True Nature Botanicals CEO: ‘Few, if any, 100 Percent Natural Skin Care Lines Exist’

Despite claims by countless skincare companies that their products are 100 percent natural, few, if any, truly 100 percent natural skin care lines exist, True Nature Botanicals CEO Hillary Peterson writes in a May 2015 Huffington Post piece.

“Skincare brands and their marketing teams correctly assume that if consumers think natural is good, then all-natural and 100% natural must be even better,” she writes.

Peterson continues:

[T]hey overpromise (100% natural, 100% of the time) and under deliver. Here’s the scientific truth: water-based skincare products like cleansers, mists, serums, and shampoos are almost never 100% natural because they need preservatives (yes, synthetic preservatives) to last more than a few days on the shelf. Oil-based products can use natural preservatives like Vitamin E, but most are not 100% natural.

Consumers should be more concerned about whether the products they put on their skin are safe as opposed to whether they are 100 percent natural, according to Peterson.

“All Natural” Lawsuits

Consumers are starting to fight back against what they perceive as deceptive advertising. Consumers who purchased a personal care product because the label touted it as “Natural,” “All Natural,” “100% Natural” or a similar descriptor, when the product in fact contained unnatural ingredients such as chemicals, artificial colors, or fragrances, may be eligible to join a class action lawsuit investigation and pursue compensation for deceptive labeling and/or marketing.

A recent New York Times story characterized the term “natural” as a “slippery adjective” for which there is no legal standard.

“All Natural” lawsuits against food manufacturers have increased in recent years, with plaintiffs filing some 200 class-action lawsuits alleging deceptive marketing practices against food manufacturers who claim to produce products such as “natural” Cheetos Puffs, “all-natural” Sun Chips, “all-natural” Naked Juice, and “100 percent all-natural” Tyson chicken nuggets, when, according to the plaintiffs, these products contain ingredients such as high-fructose corn syrup, artificial flavors and colorings, chemical preservatives and genetically modified organisms.

In July 2014, the Trader Joe’s grocery chain agreed to settle a class-action lawsuit brought against it for labeling some of its food products as “All Natural” and/or “100 percent Natural” even though they contained at least one, or more, allegedly synthetic ingredients including ascorbic acid, cocoa processed with alkali, sodium acid pyrophosphate, xanthan gum, and vegetable mono- and diglycerides.

The litigation has also made its way into the personal care category. A class action lawsuit has been filed over Tom’s of Maine toothpaste, which the company website claims “never use[s] artificial colors, flavors, fragrances or preservatives.”

The Tom’s of Maine lawsuit alleges that the use of the word “natural” is “misleading” and amounts to “deceptive marketing practices because the toothpaste contains processed ingredients like the thickening and foaming agents glycerin and sodium lauryl sulfate,” Fox News reported.

In February 2015, a proposed settlement was reached over the labeling, advertising and marketing of Arm & Hammer Essentials deodorant. The label touted the product as a “Natural Deodorant” providing “Natural Protection.” Plaintiffs alleged that the verbiage was misleading because not all of the ingredients in the product are natural.

Peterson, of True Nature Botanicals, cautioned that “every brand has a responsibility to tell their consumers the truth about the safety of the ingredients they’re using. If they don’t, then don’t use them.”

Free All Natural Personal Care Products Class Action Lawsuit Investigation

Did you purchase a personal care product because the label said it was “Natural,” “All Natural,” “100% Natural” or used a similar term? You may be eligible to join a free class action lawsuit investigation and pursue compensation for your purchase(s) due to the potential use of deceptive labels and/or marketing.

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