If you are looking for more “green” and “natural” bath, body and cosmetic products then here’s a list, created by Mama Natural, showing you which products to buy and avoid if you want to avoid chemicals.
Here’s the definitions for each category.
BAD: These are the products that use chemicals shown to be carcinogens (cancer causing), neurotoxins (causing brain issues), endocrine disruptors (leading to fertility issues), and harmful to the environment. Just think of where all those chemicals go when you wash them off, not to mention the plastic containers too. They may also be tested on laboratory animals.
Better: These products removed the biggies like parabens and sodium lauryl sulfate, but are not quite as natural as their claims. Crude oil is a natural ingredient but you wouldn’t want petro-chemicals in your skin care either (think petroleum jelly)!
Some of them still use questionable ingredients like phenoxyethanol and dimethicone. Some do not reveal all their ingredients on the websites. That’s usually a red flag that the company doesn’t want the consumer to know something. Others scored high ratings on the EWG (Environmental Working Group) Skin Deep database for harmful ingredients. Any product that scored between three to five would be here.
Good: These products remove most of the nasties and scored zero to two on EWG. They may still use some animal-derived ingredients like beeswax and carmine. But for the most part these are safe options. Many have organic certification or mostly organic ingredients. They’re cruelty-free, plus in some cases they’re also fair-trade certified and vegan (hard to find in lipsticks).
Best: This is for the die hard naturalista! No chemicals. You mainly use products that you would eat that are raw, locally sourced, organic, and vegan.
Read More at Mama Natural
