Horst Rechelbacher, Austrian-born founder of Aveda Corps., one of the first mainstream companies to eliminate toxic chemicals in products, and enthusiastic-pioneer of mass market plant based beauty, sadly passed away last month at the age of 72. But he left behind a legacy of healthier communities.

Throughout his work and career Horst Rechelbacher shed light on the dangers of toxic chemicals in cosmetics long before the conversation was mainstream. Most importantly, not only was he an outspoken advocate on the issue, he offered solid solutions.

Founder of beauty care companies Aveda and Intelligent Nutrients, author, ayurvedic scholar and organic farmer, Rechelbacher grew revolutionary companies supplying high performing products and a keen awareness to the vital importance of natural beauty.

He would famously drink hair spray and other products made by his company to prove they weren’t simply giving lip service. “Everything we put in and on our bodies must be nutritious and safe,” was Rechelbacher’s signature motto.

Our skin, like a sponge, absorbs mostly anything we put on it; yet cosmetic ingredients are not regulated the same way food is. In the last decade, studies linking cosmetic ingredients to cancer have uncovered the importance of Rechelbacher’s pioneering work. But long before the conversation was mainstream, he was formalizing the best, toxic-free products through Aveda, and later Intelligent Nutrients; safe alternatives in form that didn’t sacrifice function.

Through his companies and tireless advocacy work, Mr. Rachelbacher revolutionized the beauty industry forever.

Mr. Rechelbacher’s plant-based approached stemmed from his mother, an herbablist. At the age of 14, he apprenticed at a nearby hair salon; only three years later to find himself working in Rome. He went on to found Aveda in 1978, fusing plant science and beauty against the modern ideas of efficiency through chemicals.

Thanks to Rechelbacher’s dedication Aveda is the first beauty company to produce with one hundred percent wind power, and the first beauty company to use one hundred percent post-consumer recycled PET packaging.

After selling Aveda in 1997, Rechelbacher founded Intelligent Nutrients, a beauty company using only certified organic ingredients. Most of the ingredients used are grown on his 570-acre organic farm in Osceola, Wisconsin.

Horst left us with fundamental ideas of the power of nature. Below are three revolutionary shifts he brought into the beauty industry forever.

1. The Relationship between Plants and Beauty is Luxury

Horst launched his career at a time when laboratory science was the shining horizon of global industries; food, beauty and others were looking for leaps in efficiency via chemicals as the answer to limits of nature. But Horst held on to the intrinsic benefits plants have to offer, and believed in beauty from the inside and out. His luxurious products free of toxic chemicals offer an alternative to the mainstream, proving you didn’t have to sacrifice form for function.

2. Companies are Greater Than Their Final Product

Rechelbacher’s work went far beyond his products. As an outspoken advocate for eliminating toxic chemicals in beauty, Horst helped finance the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics. Today, the organization stands as one of the largest and most influential groups working towards regulating the cosmetic industry and increasing consumer awareness. Their most recent work persuaded Johnson & Johnson to remove two ingredients from their baby shampoo that are linked to cancer.

He also conducted his business as a holistic vision of health: He led Aveda to be the first beauty company to produce with one hundred percent wind power, and the first beauty company to use one hundred percent post-consumer recycled PET packaging. Intelligent Nutrients offers an ingestible product called Intellimune, made of five powerful seed oils: black cumin, pumpkin, red grape, raspberry and cranberry. His companies didn’t just make healthier products, but healthier and more holistic consumer world.

3. Natural is Not Only Good for Our Health, It’s Good For Business

In 1997, Aveda Corps. was sold to Estee Lauder for a reported $300 million, and is still carried in over 25,000 stores and salons worldwide. Now that’s good business.

To leave something behind, greater than ourselves, is a life well lived. Horst Rechelbacher founded and matured healthy companies that have touched millions of people. As the father of safer cosmetics, his legacy will live on; inside and out.

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image: Social Earth

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Are dangerous chemical toxins hiding in your personal care products? Thanks to a new cosmetics database released by The California Safe Cosmetics Program, it only takes a few clicks to find out.

Crazy as it might seem, a large portion of the personal care products sold in America contain ingredients known or suspected to cause cancer, birth defects, or other reproductive harm. These toxins have nearly unpronounceable names and are hidden inside shampoos, lotions, make-up and other products we slather all over our bodies on a daily basis.

To help consumers become more informed about what they’re being exposed to, The California Safe Cosmetics Program (CSCP) has created an online cosmetics database that makes it simple to find out if your favorite lipstick is putting you at risk for a life threatening disease.

