The Ordinary’s best-selling product, a face serum combining zinc and niacinamide, cost $5.90 when it first launched. Products from other brands with the same formulation can cost over $100.
When skincare brand The Ordinary launched back in 2016, it was an instant hit. The brand was founded with the goal of making high-quality skincare more accessible and affordable to consumers –– a feat they achieved, and then some.
Since its inception, The Ordinary hasn’t simply provided its customers with good products… it has totally changed the whole skincare industry. Where consumers once relied on flashy packaging and promising marketing campaigns to choose their skincare products, The Ordinary threw all that out the window.
The concept was simple: cut out the middle man, and show people exactly what they were buying. The Ordinary’s approach to skincare is based on transparency and honesty, with clean and simple packaging that states nothing but the active ingredients and concentrations in each product.
Suddenly, we didn’t need a chemistry degree to understand what was in the skincare products we were using. More importantly, serums that were stocked in Sephora for eighty dollars were available for less than $10.
The Ordinary made skincare accessible for everyone and forced every other brand in the industry to step up and match them.
Why is The Ordinary so popular?
The Ordinary wasn’t created by a skincare guru, beauty editor, or even a world-famous celebrity. In fact, it’s the brainchild of computer scientist Brandon Truaxe, who had one objective: to “democratize serious skincare.” The products went from being sold online only, to being stocked in department stores, to there being dedicated brick-and-mortar The Ordinary shopfronts across North America and Europe.
Other big beauty brands took notice. Within less than a year of the brand’s inception, beauty conglomerate Estée Lauder acquired a third of the company for $50 million.
5 Ways The Ordinary Changed The Skincare Industry
In the years since its founding, The Ordinary has totally changed how we think about and buy skin care.
1. It brought awareness of clinical ingredients to the masses
Most of the products sold by The Ordinary contain just one ingredient –– eg. salicylic acid, ascorbyl glucoside, or matrixyl. Each ingredient has its own specific purpose: unblocking pores, brightening dark spots, or stimulating skin regeneration.
Customers are encouraged to devise their own regimens, buying only what they need for their specific skin concerns by mixing a little from bottle A with a little from bottle B.
Since The Ordinary’s launch, regular consumers now have a far deeper understanding of the ingredients they’re putting on their faces. Rather than reaching for generic “anti-aging moisturizers” or “pimple-clearing creams,” they know to look out for the specific ingredients that actually make a difference.
2. It made us feel smart and informed
The product descriptions on The Ordinary’s website read almost like a high-school chemistry book. “A high 10% concentration of this vitamin is supported in the formula by zinc salt of pyrrolidone carboxylic acid to balance visible aspects of sebum activity.”
At first glance, it may make your eyes glaze over. But the brand’s approach to total transparency has allowed the general consumer to become far more educated about the skincare products they’re purchasing — and then lathering on their faces.
It didn’t take long after the launch of The Ordinary for a massive cult following to spring up online. Fans of the brand have created countless Reddit threads dedicated to understanding and sharing knowledge about the products.
The Ordinary built up a following by not just educating consumers, but making them feel smart and part of a community at the same time. The brand made it cool to learn about the science behind skincare, while simultaneously making it easy to do so.
3. It lowered the price point to make skincare accessible
Classic skincare ingredients like niacinamide (which fights pimples) and hyaluronic acid (a powerful moisturizer that targets pores) are dirt cheap to produce. However, most beauty companies take these raw ingredients, mix them together into “miracle formulations,” and mark up the cost astronomically.
The Ordinary did the opposite. Their range of serums, cleansers, and creams started at just $6.50, with nothing over $20. By cutting out all the unnecessary ingredients that go into other skincare lines, they were able to keep the price point low and accessible.
4. It made simple cool
We love bright and shiny packaging. Despite the beauty and skincare markets being saturated with hundreds of products, nothing looks the same. For a long time, maximalism was in. Sparkly packaging, futuristic bottles, and products that were designed to be on display in our bathrooms.
But The Ordinary stripped it all back. The money saved on graphic design and elaborate packaging was reflected in the RRP, and people loved it. There are no lofty promises in the ad copy, no cloying fragrances, no flashy magazine spreads, or celebrity endorsements.
The brand’s black, white, and gray packaging is distinctive in its simplicity. The bottles are designed to look like lab samples — small glass containers with eye droppers and plastic tubes that tuck neatly inside toiletry bags.
Since then, other brands have followed suit, streamlining their packaging and branding to be more subtle. Basically, The Ordinary made simple packaging cool again.
5. It allowed us to target specific skin concerns
What set The Ordinary apart from other brands, especially in the early days, was their wide range of products that target specific skincare concerns, such as aging, acne, and hyperpigmentation.
Other brands had products with catch-all descriptions, usually containing a magical mixture of different active ingredients. The ability to only purchase what you need, and nothing more, is enticing.
There’s no denying it: The Ordinary is like no other skincare brand on the market. Though many others have tried to come close. The brand has succeeded at demystifying the world of skincare, breaking down the exclusive walls that once dominated the beauty and skincare industry.
No wonder it’s so damn popular.
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