Hi, I'm Perry and you're listening to The Beauty Brains. Hello and welcome to The Beauty Brains, a show where real cosmetic chemists answer your beauty product questions and give you an insider's look at the cosmetic industry. This is episode 389. I'm your host. Perry Romanowski and with me today is Valerie George. Hello, Valerie. Hi, Perry. Valerie, we've got a big show. We did take a week off, but we're all back and we've got lots of questions, including...
How does a dye shampoo work? How do you deal with excessive sebum? Are dry shampoos dangerous? How do companies sell azelaic acid products without requiring a prescription? Does SH polypeptide 9 stimulate capillary growth? And are natural fragrances toxic to aquatic life? But first, Valerie, I am right now in Florida. I drove all the way from Chicago down to Florida.
To get out of the cold. Wow. What are you going to do with Teddy the cat? I felt like you've been gone so long already this year. I know. You know what? We brought Teddy with us. Aww. What about the cat in the wall? The cat in the wall is outside. Yep, that's right. I have to say, I did put out a lot of extra food for my outdoor kitties. The Heat Miser, Poppers, Benitu, PK Clone, and Little Blue.
But I am worried about them because it's so cold. I mean, I have shelters out there for them, but, you know, I'm gone for two weeks and they're kind of on their own. My neighbors does feed them, so that's good. You know, the whole trip, I'm worried about them. Oh, how sad. I have a question. Are you sunburned? Well, maybe. You know, I use sunscreen, but somehow I like miss stuff.
You mean, like, miss your whole face and neck? No, I sprayed sunscreen on my face and neck, but, you know, and I wear a hat, and, you know, I don't usually reapply. So that's probably a problem. I don't know. Although, on the other hand, I am Polish, and I just have a natural red face. Well, you... You look perpetually red ever since your last vacation then. I think the spray sunscreens probably aren't it for you and you need to put like a cream sunscreen in your bag.
I would agree with you. I have to do that. Honestly, my sun protection strategy is usually just cover everything up. Like, I'm the guy sitting on the beach with... a towel over him bundled up just my head is showing that's it but you know it works but not a hundred percent because I got I did get some sunburn yeah that's true well it is a little cold in Dallas as well
But we've had some nice days, and I thought you would be interested to know that Pretty Kitty is now inside Curious. What? I thought Pretty Kitty was gone. She's back. She's totally back. Although one of her... Well, two of her kittens have been missing for a long time. I think they're gone. Yeah. Then there were two. Now they're bigger cats. And one of them was found kind of in multiple pieces. I guess there's like a coyote in the neighborhood. Yeah.
Anyway, so Pretty Kitty's back, and she has been coming up to the door and staring inside, and she will not move until someone comes to get me. She wants to see me. And so the other day, I was like, let me leave the door open. And she actually had her paws on the threshold. And the UPS driver came up.
And she got scared and ran away. So we tried it again the next time she was looking for me in the door with her bold stare. And she actually came inside. But then she saw Mr. Cosmetic Chemist and this other chemist.
that i have uh came from outside and she got scared and she took off but she's been back to see me every day you will just be working away and all of a sudden boom her face in the window well that is exciting i hope you're feeding her and uh Maybe get a trap and get her fixed so she doesn't have any more kittens. Oh, well, once we're going to trap her inside, that's for sure. Well, make sure all of the holes in your walls are closed. Oh, my gosh. What a nightmare.
All right, are we ready to head on to some beauty news? I saw an interesting article. We never really talk about fragrance, but Marie Claire... did release 10 big fragrance trends for 2025. Marie Claire is like a women's beauty magazine or something. I think I went and visited them in New York. They are. And...
I don't really follow what they're publishing, but it turns out the magazine Perfumer and Flavorist, which is a magazine I do read, does. And I thought it would be fun to talk about some of the fragrance trends that they talked about. Yeah, let's see. So the story is the 10 biggest fragrance trends for 2025. Ed, what do we got here? Well... Men's perfume for everyone? Oh, I guess traditionally men are supposed to smell like...
