The international retailer LUSH has built a handmade, natural cosmetics empire. You can get your piece of the pie by making your own homemade cosmetics like lip gloss. Lip gloss is a great cosmetic to start making at home because it’s something customers use on a daily basis. Here’s how to make lip gloss to sell online.
Choose your ingredients
You don’t need special permits or licenses to make lip gloss to sell, but you do need to use FDA-approved ingredients. All lip gloss contains wax, oils, and butters. Most lip glosses contain beeswax, but you can substitute Candelilla wax for a vegan product. For the oil, you can choose from coconut oil, sunflower oil, sesame oil, almond oil, or rose oil. The most common butter options are cocoa and shea butter, but mango butter would make your lip gloss stand out.
If you want to make your lip gloss pop, add color, scents, and flavor.
Colorants
You can use natural food coloring made from ingredients like beetroot powder, coffee, and purple yams (ube). You can find more natural food coloring options in this guide.
Scents and flavors
If our childhood favorite LipSmackers can teach us anything, it’s that flavored lip balms and glosses will always be fun. Essential oils will add wonderful scents and flavors to your lip gloss.
Decorative accents
Depending on the consistency of your homemade lip gloss, you may be able to add dried flowers as a decorative element.
Where to buy lip gloss ingredients
Cocoa butter: You can find cocoa butter (usually labeled “cacao butter”) in-store at Whole Foods, or buy it wholesale online from a site like Bulk Apothecary.
Wax: You can get beeswax from your local beekeeper or homestead market or craft store. Vegan waxes like Candelilla wax is available online.
Oils, essential oils, and colorants: You can find these ingredients in your local grocery stores and other retailers.
Gather your equipment
To make lip gloss at home, you will need a melting container with a spout, a heat source (stove or microwave), and something you can use to stir the ingredients.
Make the lip gloss
This is the standard ratio for making lip gloss:
- 20% wax
- 10% brittle butter
- 20% butter or solid oil
- 50% liquid oil
- Around 1% of colorant, flavoring, fragrance, and/or essential oils
How to make lip gloss:
- Melt the wax over the stove or in the microwave.
- Pour in oils and butters.
- Add optional ingredients. During this step, you can add essential oils, food coloring, and glitter.
- Pour the lip gloss into containers.
- Cool lip gloss for 20 minutes. Refrigerate to speed up the cooling process.
Package the lip gloss
You can choose to package your lip gloss in tubes, compacts, small jars, or tins. Several online retailers sell these containers in bulk.
Sell the lip gloss online
To sell your lip gloss, you will need to do the following:
- Choose a brand name. Airmart’s AI writing tool can help you brainstorm unique ideas for your lip gloss brand.
- Purchase branded packaging. You can easily create branded packaging by creating a sticker with your brand name and logo and labeling each container of lip gloss.
- Take photos of your lip gloss. You will need to model or have friends model the lip gloss for some of the product photos. Other photos could be showing a swath of lip gloss on a blank background.
- Price the lip gloss. You should price your lip gloss based on the cost of ingredients and competitor lipgloss pricing. Homemade lip gloss prices can range between $5-$12 on Etsy.
- Set up an online shop. Airmart is an affordable e-commerce platform where you can sell your homemade lip gloss. It takes as few as 10 minutes to set up a shop and start selling.
- Promote your lip gloss. Use TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, and other visual apps to promote your lip gloss. For more ideas, check out our playbook for promoting your online shop.