“Searches can be done on a type of product, a specific product name, or a brand, chemical or company name. About 475 companies have submitted information for about 30,000 products so far, and the chemicals in the database include phthalates, mercury and mercury compounds, toluene and formaldehyde, among other known toxicants,” reports SF Gate.

Creators of the cosmetics database point out that just because a product contains a potentially harmful ingredient, it’s not necessarily a risk. Manufacturers are required to report the presence of a chemical, even if it’s only trace amounts.  Some chemicals are considered safe at certain levels of exposure. Although amount of ingredient is not listed on the website, it’s important to consider not just the levels of a single exposure, but cumulative exposure over a lifetime.

Encouragingly, the cosmetics database also contains information about about each of the chemical ingredients, and how chemical exposure can affects consumer health. Some health advocates say this website is an important tool for consumers that will continue the fight for safer cosmetics.

“The database reveals a snapshot of a Wild West industry where cosmetics companies can and are using a shocking array of unsafe and cancer-causing chemicals in seemingly innocent products,”  Janet Nudelman, co-founder of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, which is part of the Breast Cancer Fund, told SF Gate. “It will also keep the pressure on companies to reformulate products to remove chemicals linked to adverse health effects.”

Learn more about what’s in your cosmetics and personal care products at: www.safecosmeticsact.org

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Labeling in the natural beauty world is a lawless society.

The world of safe cosmetics is like a modern wild west, filled with outlawed ingredients, determined settlers, and wild, crazed shoot-outs. (See: the comment sections of any controversial beauty item.) And the new sheriff in town who is going to make everything right in the land? Cue dramatic music: there is no sheriff.

Call a product natural, and you’ll soon find evidence it’s not. Find something proclaiming itself organic, and maybe only 10 percent of the ingredients actually are organic. A product says it’s chemical-free? Then why are chemicals listed on the label?

It’s enough to make you want to hang up your sunbonnet (best chemical-free sun protection ever) and hide behind the skirts of your favorite schoolmarm.

Why the confusion? There are few to virtually no regulations on the ingredients we put in beauty products. In 2011, the Safe Cosmetics Bill was introduced to update the existing law on beauty regulation, which has not been revised since 1938. Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill, introduced the bill, noting “manufacturers are not required to disclose all their ingredients on labels, and the FDA has no power to supervise the use of toxic chemicals in cosmetics.”

So until this bill is passed, it’s up to us, the consumer, to figure out what to buy. It’s up to us to determine our own comfort level with ingredients. And foremost, it’s our decision on how natural we want to go with our products—since often times, products which proclaim themselves natural really aren’t.

Mia Davis, Vice President of Health and Safety for Beautycounter

I asked nationally-renown safe beauty expert Mia Davis to weigh in. Davis is the former Co-Director of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and current Vice President of Health and Safety for Beautycounter, a new beauty and skincare line. Recently, she shared her thoughts on natural beauty, safe cosmetics, and aging gracefully in a natural world.

Katherine Butler: Natural, organic, eco-friendly, green, and safe are all labels manufacturers use to sell their products. They all imply a level of cleanliness. What does it really mean for a product to say it is clean?

Mia Davis: A lot of time people are confused about that. They think “natural” and “organic” equals “clean” and “safe.” Many times, that’s the case. But to me, “clean” means safe—as in it’s not loaded with carcinogenic ingredients or petrochemicals that are harmful. Also, “natural” and “safe” are not mutually exclusive. I mean, poison ivy is organic and natural, as is lead.

KB: Good point. A lot of the unsafe ingredients are sometimes the ones that help a product perform. Do you have to sacrifice performance for clean ingredients?

MD: As a company, I think you have to work really hard to make sure that you are asking all the right questions to ensure that [your ingredients] are clean and safe—and performing. There’s another layer of complexity in formulating these products. As a consumer, you just really have to do your research and determine your own comfort level.

KB: Can’t we just trust that companies are telling the truth about their labeling?

MD: It’s really unfortunate how many companies are not fully disclosing their ingredients. When I was co-running the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, I heard from a lot of companies reporting on others that simply weren’t telling the truth, like “so and so are using hidden preservatives.” I wasn’t the cosmetics police, so there wasn’t much I could do. But as a consumer, I was horrified.

Now that I’m actually formulating products with a team of chemists for Beautycounter, I am shocked to learn how many chemicals have no safety data. I won’t name names, but there are several companies out there who are really marketing themselves on natural and organic products, and I would be willing to bet the farm that they are sourcing raw ingredients that are preloaded with petrochemical ingredients. Some aren’t harmful from a safety perspective. But from the consumer right-to-know perspective, it does worry me. They are marketing on something that isn’t true.