Amber and leather. So now women want to smell like that. Is this what we're saying? Exactly. Wooded scents are in and everyone's wearing them. And what's interesting is this actually also was very popular about 20 years ago. So it just shows how cyclical things are. boozy accords are also trending so fragrances are becoming inspired by alcoholic spirits such as ramen cognac I personally love the smell of bourbon so
I'm kind of happy to see that this is going to the fragrance side. If you want to smell like a pina colada, that's going to be cool now. Exactly. You know, that's my karaoke song. the pina colada song it is if you like pina colada you know we did karaoke together in Canada and I don't remember that one but also I didn't I think we were focusing on Brian Adams
We were doing Brian Eves. All right, speaking of Brian Eves, what's this? Oil-based fragrances? I guess people are really interested in perfume oils, which... They say lasts longer than traditional perfumes, but I don't really know if that's the case. Well, if it's not a volatile oil, then it would last longer, but then it makes your skin oily. So that seems a little... aesthetically unpleasing yeah yeah not for me but they would last longer for sure there's also this trend of maximalist moments
Of course, it's influenced by perfume talk, which I'm assuming is some kind of annoying hashtag on TikTok. But it's like TikTok, but perfume. Oh, my God. What is this? Consumers are taking a more is more approach to their fragrances. And I think Coco Chanel would be really disappointed because she always said like, you don't want your fragrance to walk into the room before you do.
And this just goes against everything she says. You know, you remember that store Bath and Body Works? I do. Or they're still around. Anyway. they were big in the malls but they had this one like cucumber melon scent oh i hated that one there was a girl who i used to work with and she was just covered in cucumber melon
Every time she come in, like you knew she was at work because she's just the cucumber melon was just wafting everywhere. I just got so over that fragrance. At first it was like, wow, this is really good. And then it was like, oh, I can't wait to never smell it again. That's a fragrance trend that has disappeared. But what hasn't disappeared is more moss, apparently. Moss is very big.
And experts predict that it will be used more in feminine and gender neutral scents, whereas historically it's been in male fragrances. It's like very earthy. Do you think Kate Moss uses Moss fragrance? I wonder if she used a CK1. Wasn't she a Calvin Klein model? She could have been. Yeah. I was just happy I remembered her name.
Other notes that are in are really powerful notes. People want to smell big and bold, which makes sense with this maximalist moments, but tangy gourmands. Gourmand is a category that... is almost food-like, so caramel, vanilla, chocolate. It makes sense with the boozy accords coming in. Sure, sure. Fertie notes like fig pear and pomegranate, and then consumers are seeking citrus-forward scents with uplifting notes.
like bergamot and lemon mixed with florals. So they want to smell like, what, Lemon Pledge or Pine Sol or something? You know, I'm just not a lemon fan. Yeah. I mean... I like lemon for like cleaning surfaces, but walking around smelling like a lemon. Yeah. Well, also consumers are looking to have multiple fragrances. So they have this scent wardrobe versus like an individual scent. Oh. So yeah, I guess that capitalizes on the more is more trend. I don't know. I guess...
The girl who I was talking about who used the Cucumber Melon, like, she was like, I'm the Cucumber Melon person, right? She didn't want a wardrobe of stuff. She wanted Cucumber Melon. But now, the kids these days would be just like... Okay. On Mondays, I'm Cube Cover Melon. On Tuesdays, I'm Strawberries and Cream. Wednesdays, Sweet Pea. Thursdays, Warm Vanilla Bean. Friday's Love Spell. Oh wait, that's Victoria's Secret.
I thought Friday was fish. Do you know that song? Only during Lent. There's a song. Today is Monday. Monday, bread and butter, all your hungry chips. No? No. I learned it in the 70s, I guess. Yeah, sounds like it. Oh my goodness. You know, I always loved music class when I was a kid. Well, I'll tell you something. I actually got kicked out of choir in fourth grade. They implored my mother to find another hobby for me. Isn't that terrible?
Why did you get kicked out? Was this the voicel thing? I wasn't very good. Come on. I've heard you karaoke. You do all right. It's pretty bad. Maybe in fourth grade. Maybe you weren't. I can see you. Oh, gosh. Well, what did you see in the news this week? I saw this story in Cosmetics Design about anti-pollution beauty, and they were just looking at this trend. about whether regular exposure to pollution at high levels is spurring a lot of development in beauty products.
