The story behind GlucoTain®
Discover Value. Discover GlucoTain®. How should clean feel for you?

GlucoTain is an innovative range of sugar-based surfactants offering sensory benefits through individual foam structures, from fluffy to rich and light to caring, in a broad range of skin and hair care products. When it comes to the sensory features of GlucoTain, our trained panel of experts is very hands on—literally: they meet on a regular basis to test products and to evaluate performance. They start with a vigorous scrub of their hands, apply some of the selected product and then note their observations. This sensory analysis ensures that the performance of our product meets the expectation of our customers.

Charlotte Stricane
Global Application Development Manager

How did the idea for GlucoTain come up?
Clariant is one of the leading companies in the production of surfactants. We design all our new products to best respond to the customer needs and taking into account our core values—we focus on performance, people and planet. The GlucoTain story started when our R&D department has used sugars as renewable raw materials to create non-ionic surfactants, which can be used in a variety of applications. In Personal Care, our goal was to deliver not only the expected cleaning performance, but also additional value for consumers, such as mildness and a sensory experience—all this while taking care of the ecological footprint. That was a considerable challenge, but we had very clear objectives, we maintained our focus, and we succeeded.

What are the core advantages in comparison to conventional surfactants?
Most surfactants currently present on the personal care market are based on sulfates or sulfonates and often contain polyethylene oxide (EO, or PEG). Sulfates are perceived as ‘aggressive’ to skin and hair, while EO may contain low amounts of toxic contaminations. GlucoTain is completely sulfate and EO-free. It is extremely mild to proteins and lipids, and furthermore an excellent solubilizer for oils and perfumes. This means that GlucoTain-containing formulations are easy to fragrance and do not require additional emulsifiers to incorporate beneficial ingredients.

How challenging is it to create skin care additives from sugar?
Experience matters, and our advantage here at Clariant is a team of excellent chemists. We were looking for alternatives to alkyl polyglycoside (APG), which is the most widely used sugar-based surfactant, but does not enable a broad product range. We developed glucamides, which combine the properties of APGs, like mild foam, but with additional benefits. First of all, they increase the formulation viscosity allowing for cost-optimization, and secondly, what sets glucamides apart are their conditioning properties, particularly relevant for skin care applications.

GlucoTain is applicable for skin and hair care products. What kind of special requirements has a surfactant to fulfill both applications?
First, it is important to know that hair care formulations (shampoo) are usually more complex than shower gel or body wash. This is because more conditioning is required for hair - to smooth hair cuticles, facilitate de-tangling and make combining easier. To achieve good shampoo performance, formulators use polymers, silicones, or oils, but those additives can compromise foam. Therefore, for both skin and hair care applications the ideal option is a mild surfactant with caring foam and conditioning after-feel —precisely such as GlucoTain.

Dr. Katarzyna Kita
Global Application Development Manager

Fabio Caravieri
Head of Marketing Segment Consumer Care