In our fifth episode of the Beauty Brains podcast Sarah and Left Brain tackle questions about what organic cosmetic products are and how you can tell whether your cosmetics have expired.
Please listen and let us know what you think. We’ll try to continually improve so your feedback would be most helpful. If you have any comments or questions, leave them below.
Thanks!
The Beauty Brains
Listen here.
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Show notes:
Listener Questions
5:00 – Question 1: How can you tell a cosmetic is expired?
Cosmetics are typically designed to last for an entire year but if you’ve got some that are older, they may not be good to use. Some of the key things to look for to determine if a cosmetic has gone bad is color change, odor change, and product separation. Microbial growth is also a big problem.
12:40 – Question 2: What are organic products?
There is no agreed upon definition for organic, natural or green. There are a number of different groups who have come up with their own standard for natural but no body agrees which is most important.
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18:20 – Beauty in the News
Organic perfume launch – The first organic perfume is launched.
iPads – Clinique uses iPads to help consumers figure out what skin products works for you.
Drugs disguised as cosmetics – The Brains talk about illegal drugs being sold as bath salts.
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26:00 Beauty product review
Yes to Tomatoes facial moisturizer
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31:00 Quiz – Can you name the Charlie Sheen quotes? Left Brain couldn’t.
Announcements
Book. Upcoming appearances – Rachel Ray Show on Wednesday, March 09, 2011.
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Hey!
great podcast 
really loving this website its great to find out the truth about so many products and untrue myths about mineral oil, silicones ect listening to your review on the yes to tomatoes moisturiser i’d love to know what products do you use to moisturise with?
Actually, there are strict definitions for organic and natural cosmetics in Europe, just search for “COSMOS-standard”.
Nice podcast.
You should call the fans “The Beauty Brain’s Brigade.” Lol.
@Meli – You are mistaken. COSMOS-standard is only one of many. Eco-cert, Soil Association (UK), BDIH (Germany),…etc. The list goes on and on.
make your own organic natural cosmetics, with simple products, at home.
@Left Brain: No, with all due respect for your work, you are mistaken. Cosmos-Standard is not “one of many”. From naturacosmeticsnews:
The COSMOS-standard is a new cosmetic certification developed to harmonize various certifications and labels in order to create one standard that is internationally recognized for natural and organic cosmetics.
The new certification is a result of Europe’s leading natural cosmetic certifiers coming together and forming a non-profit association, COSMOS-standard AISBL. The COSMOS-standard association consists of five founding members who now authorize and oversee the certification, including the Soil Association (UK), Ecocert (France), Cosmebio (France), BDIH (Germany) and AIAB/ICEA (Italy).
The standard goes beyond analyzing ingredients used to formulate the final product. It takes a comprehensive approach to natural and organic certification involving a review of the product’s total environmental and human impact.
Combined, the founding members represent over 1,400 certified cosmetic brands and more than 24,000 products sold in over 40 countries world-wide. The first products certified to these new standards are due to hit shelves in spring/summer 2011.
COSMOS-standard certified products will be labeled with the signature “COSMOS ORGANIC” or “COSMOS NATURAL”, depending on their certification level, in conjunction with the seal of the certification body involved. To get COSMOS ORGANIC certification, 95 percent of a product’s agro-ingredients and 20 percent of the entire product must be organic.
Under the new COSMOS-standard existing schemes run by the founding members will cease to certify new product according to their own standards as of December 2014. This transition period gives the opportunity for the founder members to phase out their standards over time, allowing their licensees to re-formulate products should this prove necessary.
@Meli – Thanks for your comments. You are correct that COSMOS attempted to harmonize the EU standards. Unfortunately, they were slow in coming to agreement and other standards have developed.
In the EU, the NaTrue standard (http://www.natrue.org/) is just as significant as COSMOS. Additionally, they have signed agreements with some US certification organizations (NSF) that may make the NaTrue brand more global in its impact.
We’ll wait and see I guess
, right now Cosmos-standard has already certified 24,000 products, NaTrue just 1,400.
If you are confused by all the various organic product certifications you can always look for products certified to organic food standards (like USDA Organic or Australian Certified Organic). The ingredients, manufacturing, etc all meet the same standards as organic food which is a standard everyone is familiar with. Makes it quite easy if you want truly organic products.
I haven’t listened to the podcast yet, I just stumbled across it. Its great to see the topic covered and I look forward to hearing your presentation when I have a moment.
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