Paul Peros is changing hair products for a greener future and better hair

Like so many good ideas, it seems obvious now someone has had it. If you’re going to come up with a new haircare product, stick some some magnets in it. Micro-magnets, of course, but still: magnets. This is what Réduit and Paul Peros, their CEO, have done. Why didn’t anyone think of that before? Your hair is guaranteed to be more attractive. At the same time, as the name suggests, they are reducing the volume – not of your hair but of the sheer mass of stuff in your bathroom cupboard. The theory is that even as your hair looks fuller and glossier, your shelves will be dramatically slimmed down.

Paul Peros, I can’t help but notice when we meet in a cafe near King’s Cross, has a glowing head of hair with a shapely quiff. He’s 47, was born in Croatia, and has worked in Shanghai, Madrid, Stockholm and Zagreb. He was previously CEO of Foreo, the Swedish brand born out of a convergence between the beauty business and tech. In a technophile age, who is going to believe in the magic elixir approach? Mere lotions and potions, on their own, are no longer enough. “I wanted to create an alternative approach,” says Peros.

He is gently satirical of the old school. “Twentieth-century products were done within the constraints of the technology of the time.” The classic beauty companies (he names names) would come up with a nice-looking bottle or a jar and then find a formulation to go in it. “It was all about the feel, the silkiness, the smell or foaminess. That doesn’t work any more. It might appeal to me or my grandmother. But not to the next generation. We’ve gone beyond all that. Our awareness has moved on. Then no one could talk back. Now everyone talks back all the time.” We have become, in short, more sceptical. Harder to please. Beauty products have to “meet the threshold of credibility”. No one is going to buy snake oil any more.

And do you really need all those – mostly plastic – bottles labelled “shampoo” or “conditioner” or “extra shine”? Réduit doesn’t think so. In conjunction with OBJ in Australia, the company has come up with a new applicator – or “advanced delivery technology” – which does away with the need for the usual array of pots and jars and phials. “We are optimising the system for efficient delivery,” as Peros puts it.

He really has done the science. If you’re using a traditional aerosol spray, you’re (a) depleting the ozone layer and (b) wasting most of the hairspray. The droplets are too big. The point about Réduit’s diffusion system, “magnetic misting”, is that the droplets are 50 times smaller in volume, making for better coverage and efficacy (according to tests, 3.7 times greater contact and absorption). “If we can get across even 10 per cent of the product, we are doubling the beauty,” says Peros.

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He takes me through the research behind the product. “You have to be able to justify your claims,” he says. One millilitre of Réduit is equivalent to 25ml of a traditional formulation, with effectively one-twenty-fifth of the carbon footprint. The way it works is you place a “pod” – not unlike a coffee pod for certain coffee machines – inside the diffuser. Each pod is geared to its function (“repair” or “volume” or “glow”, for example) and you only need to replace one every couple of months. “You can take away all the stabilisers and preservatives and fillers. Four-fifths of it is redundant anyway.” The micro-magnets force the liquid down to the scalp. “It not only works, it doesn’t feel heavy or sticky either, because you’re leaving out all the stuff you don’t need.” You’re lightening the load on your hair and on the planet.

Across the world, packaging is under scrutiny as never before. The applicator and the pods come in a compact and portable (and ultimately recyclable) box. “Réduit reduces the products you need,” says Peros. “It makes a lot of things in your bathroom disappear.” The device is made in China but the technology was developed over the past couple of years at their lab in Switzerland, Peros tells me. “Among our neighbours, we’re the only ones who are not in either watchmaking or banking.”

“Réduit”, of course, means “reduced” or “downsized” in French, but depending on how you pronounce it, it could be understood as “redo it”. Peros is an innovator, but he’s more a persuasive reformist than a tub-thumping revolutionary. “The new tech requires new behaviour. But you have to be careful with design. Look at Google glasses – they’re too weird. The product has to serve the consumer, not the other way round.”

Peros expects to influence other companies to change their approach, to become more minimalist and reduce their packaging. “This is only the beginning, in a way,” he says. He is thinking about expanding into skincare and oral care. “There are so many products on wobbly legs. It’s damaging to credibility.”

The Réduit launch date in the UK is in early March. But Peros is already open to customer feedback, using a system of “ambassadors”. “Even in the last two weeks we’ve learned so much,” he says. “People are telling me about my product. The real lab is the consumer.”