Understanding organic skin care

When I began the journey of creating my own mother and child personal care line, I was full of enthusiasm; little did I know I would have so much to learn. I knew that I wanted to use what was best for my child, pure, natural and organic ingredients. Like any novice taking the first steps of a long journey my vision was simplistic and it would take years of education and research to have a deeper and more integral understanding of personal care chemistry and the blessings and pitfalls of the organic certifications process. Although I now have more knowledge of the personal care industry my mission has remained consistent: to provide safe, effective organic skin care products and to promote and contribute to the global consciousness of environmental issues so that our children have a beautiful safe planet to inherit.

As the CEO of an organic personal care line I am very aware of all of the confusion surrounding personal care certifications. I hope I can shed some light on this ongoing dialog so that the lay person has a better understanding of what each certification means, and that they can draw their own conclusions on the subject. There has been a plethora of viral marketing and green washing that has truly befuddled consumers and I imagine with all the pressure to go green this will continue. So opening up this conversation is more important than ever. Something that always gets my attention is the statement from natural products salespeople that their products have no chemicals. Since our world is full of chemistry and everything has chemicals in it. I realize how much confusion people have. So the question becomes what is good chemistry and what is toxic chemistry. First off everything is made of chemicals, we are, plants are, air is full of chemistry. It's here to stay. Chemical substances are (also sometimes referred to as a pure substances) and are defined as "any material with a definite chemical composition." When speaking about toxic ingredients I prefer to say that our products have no harsh or synthetic chemicals. And even “good” chemicals can be harmful in the wrong dosage. Organic does not always mean safe. Essential Oils need to be used at safe levels, unrefined oils can have high metal counts, and the list goes on. There are many things to consider in creating a safe, natural, organic product.

One of the things you never hear organic products talk about is PH levels! That’s because most of them aren’t pH balanced. What does this mean for you? Normal pH skin and hair levels are 4.5-6.5. Low levels are more acidic while higher levels are more alkaline. People who suffer from dry skin and Eczema tend to have higher level PH which makes their skin more vulnerable to bacteria infiltrating our skin protective layer. The higher the PH level of your product, the more drying and irritating to skin. Many organic products have High pH levels. I don’t know about you but I certainly don’t want to use this on my child.

One of the issues in the USDA Certification process is that it has been created from the lineage of agricultural standards which mean that personal skin care is over seen by the same entities that monitor crops and livestock. And although it was a good start in wanting to regulate standards for organic skin care it also has some pitfalls. For example, to adhere to USDA standards of hydrous formulas (water based) you need to use a 15% ethyl alcohol to preserve the shelf live for an adequate period of time. There have been many complaints and hospitalizations over the past 5 years with this push to either eliminate preservatives or use ineffective preservatives. At Noli n Nali it would have been no problem to produce a complete line of USDA certified products and might have even been a bit cheaper, but I made a conscious decision to make a product I believed in. Having a USDA certified line from a marketing standpoint might have been smarter but they are so limited in the ingredients on their list approved list. Hopefully this list will increase over time and offer more choices. Whenever possible we certify our product when formulations allow and use organic ingredients whenever available, if organic is not available we try to use wild crafted which is essentially the same thing. When we have an anhydrous formula (without water) it is easy to have a safe USDA certified product. I believe there is a place for everything. Ideally everyone could make products themselves with a week shelf life; we all know this is not realistic. We strive to satisfy the consumers need to have a quality safe skin care product with a reasonable shelf life.

People in the industry are very much aware of this dilemma. Joan Shaffer the USDA public affairs officer says, "We have no standards for cosmetics or personal care products, so standards have not been changed, The National Organic Program has jurisdiction only over standards for livestock and crops, and soon, fish. We cannot certify that something meets standards that do not exist." There has been a big need for a certification with appropriate research and qualified chemist in our country. In places such as Australia and Europe they have established organic certifying agencies specifically for skin care. These agencies have done extensive research of skin care ingredients and safety in products using qualified chemists to create standards. It is exciting that the United States now has OASIS, an organic standard for the U.S. beauty and personal care market, which was formed and launched by a group of concerned trade professionals representing the beauty and personal care industry supply chain. They are one of the strictest certifiers in the world, with higher standards than most. Their mission is to provide verifiable standards that support and promote organic and sustainable production for the beauty and personal care industry, utilizing principles of incremental improvement and continuous change.

OASIS was formed primarily from 30 founding members from suppliers, manufacturers and distributors—working together to set standards and clarity for organic beauty products. “Until today, the US has not had a dedicated organic standard for the beauty and personal care industry,” said Tim Kapsner, founding member of OASIS and senior research scientist for Aveda. “In absence of a true industry standard, companies applied the USDA Organic food standard for beauty and personal care ingredients and products. But the USDA’s food standards were never designed for this industry, and its strict guidelines limit even certain types of ‘green chemistry’ and pose significant challenges for those seeking to create certified products.”
“The beauty of OASIS is that as an industry consensus standard its members range from large, global brands such as Estee Lauder Companies and L’Oreal to third party and private label manufacturers to smaller, specialist brands such as Perfect Organics and Juice Beauty,” says Gay Timmons, chairperson of OASIS and founder of Oh, Oh Organics.

At launch time, OASIS will require 85 percent certified organic content, which will likely increase as “green chemistry” continues to evolve. The organization aims to improve standards to the benefit of the manufacturer, the consumer and the environment. Member experience with ECOCERT, the prevailing European standard and certification process, and the USDA’s National Organic Program has helped tailor the standard, which is the first of several standards that the group plans to create within the field of sustainability.

Gay Timmons has a great blog called Harmony or Sustainable Public Policy? http://www.ohohorganic.com/blog/ I highly recommend it! To give you the “reader digest” version. “Beginning in the 90’s the USDA standard took 11 years to come to fruition, there where over 40 national organic certifiers with different standards and seals and everyone was "better" than everyone else. “ The lack of reciprocity prompted the OTA (The Organic Trade Association) to push to harmonize the standards. A draft harmonized Standard was written by an OTA commissioned group and, in 1999, most of the larger certifiers signed on and agreed to use it, (of course this meant they had many meetings with their members and collected their thoughts). This was just as the NOP draft standard was being designed in Washington DC. A note – the first draft garnered something like 360,000 written comments sent to Washington.

This has never occurred in organic personal care standards. Based on history, we should do the same thing that occurred throughout the '90s for organic food: respect and support the various standards out there, keep demanding more credibility and more organic ingredients, and continue to evolve this very important path to clean and sustainable cosmetics and personal care products. The folks who are extremely concerned about “organic” can buy USDA certified organic personal care products until such time as other standards are acceptable to them. In the mean time, I want to participate in the good old messy American process of “public policy” work.” In order to have the best standards and create the best products. Gay Timmons and her work with Oasis and Oh, Oh organics is highly respected in the organic industry and has been in the front lines creating many of the organic policies we see today. Thanks to work like hers we have better standards and more accountability in the industry.