Clean Beauty Series: Lesson #6

So, when it comes to your beauty care products, the magic rule of thumb is the first 5 ingredients are the ones that matter the most. After the fifth ingredient everything else is probably below the 1% line. This is where a lot of “questionable and obscure” ingredients hide.

What? 1% line? What the heck is that?

Simply put, any ingredient that is less than 1% of the total recipe can be listed in any order.  This is a great marketing ploy and a way companies can make you believe the ingredients are “better” than they really are.

How to find the 1% line?

Most companies put their “cleanest” or organic ingredients at the beginning of the 1% list.  You can usually spot the 1% line when you locate a few “organic” or natural ingredients followed by some questionable ingredients. Sometimes, there can be 20 ingredients that are less than 1%.

It is important to note that Clean Beauty Snobs know essential oils are very concentrated and these WILL be less than 1% concentration to be safe and effective. Other chemical ingredients can also be potent and very toxic at less than 1% concentration as well.

There are some exceptions to the 1% rule:

When companies want to trick you, they will list all of their “natural”, “plant-based” and “organic” ingredients at the start of the 1% line.

When you see organic oils or extracts in the middle of the ingredient list…and you KNOW that these should be the MAIN ingredients, you can understand why your skincare is not creating the beautiful masterpiece you were promised.

When you see water, synthetic and conventionally grown oils listed first and find all of the organic oils around the middle of the list, you will begin to understand why the 1% line is critical to find.

1% concentration of an organic oil is not enough for you to reap any benefits from that oil, especially if the first five ingredients are water, fillers and synthetic ingredients that take away more beauty
than they offer you.

You, my CBS, deserve high percentages of luxurious, soothing, healing, moisturizing oils that feed your skin nutrients to support ongoing collagen and elastin production.  The easiest way to prevent aging from showing on your face is by feeding it organic Skin-Food.

I don’t cut corners on ingredients,

quality, or packaging (more on why packaging matters soon).  

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