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the gray stuff on the gray market
Spotted your favorite salon-only brand in a mass-market store recently? This challenges what you know about products stating “professional sale only” but you’re delighted by the convenience — so, what’s the harm in making the purchase?
Underneath the convenience is the growing problem of diversion. Diversion happens when authorized skin treatment centers, salons or spas purchase products legally from manufacturers, then against their contract, resell them on the “gray market” to non-contracted mass marketers. Traditionally denied the right to retail these products, this gives mass marketers a new avenue for profit off of professional products.
Think the gray market is just corporate gobbledygook? Based upon independent lab testing, diverted products have proven to
- expired while awaiting resale, or have sat in potentially unsanitary conditions while awaiting resale.
- been opened or tampered with in an effort to remove batch codes or proof of purchase markers that denote their
original origin. - undergone various transfer and movement on the gray market, increasing their potential for contamination.
“That means consumers everywhere are putting something that’s potentially harmful, unsafe and definitely less effective on their skin,” says Dermalogica founder Jane Wurwand. “The availability of product that’s lacking integrity concerns me not only as a manufacturer but as a consumer.”
Dermalogica has taken a proactive stand against diversion since 2005; most recently with an ad in a British newspaper that called out the “origin and authenticity” of such diverted products after they were discovered at Boots, a non-contracted mass-market retailer in the UK.
Our goal is protect the consumer and underscore the importance of professional product recommendation for real, tangible skin health results. As such, all Dermalogica products carry the statement “Product guaranteed when professionally recommended. Ask your skin therapist for a Face Mapping® skin analysis and zone-by-zone prescription.”
As a consumer, the only way to be secure and confident in your skin care product purchases is to buy from an authorized retailer. Genuine Dermalogica products are only sold to professional skin therapists in authorized skin treatment centers, salons or spas – never to discount internet websites, drug stores or mass retail outlets.