And according to them, research has shown that air pollutants come in contact with the skin, they cause oxidative damage, and this can lead to DNA damage. And so a lot of companies are... launching products to be anti-pollution products one of the areas they're looking at is blue light there is this sense that blue light causes dam like blue light from your phone or your computer or your tv is causing
damage and that's part of the pollution realm now as far as i'm concerned i think all of this pollution stuff um as far as making products that can offset the effects of this first of all the blue light stuff is that's just marketing made up stuff you're not really helping it but all the blue light you get is from the sun and it just overwhelms anything you'd get from your devices that's true
Yeah. That's very true. And so products that are supposed to target and save you from blue light, they're not really having much impact there. It's much more of a marketing story. Now, I'm curious what your thoughts are on this. The anti-pollution part, because certainly there are nitrous oxides in the air, especially if you live in urban parts, and that stuff is going to get on your skin. That's going to cause oxidation.
Can you create skincare products that actually help against pollution? Well, pollution isn't great for hair either. And I think there is... Data, at least over the last 10 years, that are showing that pollution can be harmful to skin, not great for your hair. But the challenge is anytime you... pitch this to a brand like hey i think this active would be really great for this product because it has really great anti-pollution data
people aren't gravitating towards it. And I just don't think people are concerned. Like people are more worried like, oh, is this paraben free? Not. You know, is this going to protect my skin from all the benzene particulate that's getting pushed out by car exhaust? You know, like that's not a concern for people. So I think. at least not in the United States, Canada, Europe. It is strange, though. The things to worry about, that stuff is more worrisome than...
like parabens or some other chemical in your cosmetic product. I mean, nobody is, people aren't really worried about the right stuff, which is kind of strange. I think something has to happen for consumers to get concerned for them to make the... demand on brands and then brands start to use these ingredients because I think in theory
You know, it's great to have some of these materials, but from a marketing positioning, nobody is making anti-pollution hair care, for example, at least as like a core problem solution focus, because I don't think consumers really think it's a problem. Right. It's hard to notice that it is a problem. I think you can kind of accept that, oh, if you live in the city and the city grime kind of gets on your skin, that's going to have a negative impact. Now, of course...
Once you take a shower and you wash all that off, you feel like your skin is not being affected by that anymore. So it's a little harder to sell to say, oh, this anti-pollution product is going to... protect you from that because i'm not even sure there's a technology that can really protect you very much from these pollution things but it does make a way for brands to differentiate themselves and maybe stand apart For sure. All right. Well, that is that. Are we ready to...
Answer some questions. Well, first, Perry, I think we had some listener feedback. So when I. You are correct. We did. Yeah. When I posted on Instagram. that you had these horrific bug bites and i showed a picture of your legs guys you should have he showed me his torso one time and i was like oh my gosh
People were like, oh, it's always worse than the legs. You know how Perry keeps sunscreen in his golf bag? He should leave bug spray in his suitcase. So when he goes on vacation, he doesn't have to worry. So Perry, all these listeners are saying. put bug spray in your suitcase. What do you think of that? Bug spray was in my suitcase and bug spray was on my body and these things still went after me. Really? And it was not...
it's not that citronella bull BS. It doesn't actually work. It's the deep, the NN diet, the metataliomide, the stuff that actually has been proven to work. Well, it doesn't work for me. Or at least it didn't work for me. We need to go to the bug spray companies and say, something has happened. This stuff isn't working. That's crazy you got bit up with the bug spray. I know. Well, it's just...
It's a hard problem to solve, and the bug spray will keep it away from some people, but obviously not mine. The craziest thing is my wife, who's right next to me the entire time, gets... one bug bite, I get 150. I don't know. It just gravitate towards me, I guess. Oh, gosh. Well, good luck. Yeah. Well, I'll...
I'll keep trying. You know, we also did get some listener feedback. Last time, last show I believe it was, somebody asked for a website that could tell them about ingredients that would cause... allergic reactions. And somebody had pointed out a different website all the way from Minneapolis. She said... Skinsafe.org is a great site for searching household personal care and beauty product ingredients. I think we recommended Inky Decoder, but she's saying Skinsafe. Okay.
SkinSafe. Yeah, SkinSafe.org, although I think SkinSafeProducts.com is another place for it. Anyway, it's a platform that aims to help consumers identify personal care products with all their ingredients. It's developed in collaboration with the Mayo Clinic. Although I gotta say, that seemed a little marketing-ish. Sometimes the Mayo Clinic is not right on stuff. Right, right, right. But they also are like...
