Life is full of little annoying little things. Chipped nails and stale coffee Emily in Paris. For me, tiny mirrors are the crown. Keep with me. Actually, dont. You should go through your beauty bag. How many tiny mirrors can you find in your blusher compacts, eyeshadow palettes, and lipstick lids. If you don’t want to move, there are many. What makes tiny mirrors worse than stubborn stainors? An English character who can’t finish sentences without saying mate or inviting someone out to the pubis. When I asked my wingwoman Google for her advice on how to recycle them she said that it was impossible. Blunt, yet sadly true.
We have a problem as a culture with our consumption. We want more, faster, better, and more. When I began curating my makeup collection over a decade ago, I didn’t think about sustainability or recycling. I didn’t think beyond the new colors I wanted, the new formulas that I wanted, or the beautiful packaging that caught my attention. This is not a rare thing. Global beauty and personal-care market value is expected to exceed $716 billion by 2025. Many of those items will end up in a drawer. Vaseline’s 2014 study (the most recent I have found on the subject) showed that 77% of UK beauty consumers used less than 10 items per week. Mirrors are only one example of waste. Each year, the beauty sector produces 120 billion units worth of packaging. Most of it is not recyclable.
However, as with all environmental problems, we can’t blame everyone. As with fast fashion, there is a growing beauty market that encourages people to buy new products every day. the. time. This sector of the beauty industry is a beast that thrives on us being lured in by limited-edition palettes and mascaras that can extend lashes like no other. They also offer moisturizers that will leave you with the most beautiful of glows. The beauty industry is a fast one that wants us all to just throw everything in our faces, get rid of it, and start over. Despite the destruction and incessant waste it creates, we continue to feed it because we are told by brands that it is acceptable. It’s necessary, it’s fun, and it will make us happy.
The rise of fast beauty
ColourPop was launched in the mid-2010s and became an instant hit. The brand was instantly popular and its social media followers, now at 10 million, soared. The brightly colored, high performance formulas of the California-based cosmetics company were key to its success. However, its business model of rapid production, low prices and savvy social media usage saw it rise to the top of the cosmetics industry. Basically, ColourPop took off by applying the fast fashion model to beauty,” founder Laura Nelson told Fashionista in 2018.
Fast beauty is similar to fast fashion in that it minimizes the time between production and sale. This allows brands flexibility to keep up with consumer demand and changing trends. Ericka Rodriguez, the founder of slow-growing organic beauty brand Axiology, says that both fast fashion and fast beauty brands produce new products at lightning speed in a continuous cycle. They encourage people to buy new, fresh, and new products.
This is fashion’s way of producing the latest trends in polyester as quickly as possible. This can mean offering very similar formulas in new, creative ways. ColourPop is a master at collaborating with film, game, and sports franchises to create new collections. Kylie Cosmetics, for example, releases birthday packaging every year. Malibu Barbie is one of its most recognizable partnerships. FrozenAnimal Crossing The MandalorianThe NBA. This tactic is also used by Makeup Revolution in the UK. They are constantly collaborating with mega-influencers such as Alexis Stone and Weronika Swa, as they do with brands like Bratz or Disney.
These products are most often packaged in plastic and, as mentioned, difficult to recycle. This is only one problem. More than ever, brands want to get these products as quickly and efficiently as possible. Lush and DoorDash have partnered to offer same-day shipping. Sephora can also deliver certain orders within the time frame. Two hours. Convenient, yes. However, all those non-consolidated journeys come at a cost: The shipping industry emits almost a billion tons CO2 each year. This accounts for three percent global emissions. In addition, 18 to 30% of global nitrous oxide emissions are contributed by the industry, which is three times as potent as CO2.
There is a growing consumer awareness about beauty sustainability issues. A recent poll by WeDoMore than half of beauty consumers believe the environment is an important consideration when purchasing products. Just like fast fashion, which has conscious collections but little to no meaningful change, beauty can also use greenwashing in order to make its products seem better for the planet. Kaveh Kazemi/Getty Images Sustainability-related buzzwords, like natural or vegan, are often used as marketing terms, but neither always means environmentally-friendly.
Why natural isn’t always sustainable
It is common to mistakenly associate synthetic ingredients and bad with nature-based ingredients. However, Dr. Joana Marto, a professor at the University of Lisbons Faculty of Pharmacy, has co-authored a 2019 study about sustainability in the cosmetics industry. She also said that many natural ingredients are used in cosmetics, raising several sustainability issues in terms the environment and human rights.
