Fashion retailer FJB bets on skin care brand Dr. Barbara Sturm in effort to diversify business

Founded in 1959, FJB is a Singapore-listed company that represents over 20 brands such as GUESS, Marc Jacobs and Rebecca Minkoff. The company operates 169 brick-and-mortar stores in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia.

Group COO Douglas Benjamin told CosmeticDesign-Asia​ that the firm has been considering diversifying its business and entering the beauty space for a few years now.

With COVID-19’s impact on the fashion industry, 2020 seemed as good a time as any to make the leap.

“Skin care has been touted as a big growth area in consumerism and with COVID-19, it has taken a big leap forward in terms of demand. During the lockdown [in Singapore], we got in touch with Dr, Sturm to take on the brand and introduce it into Singapore through e-commerce,”​ said Benjamin.

Dr. Barbara Sturm, founder of the eponymous brand, is an aesthetics doctor based in Germany most well-known for developing a platelet-rich plasma (PRP) therapy which was used as an orthopaedic treatment for the late professional basketball player, Kobe Bryant.

Sturm later adapted the Kobe Procedure, as it came to be known, to create the ‘vampire facial’, which uses platelet-rich plasma from a client’s own blood to increase collagen production and improve the appearance of wrinkles, scars and even stretch marks.

She went onto to launch her skin care brand in 2014, which centres on a science-backed anti-inflammatory approach to skin healing.

“It’s a premium, world-class product. When I realised just how popular it was, I knew it was definitely this brand we should start with. We wanted to start with a true winner and true leader in skin care,” ​said Benjamin.