Twenty-five years on both sides of the factory gate: brand-side at Reckitt, manufacturer-side at KDC One.
Scale-up for tier-1 CPG partners
Problem:Scale complex formulations into mass production, manufacturer-side, for tier-1 CPG partners.
What broke:In one program, the spec had been written at lab temperature while plant tanks ran about 10°C colder in winter — roughly a third of product was rejected at the check-weigher.
What I did:Re-specified against real plant conditions and built plant-floor time into the transfer instead of adding it after failure.
Result: $20M+ in new pipeline value and 6 months cut from time-to-market.
Waterless and dissolvable formats, from inside a CMO
Problem:Established brands wanted waterless home and personal care formats that their existing supply chains weren't set up for.
What I did:Worked the waterless space from inside a contract manufacturer, including dissolvable-sheet formats: programs at concept stage for Victoria's Secret and at development stage for Bath & Body Works.
Result: New-format programs carried from concept toward production with the manufacturer's constraints designed in from the start.
The Reckitt shelf
Products I developed or launched at Reckitt
Shown by category, the way the work was organised: personal care, air care, dish care, and laundry & home cleaning.
Personal care
Hair removal — Veet
Hair-removal creams and kits for Veet and Veet Men, including the first launch of Veet For Men, led from the UK.
Personal care
Skin care — Clearasil
Rapid Rescue washes, scrubs, pads and spot treatments. The full Clearasil portfolio was later transferred from Europe to the USA.
Air care
Freshmatic, Essential Mist & plug-ins
Freshmatic refills, Essential Mist diffusers and plug-in scented oils.
Air care
Reed diffusers, sprays, candles & car
Reed diffusers, aerosol room sprays, scented candles and car fresheners.
Air care
Odour-removing bags
Bamboo-based odour-removing bags for cars and closets.
Air care
Devices: automatic & plug-in
Automatic spray devices, smart plug-in warmers and Essential Mist units, including electrical and battery-powered formats.
Air care
Botanica by Air Wick
Botanica room sprays, plug-in refills and a wax candle.
Dish care
Dish washing — Finish
Finish Quantum dishwasher tabs and Jet-Dry rinse aid.
Laundry & home cleaning
Spray 'n Wash, Resolve & Lysol
Spray 'n Wash laundry stain remover, Resolve stain remover and carpet cleaner, and Lysol hand soap.
Brands I worked on through Reckitt and KDC One
From my brand-side years at Reckitt and my years at manufacturer KDC One. They show the range of the career behind the studio — they are not Atelier Première clients.
Through Reckitt — the brands
Through KDC One — client projects
Logos belong to their owners; no endorsement implied.
Plants and CMO partners I have visited or worked with, by region.
North America: Canada, California, Wisconsin, Chicago, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Mexico · Europe: United Kingdom, France, Belgium, Spain, Italy, Poland · Asia-Pacific: China, Japan, Vietnam, Australia.
Format map — what the work covered
Across these projects, the work went well beyond the Reckitt shelf.
The gallery above is the Reckitt shelf: classic formats at scale. The projects behind the logo wall reached into a different territory, especially CMO-side at KDC One. This is that range, shown in aggregate.
Bio-based and probiotic cleaning formats, part of the new-format work explored from inside the manufacturer.
Waterless formats
The pillar I worked from inside the CMO: dissolvable and concentrated formats designed to work without shipping water.
Formats are listed in aggregate across the projects above and are not attributed to any single brand or logo. If your project is in one of these formats, it is in territory I have already worked.
Where I go deep
Depth that maps to the failures above: the categories and formats where I have already made — and fixed — the mistakes.
Laundry, home cleaning & waterless formats
Liquid concentrates, and waterless formats including dissolvable sheets, worked from inside a contract manufacturer. The waterless and sheet work is a particular differentiator for startups moving beyond liquids.
Skin and hair removal
A disruptive depilatory formulation that competitors went on to copy, clinical skin studies in Japan to understand regional skin characteristics, and consumer research that aligned real routines with product development.
Acne and skin care
Built internal expertise on skin conditions for Clearasil and trained the teams around it.
Air care
Air care in every format: electrical and battery-powered devices, aerosols, reed diffusers, gels, candles and more.
Moving across borders
The full Clearasil portfolio transferred from Europe to the USA, learning FDA regulation along the way.
Strategy grounded in the consumer
Clear about the what, the why, the where, the whom and the how before the lab work starts — and development grounded in how people actually use the product, not just lab targets.
Have a product that needs to survive the plant?
Start with the 30-minute call. Bring the product idea, the category and format, and your launch date. I'll bring the questions nobody has asked you yet.
