Homemade eczema treatment sparks business idea

They say necessity is the mother of invention, and for Antonette Golikidis, the need to reduce her son's eczema led to her own organic skincare range.

Antonette Golikidis, founder of Little Innoscents. Source: SBS

Antonette Golikidis was an account manager for a telecommunications company when she first found her passion for skin care.

“I had my first child, Alex, and he had really bad eczema. I couldn't find anything on the market that was truly natural and organic,” she said.

“I knew that there were a lot of ingredients that didn't need to be in there.”

So she set out to make her own remedy using a few organic products. Her son’s eczema slowly disappeared with her homemade formula, and word spread to mums across Australia.

Little Innoscents creams are made with all-organic products. Source: SBS

“One day I had a call from a lady in Queensland and she had a gorgeous little three-year-old daughter, and her daughter was riddled with eczema, and she had received some of my cream, from somewhere, from somebody.”

 “She called me and said, 'My daughter's eczema has gone away in three days. Can I please buy some of this cream of yours?’”

So she sent the mum a specially-made batch. This prompted her to consider starting her own skin care brand.

“That really resonated with me. And that night I went to bed and I thought about this woman, and woke up the next morning and said to my husband, I need to do this for other people.”

Little Innoscents is stocked in Chemist Warehouse stores across the country. Source: SBS

“I studied for ten months, I formulated, I got it all approved, and then the next step for me, was actually to go that step further and not just make a really clean, natural product, but to go ahead and get it certified organic.”

While she’s no longer mixing each batch personally in the comfort of her own kitchen, Antonette says it’s important for her to stay heavily involved in the process.

“I now work with some wonderful blenders and fillers, and I work very closely with our pharmacists, and I drive them crazy, but I still am in control of the purchasing of raw ingredients, and where I get things from, I still try to, as much as I can, go to farm.”

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