Tomás Costa

The boring stuff that decides whether a brand survives in Europe

If you want to import a Brazilian cosmetic into the UK or the EU there's about three hundred small decisions between "I love this product" and "I can sell it legally on Monday". I write about those decisions. CPNP notification, the right Responsible Person, ingredient compliance check against Annex II and III, customs codes, duty handling, why your container is sitting in Algeciras for an extra week. None of it is glamorous. All of it determines whether a brand actually makes it onto a UK salon shelf.

My background is supply-chain work. Ten years between São Paulo, Lisbon and London, most recently at BM Supplier where I ran sourcing for the Brazilian range. I came up on the buyer side, which means I've made (and paid for) most of the mistakes a new importer can make.

On BBI I cover the trade-facing material. The importing checklists, the ingredient encyclopedia entries, the "how to read a Brazilian catalogue" pieces. I also write the deep ingredient pieces (pracaxi, cupuaçu, açaí, buriti, the TANINO chemistry), because in my experience most European writeups of Amazonian actives are about two layers shallow on where the ingredient actually comes from and what the supply situation looks like.

I work in Portuguese and English, with passable Spanish for the Iberian distribution conversations. If something I've written contradicts what your CPNP consultant tells you, listen to your consultant. Then message me, because I want to know.