[Misc] Some thoughts on airless pumps.

Beauty Tips For Body Care
I've made it a priority to reduce the waste my skincare creates and this is best adoptable for me in steady changes. The next change I'm making to my routine is eliminating airless pump products all together. Here's why.They’re difficult to recycle. Pump bottles in general are pretty difficult to recycle. The plastic unibody can be recycled but the pump requires disassembly because it usually contains a metal spring and a glass ball. For some people, this is more work than worth their time and it’s easier to throw it in the trash. TerraCycle is a great option for these cases as they shred the plastic and smelt the metal spring. However, when it comes to most airless pump products, the unibody itself is made of mixed materials (some combination of plastic, glass and metals) which is not recyclable, at all.Brands don’t want to take responsibility. Companies are taking some actions to reduce waste, but we can all agree that more can be done. Most brands that use airless pumps don’t have any recycling programs for their packaging, pushing the responsibility onto the individual consumer than the multi-million dollar brand itself. Some have partnered with TerraCycle but airless pump unibodies is a grey area. This hurts progress. With more access to resources, companies should make it as easy as possible for their customers to recycle their own products, at the least. Drunk Elephant, Kate Somemrville, Paula’s Choice.Smart formulations do not need them. The hate for preservatives, especially parabens, is unwarranted and unsubstantiated by science. Some are certainly more irritating than others. When a company touts “paraben-free” they run the risk of using less safer options in order to preserve their formula. Thus, preservatives are used as a scapegoat to use airless pumps. It’s marketed as a safe and hygienic way to preserve the effectiveness of the product. This can be completed avoided by using stable, well-established preservatives. As for hygiene, if COVID-19 has taught us anything, it should be that we should always wash our hands before touching our face. Wash. Your. Hands. It’s as simple as that. Hygiene is a human problem, not a product problem.There are better alternatives for unstable ingredients. One area where airless pumps are seemingly immune from criticism is when using photosensitive actives like vitamin C and retinols. However, there are less wasteful options to keep these actives just as effective. Brands know this too and avoid acknowledging it. For example, Drunk Elephant uses airless pumps for it’s C-Firma face and C-Tango eye serum but very conveniently uses a metal tube for its A-Passioni retinol cream. Vitamin C’s effectiveness can be preserved in a metal tube, which is far cheaper and easier to recycle.It’s a luxury. Yes, skincare is a form of self-care. For some it’s functional, for others it’s indulgence, both shouldn’t come at the cost of excess. Airless pumps don’t have to be a part of our luxurious experiences.
Girls Blog 2015
Submitted by flappytabbycats