The hype, greenwashing and hope.
Wherever you go to buy cosmetics you will bump into products touting words like ‘natural’, ‘organic’, ‘naturally derived’ and a list of synthetic materials (usually preservatives) the product is free from. This type of products have taken the beauty and wellbeing industry by storm. With a quick look it all looks good, it must be good for your skin if it’s all-natural, right?
Let’s take a look at what terms ‘natural’ and ‘organic’ mean:
Natural ingredients are coming from natural sources, therefore from mother nature. They are from plants, minerals and flowers. Most importantly, they are not manmade – beware anything touting for natural-like, natural-feel etc. and read the list of ingredients first!
Organic refers to how the ingredients are grown. Organic farming means growing without artificial fertilisers, using less pesticides (note: Soil Assocation definition did not state use of natural/alternative pesticides instead of manmade), and cultivating healthier soils, by practicing regenerative use of farm land
Unfortunately, neither ‘natural’ nor ‘organic’ are protected terms in the cosmetics industry and there’s no regulated minimum requirements for what can be genuinely classified as organic or natural. In the food and drink industry organic products must by law contain at least 95% of certified organic ingredients. This, in Lulu’s opinion, should be a regulated benchmark for the cosmetics and wellness industry too.
The lack of regulation means that terms like ‘green’, ‘clean’, ‘natural’ and ‘organic’ can be used on almost any product. For example, an uncertified cosmetic product can be described as ‘natural’ even if only 1% of its ingredients come from natural sources. Companies have very minimal obligations to assure their product lives up to the labelled promises, unless the company is certified. Consumer demand for so called clean beauty and wellness products is driving cosmetic companies (whether big or small) to abuse the terminology for the sake of profits by all means. That’s when we are at the core of greenwashing. Here in the UK organisations like Soil Association are working hard to change it. Soil Association is also an independent party to certify cosmetic products for the global COSMOS organic and natural beauty standards.
So what’s the difference between organic and natural standards? To achieve a COSMOS Organic certification, 95% of the ingredients in a product must be certified organic, just like in the food industry. Simple! And that’s the benchmark what I have also followed for any Casa De Luluel products aimed for sale. When it comes to natural certification it is applied for products which can’t be certified as organic due to the nature of their natural content, like products containing large amounts of clay, salts and water.
Under the COSMOS Natural certification standards no genetically modified (GM) ingredients or endangered plant species can be used. One example of endangered species is vanilla planifolia, wild vanilla orchid plant. The name certainly rings (alarm) bells to everyone but the good news is the cosmetic (and food) industry is commonly using the cultivated version of the plant.
Considering the cosmetics and wellness industry is a business worth of billions (£36.7 billions in the UK at 2021), it is crucial to push the industry towards more sustainable sourcing of raw materials. Palm oil is a great example: COSMOS standards require that any palm oil used in a product must come from a certified sustainable source. This is a tricky one. There’s been alarming observations of gaps and lack of transparency in the production and reporting of sustainable palm oil. For this reason I don’t use and will not use palm oil at all.
From a small business perspective, organic ingredients are a bit pricey but I consider them as a good investment for two reasons. They don’t just make a cosmetic product more ‘clean’ (yes, should be careful not to use that word too liberally!) but they also add more value for the product due to their reputation of higher quality. By choosing certified organic ingredients I can be sure the origin and footprint of my raw materials can be traced and, hopefully, by supporting the certified organic business somewhere I can help the organic movement to become a beauty industry standard.
With love and lots of goodness of Mother Nature,
Lulu
Casa De Luluel 