By Daniel Okafor

A $30 perfume balm, a vegan PDRN serum and a men's hair powder lead WWD Beauty Inc editors' picks of their favorite fall launches. The editors — Noor Lobad, Kathryn Hopkins, Kaleigh Werner and editor in chief Jenny B. Fine — named four products they tested and kept using.

The list spans fragrance, skin care, hair care and home care. What does this change for shoppers? It signals which small-format and crossover launches are winning over trade editors ahead of the holiday season.

What made the fragrance cut?

Noor Lobad, beauty editor for news, features and social, chose Cayla Grey Velvet the Scentline, priced at $30. Lobad described the product's appeal in personal terms.

"I pretty much never leave the house without wearing some kind of fragrance. Still, I don't necessarily want to go beast mode all the time," Lobad said.

She praised the Scentline perfume balms as "incredibly subtle" and noted they "glide seamlessly onto skin — not usually the case with jelly balms." Lobad added: "It's like the perfume equivalent of a fidget spinner."

Which skin care launch reached the U.S.?

Senior beauty editor Kathryn Hopkins picked the InkeyLab PDRN serum, part of The Inkey List. PDRN (polydeoxyribonucleotide) is a regenerative ingredient popular in Korean skin care. The product launched in the U.K. as a small-batch test-and-learn drop, repeatedly sold out and never crossed the Atlantic — until now.

The serum just launched as a mainstay exclusive on Amazon.

"As a Brit, I've always admired The Inkey List's mission of bringing luxury skin care to the masses and this product is no exception," Hopkins said.

She reported the vegan serum delivers "an instant glass glow" and "creates a smooth base for makeup."

Why did a men's hair product win an editor over?

Associate beauty editor Kaleigh Werner selected BetterDays Grip Powder. It is marketed for men, but Werner found it outperformed the texturizing products she had tried.

"Few texturizing products have the traction and staying power to hold my hair for longer than a few minutes," Werner said.

The powder lifts, conditions and smooths the roots. Its formula contains:

• arrowroot extract
• provitamin B5
• vitamin E
• sunflower extract

Werner highlighted the packaging as a bonus: a pump bottle that applies and distributes the powder directly. "Hello volume!" she wrote.

What is the K-beauty pick for the home?

Editor in chief Jenny B. Fine chose a home product, not skin care: Hinok's The Spray. It contains 100 percent distilled hinoki cypress water from Jeju. Fine said it neutralizes odors on fabrics rather than masking them.

"Two spritzes and my clothes are instantly refreshed," Fine said.

The four picks point to a fall season where affordable formats — a $30 balm, an Amazon-exclusive serum, a powder pump — compete with prestige launches for editor attention. The InkeyLab Amazon exclusive in particular marks a distribution test worth watching as mass channels court K-beauty ingredients.