The Body Shop White Musk Blush Smooth Satin Body Lotion Review
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We really respect and appreciate the late Dame Anita Roddick and The Body Shop for introducing campaigning and politics into consumerism and, because of that, being one of the main building blocks for ethical consumerism as we know it.
To this day, The Body Shop is ahead of the game on some issues. For example, it is rather exciting that the company aims to "activate self-esteem for everyone involved in the business" -- that's a new -- and great -- one to add to the checklist.
And we do think that, together with Lush, The Body Shop still leads the way in terms of campaigning for human rights and against animal testing -- through its own foundation and various other charities, such as the Helen Bamber Foundation. And having donated over £9.5m in grants so far through The Body Shop Foundation, we doubt the company does it just to look good.
The Body Shop was also the first international cosmetics brand to be awarded the Humane Cosmetics Standard for its 'Against Animal Testing' policy and its own fair trade programme, Community Trade, was the first of its kind to acknowledge that producers and farmers in the developing world deserve a fair price for their produce. It now works with more than 15,000 people through 31 suppliers in 24 countries around the world through this programme. It's so well-established that we regard it as fair trade although it's not certified as such by a third party.
While we have only praise for The Body Shop on the ethical side, we really think it needs to catch up on the green side of things. It aims to become a carbon-neutral retailer by 2020, which is a good start, and its environmental policies sound good, but we'd like to see more concrete results. And when we look at the ingredients of this body lotion, we can't help but be very disappointed.
There are some nice, natural ingredients such as sweet almond oil, hibiscus abelmoschuus extract (extract from the hisbiscus plant), and organic babassu oil and shea butter, which are also both Community Traded. However, other ingredients such as phenoxyethanol, methylparaben, linalool, butylparaben, butylphenyl methylpropional, propylparaben, limonene, cinnamal, geraniol, benzyl alcohol, eugenol and isoeugenol are flagged up as either moderately or highly hazardous ingredients on Skin Deep, the Environmental Working Groups Cosmetic Safety Database, with the parabens having been linked to cancer in a report by Dr P.D. Darbre.
Despite the dubious ingredients, we've still used the body lotion and must say it works really well. It's easy to spread and is absorbed very quickly. The scent is too poignant for us, but we acknowledge that's a matter of taste. We only need to apply it every other day to keep our skin soft, which is great as we're not big fans of spending precious time moisturising every day. We also like that it's manufactured in the UK and that the bottle can go in the recycling bin when it's empty.
We've previously used The Body Shop's body butters -- especially the olive and the cocoa butter ones -- which we think are just as good and more ethical and eco-friendly than the White Musk Blush Smooth Satin Body Lotion, too. The seaweed range would also have scored higher on the green side as the seaweed is sustainably harvested in Irish waters.
Then of course there's the much-debated take-over by L'Oréal to think about. We are very concerned about L'Oréal's poor track record in terms of animal testing and polluting and we're tempted to join the huge amount of ethical consumers who have decided to boycott The Body Shop on those grounds. On the other hand, we also support action rather than boycotts and hope that Dame Anita Roddick's idea that The Body Shop would help change L'Oréal for the better from the inside, will come true in the very near future.
We must conclude that The Body Shop does do some good stuff, both in terms of quality and ethics, but as this particular body lotion proves, you shouldn't fill your beauty basket at The Body Shop in the belief that it's all natural and green. But if you're after a great performing, affordable product with better ethical credentials than other mainstream body lotions, the White Musk Blush Smooth Satin Body Lotion is a good option.
Quality
Value
Ethics
Green
