Created in May 2015, Necos, the Italian firm headed by Dario Dall'Oste, will exceed € 3.5 million in sales this year for a staff of 23 people. In just a few years, this young company has done remarkably well. Necos emerged initially from a simple observation, that of a multi-ethnic world with a strong predominance of increasingly matte or various colored skins, and which prompted the start-up to offer makeup formulas meeting this meteoric evolution of the makeup market. And, to better meet this multi-ethnic development, with also a growing number of Muslim consumers, Necos decided at the time to bank on the production of Halal products by specializing its plant located in Crema, Italy. Let’s take stock three years later!

Jean-Yves Bourgeois: Your company made great strides in no time at all!?

Dario Dall'Oste: That's right! In two years, we doubled our turnover. And being the first ones to have built a Halal certified plant was definitely a plus. In addition, this plant being located in the area of Crema also allows us to have a foothold in all markets across the world, keeping a special eye where people with colored or matte skins predominate. Brands specifically active in these markets find outstanding performance in our products, whereas brands distributing world-wide, on top of the remarkable performances, are supplied with products developed with a multi-marketing purpose, being vegetarian and vegan friendly as well. 
 
Bourgeois: But you are not the only ones operating on this market for matte and colored skins!?

Dall'Oste: Quite true but we have made and continue to make the difference every day thanks to the development of very efficient formulas. We have customers all over the world, from Australia to Colombia. Our 2,500 m² factory in Crema currently has the capability to produce per year, some 160 tons of mascaras, eyeliner and foundations, 30 tons of lip gloss and lipsticks, 70 tons of powders. We can offer a total of 126 formulas, all of them Halal compliant and most of which are Halal certified. And even if I insist on the purposefully multi-ethnic positioning of Necos, in order to follow the multi-ethnic evolution of the audience of consumers, this specific specialty of ours also allows us to offer very efficient products for white skins.
 
Bourgeois: What do prospects look like for next year?

Dall'Oste: I believe we will be able to double our activity and reach the € 6 million mark in sales. We recently invested in some new equipment and we have been hiring new people for developing some key markets. Our positioning ranges from the mass market to the premium market. We have a very well balanced portfolio of clients since three of them represent 40% of our turnover and the remaining 60% consists of 34 companies.