“Our ingredients are high quality; that’s why they are so expensive.”

It would be nice if that were true, but I can’t get any cosmetics company to give me proof of it. I’ve asked for the names of their suppliers to find out what grades of products they are selling and if they have inferior grades that go to some companies but not others. From what I’ve been able to find out on my own after talking to several cosmetic-ingredient manufacturers, the grades of cosmetic ingredients don’t vary that much, and everyone buys cosmetic-grade ingredients, which are all high quality. For example, DuPont is one of the largest suppliers of glycolic acid to the cosmetics industry (they supply over 99% of the industry who use this ingredient), and they supply the same version to everyone.