Skin care without microplastics

The reason why Cathy and Angela started Food for Skin at the end of 2020, and sell skin care without microplastics , is because Angela scanned her bathroom with the Beat The Microbead app from The Plastic Soup Foundation. With 1 photo of the ingredients list you can immediately see whether your favorite day cream, serum or cleanser contains microplastics. Angela was shocked. Her findings were in line with the Plastic Soup Foundation's official research: 9 out of 10 popular skin care brands contain microplastics.

As a consumer you have no knowledge of this, because who today manages to read those ingredient lists in super small print and in a strange language (mix of English and Latin)? This may work if you are a chemist, but most of us are not 😉

Why is skin care without microplastics not yet the norm?

There are more than 500 different names for microplastics that can be used in skincare. The good news is that a large part of this will be prohibited from consciously adding to cosmetics from 2035. Why does this take another 11 years? The cosmetic manufacturers lobby is apparently strong and has enforced this.

We know from experience that reformulating, testing and relaunching facial care without microplastics takes about a year. Large companies can probably do this much faster. So why wait another 11 years instead of 2?

Microplastics are added because they are cheap lubricants. Literally and figuratively. Microplastics are made from petroleum and these are extremely cheap ingredients that make a product spreadable. Certain major brands would rather not do away with this, because then the cost price of a product would be many times higher.

Facial care without microplastic

What makes Food for Skins facial care produced without microplastics ?

• Food for Skin adds absolutely no microplastics to its ingredients. In fact, all our ingredients are of natural origin and are used in the purest possible form.
• We use glass bottles and jars to prevent the risk of contamination with plastic.
• The sunscreen tubes made of 100% recycled plastic from the Netherlands have a biodegradable layer on the inside, so that the risk of contamination is minimized.
• The Plastic Soup Foundation has checked all our products and we have received the 'No plastics inside' quality mark for all products.

Does every product packaged in plastic automatically contain microplastics?

No, you can't say this so loudly. The risk of 'contamination' is certainly there, but it depends on the type of plastic and whether it has a protective layer. As mentioned above, we have a biodegradable layer on the inside of the SPF tube. For example, Bisphenol A (BPA – a chemical found in plastic products) is known to quickly 'contaminate' the contents. That's why you now have BPA free bottles.

Day cream without microplastic

Microplastics are now found everywhere: in the sea, in fish, in animals, in plants, in the air, but also in people. Microplastics have even been found in an unborn child (Source: Plastic Soup Foundation). Does this mean that nothing can be done about it? Fortunately. We use cosmetics (toothpaste, deodorant, creams, serums, cleansers, sunscreen) every day. Every day you can prevent this from ending up in the environment by choosing ( skin) care without microplastics .

Care products without microplastics

We are a partner of the Plastic Soup Foundation, together with the following brands that we therefore highly recommend for microplastic-free care:

• Food for Skin
• Naive
• Weleda
• Beach Street
• Loveli
• Zarqa
• Inika
• Muse
• Happy Soaps
• Happy Earth

Together we support the Plastic Soup Foundation in the fight against microplastics in cosmetics.

Would you also like to help? Read more about it in our blog about microplastics that we wrote earlier.