Don’t worry – today’s post is not meant to put you to sleep. At least I hope not. So… Preservatives – ugh, what a boring topic. Who wants to hear or talk about them? Certainly not me!

But the impetus for this article comes from someone who wanted a private consultation with me and imposed extremely unrealistic, not to mention, unsafe conditions on the product recommendations she wanted from me. One of those conditions was No Preservatives. (I told her no, not possible and had to decline.)

And then, by sheer coincidence, one of my own products spoiled in spectacular fashion. That was my sign to write this post!

So let’s get the yucky part away first. Let me describe what can happen if you have a skincare product where the preservative system has broken down.

When Products Go Bad

I recently had to throw away a well known brand of micellar water purchased in France, found in ‘pharmacies’ (high end drugstores) and large budget chain stores. Mine was from Monoprix, which is equivalent to our Target. I bought this in 2010. And yes, I (sheepishly) admit keeping it for that long!

My reasoning goes something like this – I spent considerable effort getting it over here (the U.S.). Whenever I am in Paris, I load up on beauty products that I can’t get here easily. Micellar waters (eau micellaire demaquillant in French) is one of them. But they’re heavy and bulky because it’s mostly water in a large bottle. It has to be packed carefully to guard against spills during an international flight.

Why go through the trouble? Because at that time, micellar waters were uncommon here in the U.S. Much harder to obtain than in France, where it has been commonplace for years. And cheap too ($3-7 bucks for drugstore brands). Much cheaper than our current prices. I refuse to pay $30-50+ (what a high end department store brand might charge) for something that is cheap to make and is consumed in large quantities. Water-based cleansers are easy to make and inexpensive, and should be priced accordingly. By the way, French drugstore micellar waters (the brands actually sold in France) are fantastic – they remove so well, so easily, without stripping or leaving behind any residue.

Back to my insane hoarding of micellar waters from France – at the time, international ordering was not as easy and cost-effective as it is now (so many new beauty websites have popped up in the last few years alone). And then of course, how often could I fly there to buy more?

So, you can imagine my reluctance to throw away a brand new, unopened bottle – the last of my 2010 shopping trip. Cleansers are generally the type of product that keep well (long shelf life). Micellar waters even more, because it’s mostly made of water. Hence, why I kept them for so long.

Ah! But there’s the catch. This micellar water was for the eyes – the kind that can remove waterproof eye makeup. I forgot about that because most of my micellar water from France is for the face (this kind is uni-phased – more on this below).

Eye micellar waters are made of two phases. Inside the bottle are two liquid layers, separated by a visible border in the middle. These two layers are clearly separated. They may be different colors. One layer is aqueous (water-based). The other layer is oil-based. This is a DUAL PHASE system.

Before you apply the micellar water, you need to shake the bottle vigorously to break up and mix the two phases into one solution (one color, no separation). It’s like shaking a bottle of oil and vinegar to make salad dressing. After you are done, this solution quickly separates into two phases again. An example of this kind of micellar water is Lancome’s Bi-Facil shown here.

A colony of bacteria decided to invade and make my precious “I brought you all the way from France” bottle its new home. You want to guess which phase it decided to set up camp?

The Oil Phase! Why this part and not the other phase? Because anything fatty is an attractive food source, not to mention vulnerable to oxidation. Always remember that. Fatty ingredients go rancid more quickly, oxidize more quickly, and attract more organisms, big and small.

When I first noticed it, the bacteria appeared as a very tiny ball near the border of the two phases. It was barely visible. A few days later (the next time I reached for it), it was slightly bigger. A week later, it was bigger still, now a small blob.

[Oh no – this is not what I think it is!] And yet, I didn’t throw it out just yet.

Give me definitive proof you have ruined my bottle!

And sure enough, my new visitors gave it to me. The bacteria decided to form an ENORMOUS BLOOM inside this oil layer. An indisputable colony in the form of a humongous, gray cloudy blob that took up half the space of the top layer (the oil phase). When I looked at it two weeks later, my immediate reaction was revulsion.

YUCK! GROSS! Out you go! And not down my drains either! 

It disgusted me so much, I ran outside and dumped it into the grass, which I regret now. Only because I should’ve taken a picture of it to show you. A picture is worth a thousand words, and that photo would be far more persuasive than this article. But how about a loaf of moldy bread to fill in?

Why You Need Preservatives

So what happened? The bottle had not been opened from 2010 to 2016. I had only used the bottle a few times after it was opened before the bacteria appeared.

Most likely, the preservative system broke down, which happens over time. No preservative system lasts indefinitely. All mixtures break down eventually. Skincare ingredients lose their efficacy.

AND.. something contaminated the liquid bottle. I must’ve double-dipped. I probably put my soiled cotton pad (with the makeup from my eyes) back onto the lip of the bottle to get more cleanser onto the pad. BIG NO NO! It’s an easy mistake to make, especially if you are in a hurry or distracted.

And so another lesson is – DO NOT DOUBLE DIP YOUR SKINCARE, JUST AS YOU DON’T DOUBLE DIP AT PARTIES!

A soiled cotton pad (or finger) will easily contaminate the interior of the bottle (especially if you’re shaking it a lot).

Millions of bacteria and other critters (microorganisms) live on our skin. Most of it is good for us (they protect us). But not so nice for skincare products.

Preservatives are a no-brainer to me. Of course we need them. Unless you plan on making your own skincare every 3 days, your skincare products need preservatives to keep the bugs out.

