planning, hustle, and tonnes of iterations to launch this product range.
If I remember correctly (which I do), toothpaste was the very first product that we wanted to introduce as we thought of introducing Perfora to the world. A few reasons why we wanted this to be our very first product -
- The existing composition of most available toothpaste products is scary to some extent as they have ingredients like Sodium Lauryl Sulfate (SLS), Titanium Dioxide, Sodium Saccharin, etc. We felt if we don’t have these potentially hazardous ingredients in our skincare products, why are these still a part of our toothpaste? An opportunity to create something better and more effective in this product category.
- Most people use toothpaste in India and we wanted to start off with a product that a large audience continues to use every single day. This would have helped in a higher brand acceptance from the consumers.
- We want to make oral care aspirational and a high engagement category for the consumers. With this objective, we thought there should be a separate toothpaste for your morning and nighttime brushing with different flavor profiles and active ingredients. Introducing the brand with a concept of morning & night toothpaste with innovative and non-toxic ingredients would have given us a lot of eyeballs.
Though, unfortunately, we couldn’t launch the brand with the Toothpaste range because we weren’t really happy with the product that we had created till July. You know, when it comes to a product, we are extremely finicky because we want to launch a product that will truly elevate your experience.
It took us close to 9 months to formulate this toothpaste range and another 2 months to align the manufacturing. Now, you may be wondering, does it take so long to formulate a product like toothpaste, when it is more or less a commodity?
Well, the answer is YES when you are trying to create something that hasn’t been done before. To give you context, toothpaste should be able to effectively do the following -
- Taste i.e. freshness with hints of sweetness.
- Foam i.e. so it gives you a feeling of cleaning well.
- Effectiveness i.e. able to address the primary concern - cavity protection, sensitivity, etc.
Considering, we didn’t want to use any potentially harmful ingredients like SLS (foaming agent), Sodium Saccharin (artificial sweetener), etc. we had to look for ingredients that would be a powerful alternative to these ingredients. For instance, we have replaced Sodium Saccharin with a blend of Stevia & Erythritol, natural and plant-derived sweeteners. Similarly, in place of SLS, we have used Sodium Methyl Cocoyl Taurate, a coconut-derived foaming agent.
With the objective of creating a toothpaste with clean and effective ingredients, we didn’t want our consumers to compromise on the taste & overall experience and we didn’t want to use artificial colors or flavors in the product. Hence, we took the longer route to experiment with a concoction of essential oils and natural flavors to create something truly amazing!
Finally, after a lot of feedback from our focus group and continuously working on improving the taste, texture, and foaming of the toothpaste, we have finally launched India’s very first Morning & Night Toothpaste combination.
Believe me, your morning and nighttime brushing will never be the same if you try out our Awake Toothpaste and Unwind Toothpaste.
One of our core objectives of introducing a specific toothpaste for morning and night brushing is because we want consumers to start brushing at night. Most of us, due to reasons best known to us, end up skipping brushing at night, and with our mild, soothing, and rich night toothpaste, we really want you to brush before you hit the bed. Only 15% of India brushes twice a day and we at Perfora, are aiming to improve this number, year on year.
And you might be thinking, apart from removing some bad ingredients from the toothpaste, what is special about Awake & Unwind Toothpaste? Well, our toothpaste is formulated with Nano Hydroxyapatite (a.k.a N-Ha), a cleaner & effective substitute for fluoride. In fact, 97% of our teeth enamel and 70% of dentin is made up of Hydroxyapatite. Additionally, each toothpaste is fortified with Vitamin C, Vitamin E, and natural extracts to deliver efficacy.
We really want you to try our toothpaste range and share your unbiased and honest feedback.
Thank you once again for continuing to believe in Perfora. It really means the world to us to have your trust and support.
If you would like to share your thoughts on this product or have any questions, please feel free to reply to this mail.
Cheers,
Jatan