It's a collaboration with them. So it was like, I don't know. I talked to somebody who worked there during my lunchtime. I think they were just kind of... you know, trying to get the coattails of Mayo Clinic to give it some more legitimacy. But anyway, they have a database of 135,000 products. They're evaluated for ingredient safety. Now, from a positive standpoint, you know...
If they are in a partnership with Mayo Clinic, that does offer some credibility. They have a lot of products that are listed, so that's handy for searching. And they have user-friendly tools you can... like barcode scan so check stuff out so that's good on the other hand it's also they like over flag some things so
Maybe something is not an allergen, but they're going to say that it is, so that could scare consumers a bit more. Also, if it's just looking at the ingredient label, which is published to the public... There's just certain things you miss. Like, for example, if you're allergic to coconut, some ingredients could come from coconut or they could come from palm. And even if I'm only sourcing a palm derived source, they would.
participate in this over flagging where it's like, whoa, watch out. But in actuality, it's coconut free. Yeah. And you know, another thing that happens, and this happens not just with a site like this, but any site on the internet that has ingredient lists. The ingredient list for a product can change. That's true. And this data...
May or may not be current. I remember there was a site called drugstore.com. Oh, they were so great. I used them all the time. I actually used to buy from them as well. Oh, well, I love that site, but I would look up the ingredient list for suave shampoo because I was doing a project, and I looked at the ingredient list that was listed online, and then there was a typo or something, and they had it throughout.
the whole thing. And the typo was not on the actual product because I had the actual product. And so, you know, instead of Cetal alcohol, they just called it Cetal. I'm like, wait a second. That's not, that's not. So the data is not necessarily always correct. And this is true of, like, Inky Decoder, too, because, you know, of course they're going to try their best, but...
Product ingredient list gets updated all the time, and so it's probably not always completely accurate. That's true. But thanks for the recommendation. Indeed. Check that out if you're looking for ingredients that you might be allergic to. Speaking of being allergic to, we're allergic to unanswered questions. So let's move on to beauty questions now. Our first one comes to us from Laura. She says, hi, Perry and Valerie. I'm a huge fan from Italy.
I work in the cosmetic business and your show helped me to overcome a lot of marketing BS. I just watched an ad on my SM. Social media. Instagram. Social media. That's it. Yes. There you go. Okay. I just watched an ad on my social media introducing a new way to dye your hair and cover gray.
It's a dye shampoo that works in just 10 minutes and is promoted as super easy to use and also long lasting. I checked the ingredients and it contains PPT and resource and all, but it's not activated by a developer. Can you check it and explain to me how this works? Thanks for all the great work you do. Laura and she listed instant dye shampoo, which is polarhaircare.com.
This is a very interesting product because it is a shampoo that contains oxidative dyes. And so ordinarily when you are using a permanent hair color, it contains oxidative dyes and you have to add hydrogen peroxide. to it to get the dyes to go from colorless to colored but in the case of this shampoo you're just using oxidative dyes there's no hydrogen peroxide so laura has a great question how is it working so what happens is these uncolored dye molecules penetrate inside the hair shaft
And over time, they're exposed to ambient oxygen in the atmosphere, and they will slowly find each other and react. It's a very slow process. It's way less efficient than just dyeing your hair. And not all of the dye molecules will find each other. So you'll have some unreacted stuff in your hair. But nonetheless, you should get a little bit of hair color. Now I'm looking at the product. This looks like a hair conditioner. This is probably not a shampoo.
Oh, okay. Sorry. I thought she said it was a shampoo. Give me a second. Well, no, she might have said that. The product I'm looking at right now. Oh, wait. No, actually it says instant dye shampoo, but I'm looking at the ingredient list. I'm not seeing...
Hey, I'm not seeing a surfactant. Like, what is this? Wait, this looks more like a conditioner to me, Valerie. And they call it a shampoo, but I'm seeing conditioner ingredients. Well, let me speculate on what I think is happening here. So essentially... Just for Men is a brand owned by Comb International. They're a US-based company. They have actually a patented shampoo technology where they employ this exact same concept. They take a shampoo, like a cleansing shampoo, and they put...
these uncoupled dye molecules in it and say, air, do your thing. And they actually have patented this all over the world. They're one of the first companies to do it. I'm suspecting that this brand, Polar Hair Care, is putting this in a conditioner because they want to circumvent the Just for Men patent. Otherwise, they would be in violation because the Just for Men patent says... Well, you have to have at least like one cleansing surfactant present.
