Farmstay

Farmstay is a South Korean skincare brand and the flagship label of Myungin Cosmetics Co., Ltd., a manufacturer based in Gimpo, Gyeonggi-do. It sits in the affordable, mass-market tier of K-beauty, building large ranges of natural-extract skincare around single hero ingredients such as collagen, snail filtrate, tea tree and centella. The brand markets itself under the line "Since 2008", the year its parent company was founded [2].

The label is best known abroad for high-volume staples sold through Asian-cosmetics resellers and its own online shop, and for an export business that reaches dozens of countries. It remains active: as of 2024 the company announced a Cosmoprof appearance in Bologna, and its global Instagram account stays in use [3].

Farmstay is owned and produced by Myungin Cosmetics Co., Ltd., a company led by chief executive Kim Myung-hyun [4]. According to the parent company's corporate history, the business began in 2007 as Jininsa Trading Company and was incorporated as Myungin Cosmetics on 1 March 2008. The Farmstay name itself was registered and produced somewhat later, in a window the same timeline places at 2009 to 2013 [5].

This creates a small dating ambiguity that the brand resolves in its own favour. Farmstay's websites carry a "Since 2008" tagline, which matches the parent company's founding rather than the brand's separate registration. An unattributed web summary elsewhere cited 2002, but no source supports that date and it is set aside. For practical purposes Farmstay presents 2008 as its founding year, while the brand as a distinct product line dates from the early 2010s.

No individual is documented as Farmstay's founder; the only named principal is Kim Myung-hyun, listed as the company's CEO.

The Myungin timeline describes steady expansion built on exports. By 2014 the company had launched around 80 branded products and begun shipping to Mongolia, Central Asia and the United States, alongside major Korean retail chains including E-Mart, Lotte-Mart and Home-plus. Colour cosmetics followed in 2015, with sales reaching into Eastern Europe and Russia. Over the second half of the decade the catalogue grew quickly, passing 200 products in 2017 and 400 by 2020.

A direct-to-consumer shop, fscos.com, opened in 2019, the same year the company took part in the COSME Tokyo trade fair. In 2021 it relocated its headquarters to Gimpo and set up its own manufacturing factory there. By 2022 Myungin reported exports to more than 70 countries, with over a hundred product variants registered for sale in the European Union and several in China, and was designated a "Global Small Giant Company" under a South Korean government export-recognition programme [5]. In 2023 it added a separate hair-and-body brand, LAFERME.

Farmstay frames itself around diversity and accessibility. The company says its purpose is to "embrace and cherish diversity" and to "pursue, create and promote safe beauty for all", describing products meant to suit different skin types "regardless of race, sex, or skin types" [6]. Its English tagline is "Stay beautiful with Farmstay", and its formulations lean on naturally derived extracts presented as a naturalism-meets-science approach.

In market terms the brand is positioned at the budget end. One K-beauty wholesale blog described it plainly as "the most affordable and yet good quality brand from Korea", aimed at price-conscious shoppers [7]. That value placement, combined with a very wide catalogue, has made Farmstay a common fixture among international K-beauty distributors.

Farmstay's range spans cleansers, ampoules, serums, creams, sheet masks, eye treatments and hair products, organised into ingredient-led lines such as Tea Tree Biome, Cica Farm, Collagen, Hyaluronic Acid, Peptide9 and a more recent PDRN range. Recurring hero ingredients include collagen, hyaluronic acid, tea tree, black snail mucin, centella asiatica (cica), peptides and retinol.

Its best-known product is the Collagen & Hyaluronic Acid All-in-One Ampoule, sold in a large 250 ml format, which the company states has passed 1,800,000 bottles sold and treats as its signature item [8]. Other frequently listed staples include the Black Snail & Peptide 9 Perfect Cream, the Tea Tree Biome Low pH Calming Cleanser, the Cica Farm Blemish Clear Ampoule and the Hyaluronic Acid Super Aqua Hair Filler.

Farmstay's recognition is concentrated in Korean export honours rather than editorial awards. The parent company received export-volume awards in 2019 and 2020 and the "Global Small Giant Company" designation in 2022 [5]. In the trade press, the K-beauty curator StyleKorean has described Farmstay as "a cosmetics brand that has been growing over the past 10 years, receiving a lot of love from home and abroad, including USA, Russia, India, and many more" [9].

Farmstay is an active brand. Myungin Cosmetics continues to operate it from Gimpo, with manufacturing in-house since 2021 and a sister brand, LAFERME, added in 2023. The most recent documented activity is an April 2024 news post announcing the company's participation in Cosmoprof 2024 in Bologna, Italy, with the brand's global Instagram account remaining active [3].