What Is Clean Beauty?

To learn more about our commitment to clean and sustainable beauty please head to our “clean beauty” page here. Everything we make at Genie Supply is clean + we can’t wait to work with you!

The term “clean beauty” sounds simple and straightforward enough. No chemicals or nasty ingredients in beauty products, right? Not exactly. Many big-name beauty brands have initiated regulations for their products to be all things clean.

It’s a great initiative to start, but as more people have become aware of what they use on their bodies, the less truthful brands are becoming. 

Clean beauty is challenging to define because there’s no set definition. Terms like ‘organic,’ ‘natural,’ and ‘chemical-free’ have become token words on labels to attract consumers. With such generalization comes mislabeling and popularizing beauty products that aren’t actually clean.

For more information on clean beauty, Vogue and Bazaar have excellent reads. This article is about what clean beauty means to an entrepreneur; the standards, means, and why you want to create a clean beauty brand. 

Clean Beauty Brand Standards: From Least Clean to Most Clean

1. Sephora

It shouldn’t be any surprise that Sephora is the least clean of all the clean beauty brands. Since their clean beauty debut in 2018, Sephora’s clean beauty guidelines are loose because they don’t want to drive away significant clients who make the products. 

Their list of excluded ingredients includes parabens, sulfates, phthalates, synthetic fragrances above 1%, etc. However, if you have little experience working in a lab, you can’t tell what’s what. Sephora still allows the use of silicones and petroleum, which are often cited as dirty ingredients and grace the ingredient list of almost every single skincare and color cosmetics available on the market.

A list of 50-100 items isn’t helpful to the average consumer because all they see is a long list. Most of the items on that list are ingredients that shouldn’t be in clean beauty products anyway. It’s a no-brainer for chemists, but it seems typical for the consumer. 

Sephora is smart to use 1,4 dioxane testing. This test proves their products do not have the carcinogen that’s linked to toxicity in organs. 

2. Ulta

Normally, I would say Ulta is similar to Sephora in terms of being the least clean and making their clean beauty initiative sound acceptable to consumers on the surface level. While they made a list of items that cannot be used in their products, that information is not listed anywhere on their site.

As of June 2020, Ulta has announced a partnership with Credo (don’t worry, I’ll get to them). 

This step towards making clean beauty is a smart business move because it allows both parties to benefit for different reasons. Credo only has eleven retail locations and can gain lots of exposure for their brand while Ulta gains a certified ally for clean beauty.

Another good thing about Ulta is their commitment to the environment and how their products are manufactured and broken down. Even though Ulta still has a long way to go, they’re headed in the right direction to ensuring clean beauty.

3. Beautycounter

Beautycounter is a clean beauty brand striving to make an impact. While Ulta partnered with Credo, Sephora partnered with Beauty counter in June 2020, and it makes sense.

Since their start in 2013, Beautycounter has been creating “The Never List” where they refuse to use 1800+ ingredients in their products including formaldehydes, parabens, PEGs, and synthetic fragrances above 1%. They do not, however, provide a full list and only list some restricted items.

Beyond the usual PET and stability testing, they also require heavy metal testing. Similar to Ulta, Beautycounter is committed to sustainable packaging that adds to the environment rather than detracting. They also ensure all of their products are ethically sourced including mica.

According to their site, they acknowledge the controversy with the mica industry and child labor while continuing to use mica in their color cosmetics.

4. Credo

There’s a reason why Ulta partnered with Credo. Credo’s guidelines for clean beauty is tough and goes far and beyond Sephora. They don’t just go for ingredients that are good for your health or pass the EWG ratings. Credo also houses a majority of vegan and cruelty-free products on top of all the ingredients that shouldn’t be in clean beauty.

If ethically sourced, Credo allows the use of lanolin, carmine, and beeswax. Due to association with child labor, mica also is no longer allowed unless it is synthetic. This rules out almost all existing color cosmetics on the market and truly establishes a new standard for what “clean” means in color.

All of their products also have to go through a variety of tests- PET, stability, ocular, and skin patch. They also require a heavy metal test for color cosmetics. Not sure what those tests mean? Read more in our “Cosmetics Test” article.

Each year, Credo adds more and more regulations to their clean beauty standards, which makes it harder for products to get approved. While they still use some petroleum and silicones, their list is currently sitting at over 2700 ingredients that cannot be used in their products.

The best things they’ve excluded are PEGs and ethoxylated ingredients. Taking out these ingredients are great but can make it extremely difficult to formulate products such as mascara. 

5. Whole Foods

The cleanest of the clean, Whole Foods does what all the other companies do with a few additions. Unlike Credo, Whole Foods does not allow petroleum, mica (not even synthetic), and all of their products must be vegan and cruelty-free. 

You’d think there wouldn’t be a downside to getting super clean beauty products. Truth is, ‘too clean’ can make things dangerous. Consumers think that it’s all a simple process. But when you remove petroleum, silicone, and ethoxylated ingredients, it makes things very difficult to formulate because these preservatives maintain a longer life for their products.

Create a Clean Beauty Brand with Genie Supply

Clean beauty can be challenging to manage for an entrepreneur which leads you to two options. The cheapest route allows you to choose from a list of ingredients you want to exclude like BeautyCounter.

Make sure you know what and why you’re creating a clean beauty brand. As you can see above, all of those beauty brands have standards that conflict with one another.

The expensive route is setting your own list and being a voice for clean beauty from the start. While this sounds easy enough, custom formulating is a process that not everyone is willing to take on. 

Genie Supply has tons of experience in custom formulating (especially clean beauty) . For example, we use luxury oils and amino acids to mimic silicones and petroleum, and we have synthetic beeswax or lanolin for people who don’t want any animal by-products.

It can get expensive if you want us to remove over half the ingredients of a cult classic. While petroleum, PEGs, ethoxylated ingredients, and silicones aren’t healthy for you, they are found in almost every singly luxury cosmetic and skincare item on the market.

Every tradeoff you make with an ingredient costs you more time and money. 

Currently, we’re working on our green and clean catalog that meets current clean beauty standards at Credo, and would allow a wider array of clients to private label clean beauty for their own brand without breaking the bank

(Update: It’s finished!). Now, we offer a full collection of green + clean beauty products ready for private label at 500+ units.

Everything that we make at Genie Supply is clean beauty. Period. That’s just what we do. If you want to work with us and have the strictest beauty standards, you’re looking at tripling your costs. If you wanting to go by Sephora or Ulta’s beauty standards, it’s pretty easy to do. 

Interested in Creating Clean + Sustainable Beauty with Genie Supply?

To learn more about our commitment to clean and sustainable beauty please head to our “clean beauty” page here.

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