Beauty Without Bunnies: Cosmetic Companies You Didn’t Know Tested on Animals

Arlenne Lozano, Tom Tom Managing Editor

February 16, 2014

Cosmetic companies earn about $170 billion per year. Consumers spend 27 percent of their money on skin care, 20 percent on hair care, 20 percent on makeup, 10 percent on fragrances and 23 percent on other beauty products. These statistics make sense. What is shocking is that 80 percent of the ingredients in the beauty products are not tested for safety. The average American woman puts 12 to 20 chemicals on their face every year: this means that 12 to 20 chemicals are forced into contact with animals every single year.

Makeup is used to express oneself and cosmetic companies are there to help. Although, there are many popular companies that test their products on animals like rabbits, cats, dogs, ducks, monkeys and more.

Here is a list of ten of the biggest cosmetic companies world-wide that you didn’t know tests on animals:

1) L’Oreal Paris/USA

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2) MAC

3) Sephora

4) Lancome

5) Aveeno

6) Maybelline

7) Mary Kay

8) Dolce & Gabbana

9) Cover Girl

10) Estee Lauder

In an effort to understand further, an email soliciting information from L’Oreal was sent. L’Oreal Consumer Care Center Advocate Elizabeth responded as such:

“Thank you for your interest in L’Oréal Paris, a brand of L’Oréal USA, Inc.

At L’Oréal, we are committed to only market products whose safety has been proven. To do so, we have to be able to verify that there are no potential adverse effects when using any of our products. Traditionally, it was animal testing that allowed companies to assess the safety of their products and their ingredients.But in the early 1980s, L’Oréal realized that other scientific tests could one day replace animal testing. Our belief was that the future of testing lay in developing “predictive” tools, such as reconstructed skin models and computer modeling. It paid off: by developing these replacement tests, L’Oréal was able to end all testing of its products on laboratory animals, as early as 1989,without making our products any less safe.However, for some new ingredients, there’s still a small gap between what the replacement tests can help us predict about the ingredient and what we need to know to ensure its full safety, for example when predicting the ingredient’s potential for skin allergy. For these reasons, we still need to perform some animal testing, which today represents less than 1% of our safety assessments.L’Oréal is working hard to close that gap, by pursuing advanced research and developing cutting-edge technology, but the solution will also come from the collective work and shared intelligence of regulatory agencies and academic institutions.L’Oréal has already paved the way by setting up a worldwide center for Predictive Evaluation (near Lyon, France) which produces 130,000 skin models per year. It permits it to test over a thousand L’Oreal products for safety per year, and also commercializes its skin models to other companies of other sectors.Our ambition is to replace ALL animal testing. L’Oréal has chartered a new course for predictive evaluation which will one day allow us to end animal testing and continue to advance the science of beauty.

To learn more about our advances, please visit http://answers.loreal.com/animaltesting/en/.

Sincerely,
Elizabeth
Advocate, Consumer Care Center
Ref # 6972964″

Animal testing includes poisoning, burning and other methods of torture. Over the years, cosmetic companies changed their animal testing policy; Avon used to test on animals for products sold in China. While some cosmetic companies choose to test on animals, there are others that have openly discussed they are against the use of animal testing. Here is a list of ten cruelty free cosmetic companies:

1) AVON

2) Giovanni Cosmetics

3) e.l.f.

4) Burt’s Bees

5) Urban Decay

6) Smashbox

7) Nars

8) Tarte

9) Lush

10) The Body Shop

By switching brands, it is possible to potentially save an animal. Beauty without bunnies takes just one step. Are you up for a change?

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About the Contributor

Arlenne Lozano, Tom Tom Managing Editor

Arlenne is an avid coffee drinker and a lover of animals and words. Her passion is to merge her passions to be a well-rounded journalist and humanitarian.

Comments (3)

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Ann Miller • Mar 9, 2014 at 9:10 am

Hi, I am a local, chemical free beekeeper. I bought an ad in the Antioch Tom Tom because my goods are sold right across the street from Antioch High School at Polson’s. My products are not tested on animals. I raise by bees in Richmond on 2 different organic farms. My lip balm has .2 oz per tube. Burts; a little more than half of what I purvey.
They are also sold at sweet Kathleen Stewart’s shop, Stewdio 9, in Milburn. Call me, I’ll send you a sample!
Please try it,
Ann Miller


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  Arlenne Lozano • Mar 10, 2014 at 8:19 pm
  
  Thank you very much, Ann! I will be more than happy to try it! And thank you for this feedback.
  
  Arlenne Lozano
  Tom Tom Assignment Editor
  
  
  https://www.sequoitmedia.com/beauty-without-bunnies-cosmetic-companies-you-didnt-know-tested-on-animals/#comment-805
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Isabell • Feb 17, 2014 at 9:59 pm

It’s funny because we say we want to change and save the world but we are involuntary affecting it! Good job!


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