Drula

Drula is a German skincare brand built around one task: lightening dark patches on the skin, such as freckles, age spots and melasma. According to the company, the pharmacist and chemist Dr. Otto Druckrey conceived the brand in 1925 in Quedlinburg, in today's Saxony-Anhalt, and filed its name as a trademark [1]. The name is a contraction of "DRUckrey LAboratorium". Its first product, a bleaching wax introduced in 1928, is still the centre of the range almost a century later.

The brand has been sold mainly through pharmacies since its first product. From the late 1950s it developed an export business reaching East Asia, West Africa, the Americas and the Gulf states. Who owns Drula today is not publicly stated: its website names a Hamburg pharmaceutical company as the point of contact, while an online pharmacy lists a different company as the maker of one of its products.

Sources describe the founder in slightly different terms. Drula's own website calls Otto Druckrey a pharmacist and chemist [1], while a consumer-health review site describes him as a pharmacist and physician [4]. Both agree on his name and on 1925 as the starting point.

The two accounts also tell the opening chapter differently. The company separates it into two steps: the idea and the trademark filing in 1925, then the first product in 1928. The review site compresses this into a single event, saying the brand emerged in 1925 when Druckrey created the bleaching wax [4]. This article follows the company's own sequence of 1925 for the founding and 1928 for the first product.

That first product was the Drula Bleichwachs, German for "bleaching wax", known today as Drula Classic Bleichwachs. It was aimed at pigmentation problems such as freckles, and also at pimples. In the early years it reached customers through sales representatives who called on pharmacies, a route that shaped the brand's identity as a pharmacy product.

Drula says its first international recognition came in 1934 and 1935, when it received awards at trade fairs in London and Florence. The company does not name the fairs or the categories involved.

The business remained in Quedlinburg until 1945. After the Second World War it started again in the west: in 1953 the company moved its seat to Soest, in Westphalia, into a new production building [1]. Two years later, in 1955, the name of the wax's active ingredient, Ephelidin, was registered as a trademark of its own.

Export then became the defining theme. In the company's telling, South Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong were added as Drula's first export markets in 1958, and the bleaching wax quickly became a strong seller there against pigment spots, pimples and blemished skin [1]. From 1960, the company says, the wax gained international weight as further markets opened in West African countries, Central and South America, the United States, Japan and the Gulf states.

Throughout these decades the product line stayed narrow. Rather than expanding into make-up or fragrance, the brand kept its focus on the same problem the first wax was designed to treat.

No published source states who owns Drula today. The brand's website names only one company, Sanavita Pharmaceuticals GmbH of Hamburg, which appears as the contact for private customers and in the site footer [2]. As of October 2026, Sanavita's own website showed only a maintenance notice directing visitors to its LinkedIn page [3].

A second company appears in pharmacy retail. An Austrian online pharmacy lists Cheplapharm Arzneimittel GmbH as the manufacturer ("Hersteller") of Drula Classic Bleichwachs forte [5]. Neither Sanavita nor Cheplapharm is described anywhere as the owner of the brand, and no acquisition history has been documented.

The brand's historical seats were Quedlinburg, until 1945, and Soest, from 1953. No current headquarters is given.

Drula presents itself as a small, focused pharmacy skincare line rather than a broad beauty brand. Its website organises its uses around five kinds of discoloration: general pigmentation disorders, age spots, chloasma and melasma (darker patches sometimes known as pregnancy marks), freckles, and the darkening that can remain after skin inflammation.

The brand's tagline is "Passion for Beauty", and its site names two values in German that translate as a passion for beauty and attention to detail. The company also uses the line "Kosmetik made in Germany" and states that its products have been made in Germany since 1925.

Drula frames its confidence in its products in personal rather than scientific terms. The company says it believes in their effectiveness on the strength of its own experience and positive customer feedback, and describes its daily work as a continuation of Dr. O. Druckrey's.

The pharmacy link is built into how the range is presented. Each product carries a German pharmacy article number (PZN), which, the company notes, a pharmacist can use to find the product.

The current range is short. The brand's website lists six products: Teintseife, Bleichwachs, Bleichwachs Extra Forte, Fade Milk, Anti-Aging Creme and Anti Spot Serum.

The bleaching waxes remain the core. The standard Bleichwachs is described by the company as a starting treatment for mild pigmentation on the face and neckline, including freckles, light age spots and light pregnancy marks, as well as mild blemishes. The Extra Forte version is intended for more stubborn pigmentation. Both come in 30 ml packs and are meant to be applied morning and evening to the affected areas only. Drula advises at least four to eight weeks of use before first visible results.

The ingredient lists of the waxes combine a base of petrolatum, beeswax and lanolin with zinc oxide, titanium dioxide and salicylic acid. The ingredient that defines them is Ephelidin, the trade name for diacetyl boldine. The company says it is derived from a natural compound in the bark of the Chilean boldo tree. According to Drula, the waxes act early in the skin's pigment production: the active ingredient blocks the activation of tyrosinase, the key enzyme the skin uses to make melanin, and so slows the formation of dark pigment [1].

Around the waxes sit a few supporting products. The Teintseife, a 75 g complexion soap, is described as a mild cleanser containing plant oils and vitamin E, and the company recommends it as the first step before applying the waxes. Fade Milk is a body lotion intended for treating pigmentation over larger areas of the body. The Anti Spot Serum is aimed at stubborn pigment spots. Other ingredients the brand names across its range include phenylethyl resorcinol (derived from Scots pine), mulberry root extract, glycolic acid, vitamin A, vitamin E and panthenol.

Drula attaches the same safety guidance to all of its lightening products. Users are told to avoid direct sunlight during treatment and to wear additional sun protection of at least SPF 25. The waxes are labelled as unsuitable for children under three.

Drula's website continues to present its six-product range with pharmacy article numbers. It also lists business contacts for several regions: Europe and French-speaking Africa; Asia, Vietnam, the Middle East and Latin America; Russia and the CIS countries; the German-speaking markets; and South Africa. The website states that it was last updated in September 2023 [2].

Signs of recent activity are limited. The year 2025 marked a century since the 1925 founding, but no centenary activity has been documented, and no new launches or company news from 2025 or 2026 are known. As of October 2026, the Austrian online pharmacy that lists Classic Bleichwachs forte marked the product as no longer in trade ("außer Handel") [5].