Senior Chemist (Antiperspirant/Deodorant Formulation Development)

At Revlon, we create beauty innovations for everyone that inspire confidence and ignite joy every day.

Breaking beauty boundaries is in our company’s DNA. Since its game-changing launch of the first opaque nail enamel in 1932 (and later, the first long-wear foundation), Revlon has provided consumers with high-quality product innovation, performance, and sophisticated glamour. Elizabeth Arden made waves as a woman-led beauty company in the 1920s. In 1931, Almay became the original hypoallergenic, fragrance-free beauty brand.

Today, Revlon resiliently continues its legacy as a leading global beauty company. Our diverse portfolio—which consists of some of the world’s most iconic brands and product offerings in color cosmetics, skincare, hair color & care, personal care, and fragrances—is sold around the world through prestige, professional, mass, and direct-to-consumer retail channels. These brands include Revlon, Revlon Professional, Elizabeth Arden, Almay, American Crew, CND, Cutex, Mitchum, Sinful Colors, Creme of Nature, Christina Aguilera, John Varvatos, Juicy Couture, Ed Hardy and more.

We honor our heritage, embrace change, and applaud diversity. We champion our employees and celebrate our consumers.

We are Revlon, together, transforming beauty.

This role is an Onsite Role: This role requires full-time presence at our Kenilworth, New Jersey office.

Overview:

The Senior Development Chemist is a hands-on technical leader within the R&D Antiperspirant/Deodorant Formulation team. This role independently develops and commercializes innovative, stable, safe, compliant and cost-effective antiperspirant and deodorant products across multiple product forms. The chemist translates product briefs and consumer needs into measurable technical targets, designs robust formulations and processes, and leads projects from concept through scale-up, product release and first production. The role also provides technical guidance to junior lab staff and serves as an R&D partner to Marketing, Regulatory, Safety, Claims, Packaging, Quality, Manufacturing, Procurement and external suppliers.

Key Job Accountabilities

• Independently formulate, reformulate and optimize antiperspirant and deodorant products, including anhydrous sticks, soft solids, clear gels, roll-ons and other emerging formats.
• Translate product briefs, competitive benchmarks, trend insights and consumer needs into formulation, sensory, efficacy, stability, cost and manufacturing targets.
• Apply knowledge of ingredient functionality, antiperspirant active systems, wax structure, emulsions, surfactants, and fragrance interactions to solve complex formulation challenges.
• Design efficient experiments, interpret data and establish relationships among formulation variables, product performance, and process parameters.
• Identify new ingredients, technologies and formulation approaches; develop prototypes and technical recommendations that strengthen the AP/Deo innovation pipeline.
• Lead multiple projects from feasibility through formulation, stability, package compatibility, safety, clinical/efficacy testing, pilot, product release, and first production.
• Assess technical risk, communicate tradeoffs clearly and drive timely decisions while meeting project timing, quality and cost objectives.
• Support value improvement, raw-material continuity, regulatory-driven reformulation and business-continuity programs without compromising required product performance.
• Develop stability and performance test plans; ensure samples are properly prepared, staged, evaluated and documented, and investigate out-of-specification or adverse trends.
• Interpret instrumental data, including variability and connect results to formulation and process decisions.
• Enter and approve formula, ingredient, and product information in organizational systems to support safety, regulatory, claims, artwork and product-release workflows.
• Represent R&D in cross-functional project meetings and communicate technical status, risks, decisions and next steps to technical and non-technical audiences.
• Build productive relationships with raw-material suppliers, contract manufacturers, testing laboratories and other external partners to evaluate new innovation opportunities
• Provide day-to-day technical coaching to associate chemists, technicians, or temporary staff; review experimental plans and data for scientific rigor and completeness.
• Contribute to laboratory methods, best practices, knowledge management and continuous improvement initiatives.
• Maintain a safe, organized, inclusive and collaborative laboratory environment and follow departmental procedures.

Qualifications:

• Bachelors degree in Chemistry or a related scientific discipline
• 5 or more years of relevant formulation and product-development experience in cosmetics, personal care, OTC, consumer products or a closely related industry.  Experience within the antiperspirant/deodorant category a plus.
• Demonstrated success independently developing and commercializing products from bench scale through manufacturing.
• Direct antiperspirant/deodorant formulation experience preferred; experience with OTC products, anhydrous systems, sticks, gels or roll-ons is highly valued.

Knowledge, Skills & Abilities

• Strong command of cosmetic formulation science, ingredient functionality and product/process interactions.
• Working knowledge of U.S. OTC antiperspirant requirements and cosmetic regulatory, safety, claims and quality considerations; ability to partner effectively with subject-matter experts on global requirements.
• Ability to design experiments, analyze quantitative and qualitative data, draw scientifically sound conclusions and make practical recommendations.
• Skilled in root-cause analysis and structured troubleshooting of formulation as it relates to stability, package and scale-up issues.
• Ability to prioritize and independently manage multiple complex projects in a fast-paced matrix environment.
• Clear written and verbal communication, including the ability to translate technical information for Marketing, Operations, and leadership audiences.
• High level of ownership, scientific curiosity, accuracy, attention to detail and sound technical judgment.
• Proficiency with Microsoft Office, document-management or product-lifecycle systems. Familiarity with SAP is a plus.
• Proficiency with standard laboratory equipment and methods, such as mixers/homogenizers, balances, pH meters, viscometers, penetrometers or texture analyzers.
• Ability to work safely in a laboratory and manufacturing environment and to travel occasionally to plants, suppliers or external testing sites as business needs require.

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Revlon is unable to sponsor or transfer employment visas for this role; candidates must be legally authorized to work in the United States without current or future visa support.

The base pay range for this position is $80,000.00 - $110,000.00 / year; however base pay offered may vary depending on skills, experience, job-related knowledge, and geographic location. Certain positions may also be eligible for short-term incentives as part of total compensation.

Employees (and their families) are eligible for medical, dental, and vision benefits. Employees are covered by the company-paid basic life insurance policy and company-paid short-term disability insurance (the benefit commences upon hire and allows for a portion of base salary for up to 26 weeks if you are disabled). Other benefits offered to employees include but are not limited to the following: long-term disability, supplemental life insurances, flexible spending accounts, critical illness insurance, group legal, identity theft protection, etc. Employees are also able to enroll in our 401k Retirement Savings Plan.

Employees will also receive 3 weeks of vacation, pro-rated based on date of hire for the 1st year of employment and twelve paid holidays throughout the calendar year. Vacation will depend on role.