Simplifying Clean Beauty
Let's Get Started!
Clean beauty can feel overwhelming! In fact, the beauty industry in itself can be overwhelming, so it is completely understandable that the idea of switching your beauty regime up and moving to this thing called "clean beauty" might give you brain fog!
However, you are in the right place to start your journey because I can show some really easy and simple things to do to start the process. I would never advocate for someone throwing out all of their "toxic" products and starting all over again. This would be a huge waste and it would just fill up the bin in your bathroom even quicker. I believe that changing to clean beauty is a process that takes a bit of time and that is ok! It is better that you understand exactly why it is that you are making this change and make a decision to consciously take in each step.
So, I guess a good place to start would be to explain why clean beauty is good. Let's break it down into a few quick bullet points!
- No harmful chemicals or toxins
- Supports your skin and physical health
- Better recycling options
- Produces less waste and toxins into the environment
- Less likely to cause skin irritation and allergic reactions
Well that really was quick!
Let's talk a little bit about how you know what is "clean" and what is not. For starters, you unfortunately cant believe everything you read on the "clean" beauty packaging. "Natural" is a not a regulated word in marketing which means anyone can say anything is natural. Not very helpful hey?! Even the word "organic" doesn't hold much sway in the beauty industry as the term is also not regulated. It is for food and produce, but not for beauty. However, there are a few really easy ways to learn how to trust products that you can trust. For starters, if you see any of these symbols on a product you are buying then you are in safe hands!
Apps To The Rescue!
These can give you peace of mind! The other quick and simple thing you can do is download two apps called Yuka and Think Dirty. These apps both have a barcode scanner which allows you to scan products in shops before you even buy them! You can also scan products in your bathroom cabinet so you can learn more about what you already own. They give you the list of ingredients and rate each ingredients so you can see if there is anything harmful in the product and if so, what level of harm it is considered. Yuka is good in that you can also scan food products as well as cosmetics.
The only thing you have to make yourself aware of is that these apps rate some ingredients differently. Thankfully it is only a few ingredients so it doesn't make a huge difference to your understanding of the product. The other thing to look at is that Think Dirty grades products on a scale of 0-10, 0 being the best and 10 being the worst. If you see a product come up as say an 8, but its a product that you have heard is clean and reliable then click to see how many ingredients are coming up as an 8. It may be that there are 20 ingredients in the product and 19 of those ingredients score 0-3 and there is only one ingredient coming up as an 8. If this is the case then take a look at where that ingredients comes in the list of ingredients on the packaging. If it is the very first 5 ingredients listed then this is bad as the first 5 ingredients on the list makes up most of the product.
Determining The Meaning
However, if it is coming up as the last item in the list, of all 20 ingredients, then it means there is a minute amount of this ingredient in the product. At that point it is a judgement call for you to decide how you feel about a tiny amount of that toxic ingredient. However, there are many products on the market that score 0-3 for everything single ingredient! So it is possible to get totally and utterly clean products.Yuka on the other hand scores in percentage. For instance if a product scores 20% then this means only 20% of the product is good and that the remaining 80% is toxic. I personally like Think Dirty's way of marking products because I think it gives more scope for understanding the product, however, Yuka has more products on its system to check out. My advice is to have both apps. Whilst they do have in app purchases, you can download and use the bar scanner on both for free.Another useful tool is the EWG website. They don't have an app but their website is incredibly comprehensive and gives you loads of information on brands, products and ingredients. They have a website search engine to check out anything you want to learn more about.This is a great way to start thinking about the ingredients in products that you are using and start gaining an awareness for what clean exactly looks like on the shelves in beauty shops. Of course if you shop with Just BeYOUtiful then you safely know that the hard work has already been done for you as our shelves, online and instore, are filled with some of the most beautiful and effective clean brands in the world!
