The Aircos company actually holds a long track record, which begun in 1952 with the creation of the Airsec company and a patent granted for a desiccating process and which later lead to the creation of Aircos. Four important milestones will have marked the company’s development. In 1989 with the construction of a second production plant in Ardon, France, to support the other French plant in Romorantin who will later specialize in makeup. Then 2000 sees the creation of a R&D Formulation Laboratory in Paris, at the Group’s headquarters, specialized in the formulation of powders. In 2012, Aircos developed its brand new in-house Back Injection, IPM process. And finally, in 2015, the Company decides to focus on the development of its export sales.
The Back Injection asset with the IPM process
Needless to say, the IPM process was clearly a very smart idea!? "With this back-injection process developed six years ago," explains Sirot. "We can really put forward our mastery of the container/content compatibility. This technology which stems from our expertise as formulation and injection specialists was fully developed in-house. And most of all, our process allows highlighting all the properties of the ingredients (in particular pigments and nacres) and resulting in astonishing softness, brightness and payoff. We have also clearly benefited from the craze for products with a metal effect, where our IPM process delivers unmatched performances." This technology is so successful that Aircos today has no trouble feeding its ten IPM machines running in Romorantin. "IPM is undeniably one of our key assets," underlines Sirot, "this is why we continue building on the potential of our R & D laboratories to keep on innovating."
Export sales have skyrocketed from 5% to 50%
"Our export sales have jumped from 5% four years ago to almost 50% today!" says Thomas Sirot. “In recent years, we haven’t stopped proposing very innovative and truly differentiating formulas in all the areas of the products we manufacture with the industrial guarantee of complying with GMP standards. We have also invested a great deal commercially, particularly on the two Coasts the United States, but also in the Middle East. Proposing and producing our own packaging is undeniably a very important asset in times when demand for Full Service is so high.”
It must be said that Aircos’ Ardon plant is home to some 35 injection and bi-injection machines ranging from 25 tons to 330 tons. Production lines which are dedicated to makeup cases, intermediate size packagings or samples, without forgetting printing and assembling machines. Total industrial investments, including the extension of the Romorantin makeup site, amounted for the two sites in 2017 and 2018, to EUR 4.5 million.
25 million in sales in 2018!
A figure to compare to the 10 million achieved in 2014! Quite a track record for this family-run French SME of 170 people which integrated in December 2017 another family owned Group, Anjac Health & Beauty, posting EUR 190 million. in sales and with very complementary activities in terms of formulation, manufacture and packaging of health, beauty, medical devices and hygiene products.
The acquisition of Aircos is part of Anjac’s ambition to build a group of companies with high added value. The expertise of the SME in the area of makeup enables the Company to strengthen its field of expertise and therefore to diversify its offer. The integration of Aircos is also in line with the commitment of the Anjac Group for promoting French industrial excellence, an asset already recognized for the six other Group companies: Sicaf, Chemineau, Eurowipes, Shadeline, LPEV and more recently Pascual.
