Cebu-based soap maker eyes overseas expansion

CEBU, Philippines - A Cebuano-owned company is now slowly making its name in the international market, taking advantage of the increasing demand for handmade beauty soaps, made from natural ingredients.

While the Natures Ultimate Care hand-made beauty soaps still has to establish its name in the local market, the company has noted an increasing demand for this particular product abroad, said Jing Pacubas, NUC brand and product director.

NUC hand-made beauty soaps which only uses natural raw materials to create a truly health-friendly beauty ingredient, is an added product of the Surebright Manufacturing Industries Inc., the maker of household, commercial and industrial cleaning and maintenance chemical products.

The company has started making its beauty soaps line about two years now, prompted by the owners’ passion only to use effective, yet chemically-free beauty soaps.

Pacubas said because manufacturing the handmade soap is primarily based on the efficacy for the family and friends’ use, it has slowly captured the growing market here and abroad, after NUC products are made available commercially, initially at 360 chain of stores, and Rose Pharmacy outlets nationwide.

Surprisingly, he said aside from the beauty-conscious Filipino market, the brand has also gained interest from foreign customers , especially Koreans who buy volumes at the retail outlets and bring the NUC to their home country.

Today, the company is also talking with different retail and Filipino stores outside the Philippines, to make this product available in other countries, while the company is also receiving online orders from customers abroad.

The soap’s primary ingredient is the miracle VCO (virgin coconut oil), among other natural-based ingredients.

Aside from Koreans, and some customers from the United States specifically from New York, NUC handmade soap is now getting popularity among Europeans and Middle Easterns.

Despite the availability of wide array for beauty soap products, which also all claim of their efficacy, and instant results, Pacubas said the brands’ increasing popularity is mainly due to “word-of-mouth” advertising and users’ first-hand experience of the brand.

Besides, Pacubas is confident of the products’ quality, considering that he is the number one user of all its soap variants.

At present, NUC has five variants, which include the mixtures of papaya for whitening and exfoliating purposes; coffee and almonds for deep skin cleansing as well exfoliating; avocado and rose for moisturizing; lavender for relaxing, and tea-tree and lemongrass to refresh the skin.

For the domestic market, he said the company is pushing its whitening line which uses papaya extracts, combined with VCO, and other natural base ingredients.

For the European market on the other hand, NUC is gaining interest for its relaxing and deep cleansing line which uses tea-tree and lemongrass with VCO extracts.

Aside from the handmade soaps, Pacubas said the company is planning to expand its product lines in the beauty care category in the next few years.

Because of the fast growing demand for its beauty care soap line, the company has invested about P8 million to expand its manufacturing plant facility here in Cebu.

Today, Surebright has doubled its production capacity for NUC beauty soaps alone from 1,000 pieces a day, to 2,000. (FREEMAN)