Carmine, the vivid red dye derived from crushed bugs, has been a staple in cosmetics and food. Due to ethical concerns and increasing consumer demand for vegan products, many brands began phasing it out in the 2010s. Despite challenges in replicating carmine, biotech startup Debut has successfully created a fermentation-based version that matches the original without allergens. This innovation addresses both ethical concerns and performance needs in the beauty industry, paving the way for a sustainable alternative to traditional carmine.
"It's a really unique color . . . it's a very complicated [chemical] structure," says Joshua Britton, Debut's CEO and founder. Academic scientists took 15 years to understand it, he says, "and it took us three to four years to work out how to make it."
Carmine is a "perfect ingredient," Britton says. It's stable when it interacts with other ingredients, long-lasting, and vibrant in a way that other dyes aren't.
Major brands started moving away from carmine in the 2010s because of ethical concerns... But because synthetic dyes don't perform as well, carmine is still found in some high-end products.
The resulting product is the same as the original color, minus the allergen and gross-out factor.
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