Mat Baxter launches luxury tattoo skincare brand

Marketing strategist Mat Baxter has launched a tattoo luxury skincare line after identifying a gap in the market while in the studio chair receiving his first tattoo.

Baxter has teamed up with Sydney-based Swedish tattoo artist Mikael Rämgård on Skingraphica (styled “SKINGRAPHICA”), providing a range of originally formulated and Australian-made products for stages in the “tattoo journey”, from preparation to restoration.

The former global strategy and creative boss at IPG Mediabrands said he was shocked to discover that mainstream cosmetic brands like Sephora and Mecca didn’t carry a single tattoo skincare product.

Mikael Rämgård and Mat Baxter

“ It’s a $6 billion a year industry. It’s growing at 10% a year. 70% to 90% of celebrities and sports people sport a tattoo. It’s got demands that the general skin market simply does not have because it carries ink in the dermis, and that presents a whole bunch of additional skincare challenges.”

He had the revelations about tattoo skin care while preparing to receive his first tattoo, discussing the matter with Rämgård in his Sydney studio. Baxter had chosen the Swedish artist on the strength of his globally recognised photorealistic style, and had settled on the head of an eagle on his inner left arm.

“These are $3000 to $5000 artworks, so I was like ‘How do I look after it … what’s the luxury high-end tattoo skincare brand?’ [Rämgård] said there isn’t one.”

He and Rämgård agreed to “open the brand” then and there. Baxter has fronted up the capital for the startup, and Rämgård is an equity partner bringing his experience and industry contacts to the venture. Baxter retains control through the share structure.

On the brand marketing shoot for Skingraphica

The pair developed the products from scratch.

“We have proprietary ownership of all the formulations. We did what we called a hybrid R and D process: a traditional R and D process, which was human biochemists hired by us in a lab working on formulation design … [and]  an AI-informed initial formulation design. ”

Baxter said the approach allowed them to develop “some breakthrough formulations”. The flagship product at launch is Lume, a cream that restores the vibrancy of old tattoos.

“Lume is the world’s first tattoo restoration product. It optimally works on tattoos five years or older, it brings blacks back, brings colours back to higher levels of vibrancy, more vivid, with better clarity.”

A 30ml container is priced at US$245 (around A$360).

While that puts the product in luxury territory, it’s not vertiginous.

“A lot of men can’t understand it because they’re not in it. But I’ve lived this category for the last year. I spend my weekends walking around Mecca. I know every brand. I know their packaging. I know their brand designs. I know their pricing. We’ve done a lot of work to validate the market, and ensure [Skingraphica] is smack bang on point. I’ve used all my experience and also all my contacts to deliver a brand that is going to be better in terms of its quality and execution.”

Mikael Rämgård and Mat Baxter thinking brand thoughts

Baxter’s marketing strategy for the new brand is decidedly focussed: in terms of above-the-line spend, he is only doing out-of-home.

“We’re not doing anything other than out-of-home (OOH). Out-of-home is the last superpower brand channel left, in my view, outside of digital.”

In terms of digital, “there will be no performance marketing … no low-end buys … we’re not interested in cheap, we want quality.”

“The thing that has always blown my mind — having been agency side — is you meet all these clients who expect their customers to pay a premium for what the client describes as better quality … so you expect your customer to recognize that they should pay more for quality.

“But when you go to the media, you are not willing to extend that same courtesy to them. You find a better quality media channel, and you expect them to price themselves [cheaply]. Is that sensible? You are sticking a quality product in a [low] quality environment. That doesn’t make any sense. And so we’re not going to do that.”

The campaign will roll out first in Australia, but Baxter says the out-of-home strategy is global. The product line will launch October 1.

Baxter co-founded Naked Communications in Australia, became Mediacom’s chief strategy officer, moved to New York for the IPG Mediabrands role, before becoming CEO at Initiative and then Huge.

It emerges during the conversation that this is Baxter’s first time working as an actual brand marketer, after his career in agencies. Does he feel nervous?

“No, I feel energized and excited. It’s time to put up or shut up. I’m tired of sitting in rooms and not having the final say about the brand. I want to have the brand and be able to make the calls directly and have the brand under my care and under my watch. I might fuck it up, who knows? But I’m gonna do some of the things that I’ve always felt needed to be done … I’m really confident that we’ve got a great product in a category that does not exist. In 25 years, I’ve never had the chance to create a category for anyone else, let alone myself.”

Hear more from Baxter in an in-depth interview with Mumbrella marking his involvement with health-care startup Tmrw.