Women's Media Nation | Social, political, and cultural issues relating to women

The hot new color for beauty? Green.

posted by ChickSpeak
Friday, September 4, 2009 at 7:55pm CDT

Everyday women have to make choices regarding their appearance.

What jeans will make your legs look two feet longer? What shirt will hide that extra five pounds? What shoes will hurt your feet less? What kinds of beauty products should you use on your skin and body?

Over the last few years that last question has become more and more difficult to answer. There were always a lot of choices concerning beauty products, so many products in varying categories of uses and intended results. However, now the big choice isn’t whether to spring for that Chanel face-wash, or just stick to your tried and true Clean and Clear, it’s whether you should spend a little extra cash and go organic.

Organic or “green” products may seem to have just sprung up, but in reality they have been around a long time. Beauty companies like Aveda and Jurlique have been around for about a decade, selling natural and organic beauty products. But more recently, the public’s high demand for everything organic from foods to clothes, have trickled down into the beauty industry.

According to the Organic Monitor, a research and consulting company that specializes on the global organic and related product industries, the natural and organic body care industry is growing 20 per cent every year. This high rate of growth has sprouted a plethora of new beauty lines and products, many of which are more affordable to the public.

But organic products aren’t new. There have always been natural products, but it’s the accessibility that’s really changed. Organic beauty started as a more of a prestige, higher-priced area and is only more recently moving into the mass market. This gives people, who wouldn’t normally buy these kinds of items, the chance to.

As evidence of this new accessibility, Target, one of the biggest mass retail stores in the United States, recently opened a new Natural’s aisle in their Health and Beauty section. In that aisle only natural and organic products are sold with lines that include Burt’s Bees, Weleda, and Alba.

Price has always been a factor when picking out products, but now more then ever. In this disastrous economy, even spending 5 extra dollars on a face-wash is not a feasible option for most people. And when comparing a Burt’s Bees face-wash to a Clean and Clear one, there is a staggering difference in price. Both products were about the same size, but the Clean and Clear retailed for $3.49, compared to Burt’s Bee’s $8.00 price tag.

Although looking at their respective ingredient lists is staggering as well. While Clean and Clear’s ingredient list is almost unreadable, with unpronounceable chemical names like phenoxyethanol, Burt’s Bees, with ingredients like jojoba and safflower reads more like things you might find in your garden or refrigerator.

So that’s the question, is spending the extra money worth it to not get those harmful chemicals on your skin?

“In the long run, buying an organic or natural product will benefit your skin,” Cynthia, a beauty expert at Sephora, said as she stands next to Naturals product wall in the Sephora store.

Cynthia goes on to explain that products like Sephora’s best selling natural Claudalie, doesn’t contain any harsh parabans, or the chemical phenoxyethanol.

“Over time the parabans and chemicals like phenoxyethanol can do a lot of damage to your skin,” she said. “So quite frankly, spending a little extra cash for a natural product is going to do you a lot better.”

A product like Claudalie, Cynthia explained, has special radiance enhancers for your skin, which will eliminate the appearance of wrinkles, and give your skin a glowing finish that most women die to have. But the price tag for those radiance-enhancing ingredients is steep. For a 6.7 oz facial cleanser, the same size of the Clean and Clear, you will be charged $26.00. It’s a hefty sum for most, but according to Cynthia it’s worth every penny.

As of now natural products are still lagging in sales behind regular ones, at least at Sephora explained Cynthia, but she thinks that could change.

“In the next year or two, as more awareness is being made about how much better these products are, I think there will be a big increase in sales,” she said.

The fact that organic products are more expensive still deters many from purchasing them, but it might not for long. If the demand for organics keeps growing at the rate it is more and more organic beauty lines will start springing up, which hopefully will mean more affordability for the mass consumer. In the meantime, it might be time to give a natural product a try, who knows that safflower oil and jojoba may give you such beautiful skin that you’ll never go back to non-organic again.

Kimberly Reiss is a recent Boston University graduate with a degree in magazine journalism. She hopes to work at a magazine, preferably in the beauty department, and is now plugging away to find her dream job.

Photo from sephora.com