Cocoa butter is natural and vegan. However, it is difficult to produce ethically. 2019 Washington Post investigationThe Ivory Coast’s child labor crisis has been revealed. And in 2018, the most prominent research firm Verisk MaplecroftA study was done to determine the harmful ingredients in cosmetics. It found that cocoa is used in blusher and bronzer, as well as in body lotions and hand creams.
Another example is palm oil, which has a reputation for being a contributor to deforestation. It is found in 70% of cosmetics. It is also used in cosmetics for its shimmer and pigment. The Dutch child rights organization is in its 2019 year. Terre des Hommes Netherlands11,000 children were employed in Madagascar’s mica mining industry. Verisk Maplecroft discovered mica in 100% of the blushers, 40% of the mascaras and 60% of the foundations tested. The brands tested were not named by Verisk Maplecroft.
Marto says that the use of mica for pigment raises many issues regarding sustainability. Marto points out that child labour is still a major factor in mineral mining and the environmental impact. But she also noted that progress is being made in this area: L’Oral has pledged to ensure traceability and transparency in its supply chain, with 98 percent of its mica coming from secured sources.
Marto states that companies need to look at sustainability from multiple perspectives if they are to be truly sustainable. This covers everything, from raw materials to manufacturing, packaging and distribution. The truth is that fast beauty brands don’t care if they hit all these notes. The greenwashed distraction process can be completed as long as they have something to shout about, such naturally derived ingredients. Every problem has an antidote. Slow beauty brands place sustainability above profit from start to finish.
The beauty industry is being slowed down by brands
Beauty is a process. It doesn’t matter if you apply false eyelashes with precision or stick to a tried and true skincare routine to achieve maximum satisfaction. This should be mirrored in the supply chain. Like all sustainable solutions, the idea to take things slower is not new. Sustainable fashion is rooted in simpler ways of living. Before clothes were considered disposable, slow beauty principles can be traced back to an era before the advent of big-name makeup companies.
Mauli Rituals UK is a UK brand that produces small batches to allow for thoughtful and considered product creation. The brand is based on Ayurveda which was an alternative medicine system that was developed thousands years ago in the Indian subcontinent. All of us are connected. Anita Kaushal is the brand’s co-founder. We’ve lost touch of the importance of slow, whether it be beauty, fashion, food.
Slow beauty is fundamentally based on the principle that less is more. This has led many brands, such as Mauli Rituals to look beyond traditional skincare and makeup products. Multipurpose products are a common way to reduce waste and increase efficiency. Karen Lee-Thompson is the founder of Wo Skincare, a slow, multipurpose skincare brand. She says: We see a lot waste in the beauty sector, so we constantly create new products and encourage consumers to buy more. We want to think differently. Rodriguez shares a similar viewpoint with Axiology. She explains that we only launch what is necessary and do so in a slow, deliberate manner. The goal is to replicate nature so that no waste ends up in incinerators or landfills and can be reused.
Dew Mightys multipurpose focus is also on refillable containers and compostable packaging. Its Bloom Jelly Serum Bars can replace up to eight products in a beauty regimen. It rejects the fast-paced beauty industry. Tiffany Buzzato, the founder, said that fast beauty is just like fast fashion. Trendy product launches every few weeks are unnecessary if you create well-tested, efficacious powerhouse products that maximize results for all skin types.
All of us are connected. We all share a common goal: to look after the wellbeing and well-being of our planet and people.
Anita Kaushal, Mauli Rituals co-founder
These indie brands are extremely influential. In the beauty industry, bigger and more powerful brands are increasingly looking at smaller brands to be their leaders. They mentor them and invest in them as they show new, sustainable approaches. Take clean beauty. Rodriguez recalls that it started as a small movement of indie beauty brands. It is expected to grow to $11.6 billion by 2027. Bigger brands have already begun to experiment with multipurpose, zero-waste and low-waste products. Garnier launched solid shampoo bars in 2013, Charlotte Tilbury offers refills on many of its cleansers and moisturizers, and although it isn’t plastic-free Milk Makeups Lip + Cheek is at the very least multitasking.
Positive changes must be supported, and we must reject the quick beauty approach. It’s easy to fall into the trap of consuming, hoping that the next concealer palette or eyeshadow palette is the one-hit wonder your face needs. We were not simple creatures. Beauty is not something we love to buy new things. It is about us. It’s about taking time to be with ourselves in a world that requires so much of your time and energy in so many directions. We can embrace the slowness and beauty of the rituals we perform. We have the power to control the brands we choose. We can empower ourselves and our planet.