Fytokem's sales rising after slump

Related tags Cost Skin whitening Marketing

Outsourcing may have helped Fytokem Products, a Canadian producer
of plant-based ingredients, increase its sales from last quarter,
but they were still well down on the same period last year.

The Saskatchewan based company increased its sales by 24 percent compared to last quarter to $127 231, but this was a marked decrease in comparison with second quarter of 2003, when sales reached $214 796.

However, a reduction in costs of 35 percent meant that the company managed to record its largest ever quarterly profit of $18 850 - a considerable increase on the slight margin of $2 166 in the same period last year.

Art Hesje, the president and CEO of Fytokem, attributed most of the cost reduction costs to the outsourcing of marketing to Atrium Biotechnologies, leaving Fytokem to focus its energies on production, product development and quality control.

"This is the fourth quarter of the last five where we have shown break-even or better financial results," said Hesje. "Our concentration on cost control and product quality is showing results and we are getting positive feedback on our products from both potential and established customers."

He added that he expected sales to improve as the company continued to center its attention on product quality and finding new market opportunities.

"As our sales grow we will strengthen our product research and development activities," he said "We will continue research on our existing products to ensure we can answer all questions related to them and then focus on new products."

He told CosmeticsDesign that the first new product to be launched on the market will be an elastase inhibitor called Fytolastin, that claims to inhibit the increase of the elastase enzyme. This will therefore reduce the age related relaxation of muscles, which causes wrinkles.

Fytokem's products are made from the plants of the northern Canadian prairie region and are aimed at the personal care industry, which includes skincare, haircare, personal hygiene, fragrance and makeup consumer goods. In particular, Fytokem develops ingredients for the anti-irritant and skin whitening sectors.

"We have two product lines in the market, namely Canadian Willowherb(CW) and Tyrostat (TS)," said Heske. "CW is sold mainly as an anti-irritant, anti-inflammatory, although it also has anti-bacteria and anti-oxidant efficacies and we have customers for CW literally around the globe. TS is a skin lightener and the major markets for this product are in Europe and Asia."