Impact Interviews With Amber Stryker: Lena Korres From KORRES
I first became a fan of KORRES when I received the Apothecary Wild Rose Brightening Sleeping Facial in my IPSY Glam Bag Plus. The formula is perfect on my skin and the scent is divine.
The founder of KORRES, Lena Korres, was kind enough to speak with me about the brand’s holistic approach to clean, sustainable beauty. Read on to learn about Lena’s trailblazing approach to science and clean beauty.
You’re the Founder of KORRES, a brand I love! With your chemical engineering background, can you tell me how you got started in the beauty industry?
When I first started in STEM, it was not common for girls to go into science and specifically engineering. I loved school, and science just fit into my DNA. When a chemical engineer finishes school, a common job is going into the oil industry. I did not want to do this, and apart from being a chemical engineer, I am an outdoorsy person who loves nature.
As a student, I was starting to become more conscious of beauty ingredients — specifically, more natural products. Twenty-five years ago, there were no options! The clean products that existed were very boring, and I wanted a scientific product that was effective.
That’s when I noticed a huge gap and decided to create beauty products that were meant for someone like me. We started creating natural, scientific, and world-augmented products with clinical efficacy, which is also a beautiful experience.
One of KORRES’s key statements is “pure ingredients from an ancient landscape.” What is the inspiration for the brand?
Here in Europe, Germany has 12 endemic plants. The U.K. has 20 endemic plants. Greece alone has more than 1,500 endemic plants!
With that much nature, Greece has an amazing wealth of ingredients with ancient traditions. It has some of the most powerful ingredients in the world that are climatically diverse. I can give an example that everyone knows: olive oil! Our ancestors began cultivating olive oil from a Greek cooperative — one of the first agricultural unions to practice organic farming — back in 3,000 B.C. They were pioneers and passionate about organic farming.
Greek agriculture is not only farmed in a natural way, but they provide powerful ingredients that are healthier. For us, we believe that KORRES has an obligation to bring them to the world because everyone can benefit from these ingredients and practices.
KORRES implements a “Seed to Skin” Full Circle™ Process at all levels of operations. How does KORRES promote sustainability and clean beauty?
“Sustainability” is a beautiful world, but to make it a reality is very difficult and expensive. Our “Seed to Skin” Full Circle™ Process took us 26 years to accomplish. We built it step by step from the soil up, including building partnerships with our farmers. Now we have more than 1,000 farmer families in our network where we know we get quality raw-material ingredients. Our extraction process with nature was also challenging because we have a list of 2,000 chemicals we do not use, but because we work with our farmers, we know every detail. Even our packaging is recyclable because we research innovation at our recycle labs.
People want to be sustainable and live with quality products but often do not know how [to]. At KORRES, we provide them with that platform. I like to do more than tell a story and instead make them tangible to bring the consumer in for the experience.
KORRES is not only revolutionizing skin care, but also setting the standard for women in leadership within your team! Can you tell us more about your women-led research and development team?
I’ve always been an advocate for women in science. I have been the proud leader of the innovation team here in Greece. It wasn’t a plan to only hire women, but we met many passionate women who wanted to develop personal but effective formulas.
The heart of the innovations is the formulations: the ingredients, how you develop products, and the technology behind products. We also take these formulations very personally since we are formulating products for ourselves, our mothers, sisters, and more. The company even grows with us! We are introducing products for babies because the women on our team have children. We even have products to support menopausal women.
KORRES aims to build products that protect your skin and the planet. Are there any other efforts you want to share?
KORRES Full Circle™ encompasses everything and all possibilities for our brand. We did it out of ownership and a sense of responsibility for our products. To us, it was necessary to own our products and operations because we wanted to be able to answer every question. I want to promise to our consumers that we know our products inside and out. I personally know many of the farmers who supply our ingredients.
KORRES inspires others to work together to make the most effective natural beauty products on the market. What’s next for the brand?
KORRES has launched a new membership-based experience. We are creating the platforms we need to engage more people and bring people into our world. We are excited to bring more people in digitally, and connect them to our products and our world!
