Shifting gears to sustainable beauty

How do beauty brands make the changes that will make the industry more sustainable? Kirsty Mawhinney explores the steps taken by the beauty industry towards being cleaner and greener. 

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he climate emergency and the increasing threat to biodiversity make it abundantly clear that ‘business as usual’ is no longer enough. Beauty brands sourcing medicinal plants from around the world have a responsibility to become stewards for the people, plants and ecosystems on which they depend. Finite natural resources are being depleted and some are disappearing never to return. A growing number of people are looking for companies, products and services that support, protect and demonstrate actionable, sustainable initiatives and provide full disclosure from source to end of life of beauty products.

The definition of what natural skincare is has long been open to interpretation and on a positive note, more recently, we have seen the term ‘clean beauty’ grow in popularity. Cosmetic Scientist Meryem Benohoud, Technical Director at Keracol shares new developments in how we define natural, “Natural is becoming broader, it is more than the material sourced from plants directly. Processing, modifying and transformation of natural material are taken into account,” she explains. “The variety and diversity of natural ingredients have increased rather than depleted thanks to innovations in cosmetic science, being referred to as ‘Green Chemistry’”.

In February 2021, Professional Beauty World Modern Botany hosted a live conference and debate with Meryem Benhoud, Dr Simon Jackson of and Cecilie Oest- Jacobsen of Biosyntia. click here. To view this topic,click here

In addition to ‘natural’ in skincare, we are seeing the upcycling of food waste being used in skincare products as well. About 1.4 million bananas are thrown away every day in Britain.1 . In response to this, Kadalys, a skincare brand from Martinique, upcycles these throwaways bananas. A new cosmetic active ingredient called “Musactif’’ has been found within the banana supporting the skin’s synthesis of collagen and elastin leaving the skin more youthful in appearance. Coffee is another ingredient that is being upcycled for use in skincare products. The human population drinks 2.25 billion cups of coffee every day. The UK alone is responsible for 95 million of those cups. Resulting in an estimated 500,000 tonne of wet waste coffee grounds. Juan Medina of Kaffe Bueno shares that when we drink coffee, we are only using 1 per cent of the benefits of the coffee bean. Kaffe Bueno supplies the cosmetic industry with coffee to be used in skincare formulations. There are numerous benefits to the skin from regeneration to tanning You can view the discussion where Shirley Billot of Kadalys, Kaffe Bueno The Green Chemist clicking here. Juan Medina of and Dr Barbara Olioso of share the latest facts about upcycling and green chemistry by click here

How do Beauty brands make the change? 

The beauty industry is ready to take on the challenges and find sustainable solutions that support the natural diversity that we all value on our planet.

As we shift from a linear economy of make -- take -- dispose to a more circular economy of make -- use -- reuse -- share -- transform -- repair -- recycle there is a real business case for making the shift.

The circular economy principles could potentially reduce consumption of new materials by 32 per cent within 15 years and by 53 per cent by 2050. The transition towards a circular economy is estimated to represent $4.5 trillion global growth by 2030 while helping to restore our natural systems.2

The United Nations along with governments and regulatory bodies have all set targets to work towards reductions in carbon emissions and water consumption, in addition to striving for climate action and better life on land and in the seas.

Beauty is essential

Have you heard of the European Union’s “Green Deal’’ Published end of 2019? The overriding plan is to target climate – neutrality by 2050. Chemical strategy for sustainability will directly impact the beauty industry. Products and ingredients that are considered “essential” will be given more regulatory scope and looked at in an entirely different way.

John Chave, Director General of Cosmetic Europe, was quoted as saying, “The commission has taken a narrow view on what is essential. Beauty is “essential” and must be considered essential in a broader way.”

One of the challenges the beauty industry faces is that we are not known for the range, depth and variety of products, solutions and benefits we provide! We are more than colour applied to our lips! Not that this does not have value as we know that the sales of lipstick proved to be extremely resilient in recessions and financial downturns. Heard of the Lipstick Index? During the pandemic, we have all seen the value of hand sanitisers. Beauty and personalcare products make you feel good not only on the outside but also the inside. Touch therapy is essential for wellbeing as is a good haircut and colour – ask anyone who has not visited their beauty salon or hairdresser during pandemic lockdowns around the world and they will tell you how much it might have affected their confidence.

The packaging dilemma 

Packaging seems to be the number one point raised when discussing sustainability in the beauty industry. However, it is only one element in the complete lifecycle of a product, considering the end-to-end, or cradle-to-cradle journey of the product is essential when talking about sustainability. To ensure the industry is sustainable, we need to generate more than profit. Consumers are no longer satisfied with simply the product-purchase relationship, they want to become part of the brand they use, and they want to know the purpose of the brand beyond the business. Rachel Leon Wardrop of Aveda UK recently spoke at the CIPI conference hosted by Professional Beauty World. Rachel shared the value of having sustainability in the brands DNA and the commitment that Aveda has in putting CSR first. Aveda’s purpose is ‘to plant beauty in the world’.

Yet another informative webinar hosted by the Professional Beauty World ‘The path to sustainability’.

Pascale Brousse of Trend Sourcing spoke at the CIPI Conference held in March 2021, hosted by Professional Beauty World, and shared the following with virtual attendees; “There are two main concerns we are needing to address tackling waste and global warming.” Pascale went on to highlight, “It is hard to address both as they are incompatible with one another. Trying to avoid waste and the issues surrounding plastic will send you down the road of moving away to glass or aluminium. These materials are energy-intensive, which means significant emissions, and therefore not addressing climate change and vice versa.”

FACT NO.1: We have produced 8,300 million metric tonne of plastic since the 1950s. The vast majority of which has been thrown out as waste.3

FACT NO.2:

• Only about 9 per cent of plastic waste gets recycled.

• 12 per cent gets incinerated.

• Leaving 79 per cent of it to accumulate on our land and in the oceans, harming the environment, the food chain and, ultimately humans.3

Form and function play a vital role in the decisionmaking process of what packaging one ultimately chooses to use. Bioplastics made largely from cellulose, a plant-based polysaccharide material may be one solution, however the material lacks the robustness and flexibility of traditional petroleum-based plastics. It requires a large amount of land to grow the plants putting additional strain on the environment and food supply.

Consumers need to get behind the sustainability initiatives that brands put forward. Joanne Bell shared some interesting research at the CIPI Packaging conference stream, hosted by Professional Beauty World. Bell’s research came from “Meet the 2020 Consumers driving change Report”.4

• 80 per cent of consumers are value-driven and are concerned about the cost of products.

• 40 per cent of consumers are purpose-driven, caring about sustainability.

• 35 per cent of the consumers who are purpose-driven have a willingness to change habits.

This research can support whether consumers are incentivised to bring back used packaging to support refill, reuse and repeat packaging innovations as we are seeing from companies such as Terracycle and Loop programme.

If you want to hear how Mark Giannandrea from Davines professional hair care brand and others discuss the topic around packaging click here.

Provenance and transparency are the new currency 

Full disclosure from seed to shelf sustainability is no longer a conversation piece but essential to the future if we still want to have a professional industry and for that matter a home on this planet. A number of brands have already signed up to BCorp, Davines back in 2018 announcing that they were BCorp certified at The International Manufacturers & Distributors Forum. Sign up to today and be part of #UniteOnBeauty movement.

About the author: Kirsty Mawhinney is a beauty and skincare evangelist. Having spent the last 25 years developing her craft of educational and marketing communication targeted to the skincare and beauty sector, she now consults through her business Skin Insight. Follow Kirsty: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ kirstymawhinney/