Last year I made the decision to go cruelty free and stop using beauty products that are tested on animals. Before I made that leap, I thought that going cruelty free meant spending lots of money on obscure hard to find products. Boy, was I wrong! It’s become easier and easier to find great products that don’t come at the expense of our animal friends. Seeing as it’s #BeCrueltyFree week this week, I think there are a few things you need to know about cruelty free beauty.
1. Not all companies are created equal. Be aware that there are a number of companies that claim to be cruelty free, but sell their products in China and other countries where animal testing is mandatory (you can read about that here)! So, how do you figure out who you can trust? You can check one of the many great resources (the SAFE Shopper App, the Choose Cruelty Free list and search PETA’s Cruelty Free list). If there is a company who you’re not sure about, ask! Ask them on Facebook or via email, ask bloggers, ask Google!
Australis, e.l.f. cosmetics, Urban Decay and NYX are all cruelty free, hooray!
2. Cruelty free doesn’t mean inferior quality, higher prices or harder to find. There’s a good chance that some of your favourite brands are already cruelty free, so this could be easier than you thought! Popular brands Australis, e.l.f Cosmetics, Urban Decay and NYX are all cruelty free. As with all cosmetics, prices vary, but E.L.F. is a super popular brand that you can find at Kmart in New Zealand for like $5 or something. There are so many reasonably priced cruelty free brands that price and quality is no longer an excuse.
3. Making the decision to go cruelty free doesn’t mean you have to replace all of your beauty products in one go. We want to make this an easy transition, right? I don’t like the idea of wasting products, so when I decided to become cruelty free I gave some of my products to friends, and replaced the rest as I finished using them (or they expired). This made the whole process super affordable and it gave me time to research new brands that I hadn’t heard of before.
New Zealand has many great beauty brands including Living Nature, ecostore, Verité Spa Organics, Trilogy and True
4. There are lots of local brands that are cruelty free! New Zealand is an absolute skincare haven – we have loads of great cruelty free brands here, including Living Nature, ecostore, Verité Spa Organics, Trilogy and True. A lot of NZ brands include our beautiful native botanicals, and there are loads of organic options as well.
5. “I’m just one person, how can I make a difference?” Trust me, there are a lot more people out there who want to end animal testing. Making a personal commitment to choose cruelty free might not seem like much, but as more and more people express their concerns over animal welfare in the beauty industry, more companies will be willing to look for alternative methods for testing. You can vote not just with your wallet, but also by doing things like contacting your local MP, letting companies know that you’re not using their products anymore because they test on animals, and getting involved in anti-vivisection campaigns.
Wise words from Ricky Gervais about animal testing / via Twitter
The European Union (EU) and India already have legislation in place that bans cosmetic testing on animals, and it’s about time that the rest of the world joined them. After all – if this successfully operates in other countries, surely it is proof that vivisection is not necessary for the rest of us? This week I challenge you to think about the products that you use, and join me in asking New Zealand’s Parliament to ban animal testing on cosmetics (it’s super easy and takes less than 2 minutes).
What’s your favourite cruelty free beauty brand? Let me know in the comments below!
Yay! So important that we speak with our wallets and only buy cruelty free products 🙂
Yeah if only China would stop that, then that would open up the brands like MAC etc again 🙂
Awesome post, and NYX and ELF are great products (well a lot of them) at a price we can afford, would be a lot cheaper if we lived in the states though lol. But back to the topic, it would be interested to see what people feel about cruelty free brands which are owned by a non cruelty free company, L’Oreal own The Body Shop, Urban Decay and so on, so even though those brands are cruelty free, are we still not supporting companies that are not actually cruelty free. I am in 2 minds about this, I used to buy there brands but lately have been avoiding them, as I don’t want to support brands that are owned by a non cruelty free company. Its so tricky. Another awesome NZ site is Bella Vi 🙂
I’d love to hear people’s thoughts on that too! Personally I think that it’s important to support cruelty free brands that are owned by larger companies, because we want to show them that cruelty free is a viable option for their business. When they see these brands doing well, and people being vocal about the fact that they want cruelty free cosmetics, that’s more incentive for them to make those changes. In fact, L’Oreal is very aware of the cruelty free debate, and goes so far as to make statements about the fact that they are cruelty free … except they keep selling their products in China – which is such a shame! I’d love to see a large company like that pull it’s products from the Chinese market until the testing is no longer conducted – large companies like that could have so much sway with issues like this!
I LOVE E.L.F. products. They work well and are very affordable.