Microorganisms

What are these bugs? First off, by bugs I mean microorganisms. You can’t see them. They’re microscopic. Every single surface around you, your whole body, and the air is filled with microorganisms. We are surrounded by bugs!

There are basically 3 main types of microorganisms:

  1. Bacteria
  2. Fungus (Mold)
  3. Yeast

Microorganisms tend to multiply VERY fast. Often exponentially. They spread if unstopped. They love moisture and heat. This is why you are always told to keep products in a cool, dry place (and away from sunlight).

Using contaminated skincare is usually not a life and death matter. But it can easily irritate your eyes or skin, and create chronic dermatitis (itchy, flaky skin) and allergy symptoms.

Preservatives are essential for your safety and and they extend the shelf life of your products so you don’t have to make them yourself or buy them every week. There are no if’s and but’s here.

How would you feel if you opened up a can of beans and found larvae or things crawling around in there? You don’t want your groceries to spoil, and you certainly don’t want to eat spoiled food. Same goes for skincare of course! If you’ve never seen black, green, or pink mold inside jars of cream, it’s not a pretty sight.

It feels like I am preaching the obvious, almost condescending talking about a matter that I assume is common sense. I’m sure most of you also think preservatives are a total no brainer. But if there’s even a few of you out there who insist on not having preservatives in your skincare, then it’s worth bringing up this topic. By the way, this person who wanted no preservatives in her products had shown me a passage copied from a blog. It was a long list of ingredients that the products could NOT have in them. Basically 99% of all skincare ingredients. Impossible to find any such product for sale anywhere.

It made me wonder – who else out there is looking for bare bones skincare? I suspect it’s not an insubstantial number given the tremendous interest in natural and organic skincare. But we need to be SENSIBLE about our search.

Chemicals Are Not The Enemy

Chemicals get such a bad rap. And because preservatives are decidedly unsexy and unnatural sounding, they get an even worse rap.

So let me say once again – everything on this planet and in this universe is made of chemicals, except for two things – light and electricity (basically, energy).

  • Don’t be afraid of chemicals. YOU yourself are made of millions of chemicals! Chemicals can be your friend! They save lives. Drugs are made of many chemicals (and contain preservatives). You eat them at every meal!
  • Don’t be turned off by long-sounding chemical names. You can blame that on the field of chemistry and chemical organizations who invented long, difficult-to-pronounce chemical nomenclature systems centuries ago. Many simple and short chemical names that are familiar to you have an equivalent, long chemical name with plenty of numbers and hyphens. Same thing, just a different name.
  • A product with more chemicals is not worse than one with fewer chemicals. What ultimately matters is how they interact with one another. You can have a product with 5 chemicals, and if it’s poorly formulated, then it will be far worse than a product with 3 times as many ingredients. More chemicals introduce complexity, but it is not necessarily bad.

New skincare brands that complain about too many chemicals and long, hard-to-pronounce chemical names, and then tout having short formulas with easy-to-pronounce ingredients, make my eyes roll. This is not what matters. It’s the wrong thing to focus on. The end outcome is what matters – did the formula have any effect? And whether a formula has any effect depends on what ingredients were chosen, and how they work together. Not how many there are.

By the way, many plant-based chemicals found in nature can be unhealthy or downright deadly for us. That’s the other side of the coin no one talks about.

Anyhow, enough of my ranting. I wrote this article to stoke any fears about preservatives for the 1% of you who may be on the fence about them. There is a massive aversion to parabens, the most common type of preservative in cosmetics, drugs, food, and other products. It’s a controversial ingredient that has been forever demonized and will never resuscitate, which is fine. We’ll hopefully find something just as good if not better.

The good news is that the cosmetics industry has been on the search for new preservative alternatives that are more “green” and gentle. The challenge though with finding more “natural” preservatives is efficacy. They have to work! They have to last too. Weak preservative systems do the skin no good either.

When Preservatives Fail

And so I will end this post with one more story – an example of a preservative system that fails on a new (fairly fresh) product. Last year, I received a deluxe sample of a cleansing oil in a GWP (gift-with-purchase) bag. Trendy brand, huge markup (aka over-priced). It came in a solid bottle – thick, opaque, tightly closed. It had never been opened and was stored in a cool, dry, dark place. But a year after receiving the GWP, when I opened it for the first time, a bacterial colony had grown inside this bottle. Another cloudy blob. At the time, I was surprised – maybe this is just a fluke.

This past year, I received another sample from this same brand, a face oil. Same thing happened shortly after it was opened. A cloud formed inside the bottle (and grew quickly though it was nowhere as dramatic as my micellar water bottle). Once may be a fluke. Twice is a real and serious formulation or quality control issue. It could’ve been the preservative system (weak), an unsanitary manufacturing facility, or a contamination breach in the manufacturing process. Who knows.

The point is, skincare goes bad without a good preservative system. Anything organic goes bad. That’s the reality of life. So we must accept preservatives, unless we plan on spending a lot of time in the kitchen making simple skincare.

 

I meant to write this post last month but too many things came up. And here we are, 3 days away from Christmas, and I’m talking about yucky blobs and mold. So sorry. Not very holiday-friendly or uplifting 🙂 But at least, this topic can be checked off and we move on to the next!

I wish you well and hope you are able to enjoy the holidays with your family and friends. Best Wishes and Happy Holidays!

Cover Image Credit (rotten tomato): photographed by Joe Buglewicz.

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