Trying to read a cosmetic ingredient label is a lot like trying to read Shakespeare: you know it’s important, but you may have no idea what you’re reading really means. The Cosmetics Cop Team’s Cosmetic Ingredient Dictionary can help a lot, but the issue of how much of an ingredient should be in a formula is, for the most part, impossible for a consumer to understand.
For example, if you decide to look up decyl glucoside you’ll find out it is a gentle cleansing agent. But how much of that ingredient do you need and what other ingredients does it work best with? Or what about the dozens of other gentle cleansing agents that can be used instead? The same is true for antioxidants and countless other beneficial ingredients.
Making it even more complicated is the more than 20,000 cosmetic ingredients that a cosmetic chemist can select from to use in any formula in an endless variety of amounts. Now that’s really confusing!
Here’s what you need to know to make the most sense of it all:
1. The benefit or risk of any ingredient is in the dose, the form, and the delivery system. For example, salt is composed of sodium and chloride. Pure sodium and chloride by themselves are corrosive (think what happens when salt is sprayed on ice-covered roads), but together they become a tasty seasoning for food. But consuming too much salt can be a serious problem for high blood pressure. It works this way for each and every cosmetic ingredient as well.
2. While concentrations and formulation are everything, there is very little consensus in the cosmetic industry on how much of an ingredient is best or in what combination with other ingredients it should be used with. What studies do exist have limitations as the possible combinations are, quite literally, endless.
3. For most ingredients, knowing the percentage doesn’t give you much information at all because ingredients often work in combination with other ingredients, or as a part of other products’ formulations it is meant to work with. How much of each, and with what other products it’s to be used with, is the art of the formulator. I could never explain that for the large range of ingredients and products I’ve chosen to use for Paula’s Choice various skin-care systems, which is why, with a few exceptions, I have chosen not to reveal specific percentages for ingredients.
Delving a bit further into individual ingredient percentages, we always disclose the percentage of active ingredients required by the FDA for sunscreens, skin lightening, and acne products. We also share concentrations of the salicylic acid and glycolic acid we use because those ingredients do have specific research about how much is needed for optimal efficacy. But for the other ingredients I use in my products the specific percentage is what makes each formula unique to Paula’s Choice. Most important for you to know is that I have formulated my products based on my 30 years of experience in the cosmetics world using a cocktail approach to skin care.
Why “cocktail”? Research makes it abundantly clear that skin requires a cocktail (mixture) of ingredients to keep it healthy. Just like your diet requires many different foods to keep you healthy, skin is just as complex. No one skin-care ingredient can provide what skin needs.
Mixing different, state-of-the-art, and effective ingredients results in a more powerful blend that can make your skin look beautiful and radiant. Now that’s great skin care—even though the ingredient lists may stir more questions than answers!