KB: What’s your take on more chemical-laden products like hair color and nail polish? Can you love doing your nails and still be committed to using natural products?

MD: I think it’s a spectrum. Hair color and nail polish are two of the products that tend to be the most chemically-laden and often hard to find a “natural” version. I prefer to say “less toxic” than chemical-free.

I think you just have to choose your battles and do what makes you feel good. I always push companies to make their products as least toxic as possible. I screen chemicals for safety, be they natural or synthetic. I want to be sure the ingredients in the products I use and promote are all okay for humans.

KB: So can you really fight fine lines, sunspots, without Botox or retinol?

MD: Well, you can prevent and minimize the look of fine lines—not permanently, but with makeup. That’s a version of fighting.

Can you fight these things with Botox or retinol? Yes, and people need to make their own decisions. But if you’re using something that is by definition toxic to fight an aesthetic result that you don’t like, you have to think about the long haul. Are you going to look better in the end by using a toxic chemical? We don’t know. You just have to do what you’re comfortable doing.

Plus, there are plant-based ways to help age gracefully. Vitamins E and C are really good for you. Seed oils are very nourishing and are great for prevention.

If you’re much older and have wrinkled skin, you probably won’t see a reversal. But that’s okay; shouldn’t we be more focused on aging gracefully?

KB: Hear hear! So how should the consumer keep herself informed in the lawless world of natural beauty?

MD: In the end, remember that “natural” could mean anything or nothing. Most people assume that the FDA or some other agency is backing up these claims, but none are.

In the food industry, companies get in trouble for calling something organic if it isn’t. This is not the case in beauty. So go out there and vote with your dollars. And ultimately, know we have to pass legislation so we don’t have to be so vigilant about labels. This industry hasn’t been regulated since 1938—it is high time we’ve do something, so we don’t have to have these conversations.

What can you do to determine your level of natural beauty? Check out this article on seven important beauty ingredients to avoid. Go to The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics to learn more. And be sure to consult the Environmental Working Group’s database for individual ingredients and product safety, Skin Deep.

Image: Mr.nomind via photopin cc

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Safe cosmetic ingredients is the name of the game for new body care line, Beautycounter.

“I believe strongly that women should never have to compromise their health in the name of beauty,” says Gregg Renfrew, who describes herself as a mother, wife, and friend. “I know we can do better, and that’s why I started Beautycounter.” Standing among a crowd of rapt women and men in a chic hotel in wintery Boston, Renfrew kicked off the launch of Beautycounter, a new beauty and skin care line designed around the safest cosmetic ingredients. Just how these products plan to save us may surprise you.

Beautycounter offers up the usual high-end face oils, shampoos, and sugar scrubs so popular with the organic set, but it promises its users much more than hydrated skin. It’s a social selling company designed to empower and educate women on the basic products we use daily, which oftentimes contain dangerous chemical ingredients. But Beautycounter also plans to inspire a country.

The Beautycounter launch at The Liberty Hotel, Boston, February 26, 2013.

Renfrew promises that the Santa Monica-based company has “done the homework for you” by using only safe, qualified ingredients that won’t harm your health. Citing high cancer rates, Renfrew points out that “using [traditional] products has a cumulative effect, and it can really influence us over a lifetime.” She notes that the European Union has banned and restricted more than 1,300 beauty ingredients, while the United States has banned only 11. “Even tiny amounts of these toxic chemicals can disrupt your hormone system and impair your ability to lead a health and long life.”

Beyond selling body care products, Beautycounter plans to enact change in the United States. Working together with three non-profits: The Environmental Working Group, The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, and Healthy Child, Healthy World, the company aims to make a difference for the individual while also promoting a large scale movement towards safe, clean beauty in our country.

And here’s how Beautycounter plans to do this: Styling themselves as “a social selling company,” they offer a $10 membership, with the proceeds allocated to one of the three non-profits working with the company. They also offer positions as consultants, where you can build a business around the products. As Renfrew explains, “You can sell Beautycounter anywhere, anytime—at a wine and cheese gathering, a Twitter or Facebook party, or just offer coffee with a friend.” Just think of your mother’s Tupperware party, but without the plastic and strange orange hues of the 1970s.

“What we all share is our common desire to move the needle in the right direction,” Renfrew promises. And with the right direction promising greater health among high-performing products, it’s a cause from which we all benefit.

You can learn more about the Beautycounter movement at Beautycounter.com.

Photos courtesy of Beautycounter

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