And so in this case, they don't. So this is basically a hair color. I'm going to guess that you could actually put hydrogen peroxide in this product and dye your hair much faster versus air dyeing it. huh oh very interesting and i'm looking at the ingredient list The reason I say it doesn't seem like a shampoo is because it's got cetiril alcohol in it. It's got glycerol stearate. It's got petrolatum. It's got cyclopentosiloxane. These are all stuff you'd find in a conditioner.
One of the questions I have for you is the dye molecule. Is that the phenylmethylpyrazolone? Phenylmethylpyrazolone is one of them. The ingredient list is actually very strange on this because they say ingredients. And then other trace ingredients, which you're not really allowed to do that. And they list dye molecules. I think Laura said she doesn't see PPT, but it's actually PPD. And it's the fourth ingredient, P-phenylene diamine. It's in the main...
ingredient list along with resorcinol and phenylmethylperazolone. But there's other colorants such as NNBIS2-hydroxyethyl p-phenylenediamine sulfate meta-aminophenol that appear in the other trace ingredient section. So I just... find the whole thing very bizarre yeah you know if we had a contest of who could pronounce chemical names better you or me you might win I'd take I'd take home the gold medal
You might do that. All right, so that's basically how it works. Now, does it really work, do you think? I guess it works over time. It works over time. It's gradual, progressive color. I think it's a little... cheesy I personally don't like exposing skin to colorants like that because again if you're in the shower and you're putting this on like a conditioner it runs down a lot of your body and
I personally just from a usage standpoint, I think the less skin contact you can have with colorants, the better. So I probably would reach for a more conventional hair colorant and skip the shower. Now, there are other ones where they use direct dyes as the ingredient. And those to me seem a little safer because there's not any chemical reaction. It's not monomers that are unreacted. But they don't work as well, right?
They don't work to cover gray hair for sure. And there's very little penetration into the hair. So I think if you're looking for like true, more permanent color change, this is a better option than a product with direct dyes, which is directly colored, no reactions required. I still say just go do conventional hair color. Skip this weird gimmicky stuff. Yeah. Yeah, I'd agree. All right, we got another question from Heather. Hi there. I came across this product when looking into fillers.
I have static lines on my forehead and between the brown area. It has a hefty price point, but this is a doctor's website. What do you think? Grenzine Serum from Oakville Plastic Surgery Skinlight.com is the website. Yeah, Vivier is the brand. V-I-V-I-E-R. And grenzine is the serum, G-R-E-N-Z-C-I-N-E. We'll put it in the show notes. And the ingredients are essentially propylene glycol, pentylene glycol.
Butylene glycol, water, ascorbic acid, which is vitamin C, ethoxidiglycol, which is a penetration enhancer, grapefruit fruit extract, which is a fragrance, oil, I guess. a marketing ingredient. Yeah. I guess I might adjust the pH too. And then 1,4-diaminobutane dihydrochloride, which has the street name polyamine DAB and a fragrance. So... What do you think, Perry? This or actually getting fillers? Valerie, they're charging $334 for one ounce of this stuff.
I mean, that's like 10 bucks a gram. I know. I was just asking the question to play the polite podcast host. Humectants and water? I know. What? This is, oh, wow. Okay, well, let's look at, so. To be fair, Perry, the humectants are the first ingredient. Yeah, that's. So actually, if you put this on your skin, it's going to feel warm to the touch. It'll feel like it's warming. Yeah. Which is kind of cool. But, I mean, come on. So the benefits, they say, are anti-wrinkle, firming and lifting.
It's for your face, hypoallergenic. I mean, I don't see anything in this product that you couldn't find in something else at a much less expensive price. Let me tell you a story here, Heather and Perry. I have a friend who has really bad melasma. I mean, really bad. And I told her... You have to go get laser. For the listeners who don't know what melasma is, that's hyperpigmentation? Yes, big patches of dark hyperpigmentation. It's very stubborn. It's often hormonal, genetic.
from sun exposure, prolonged sun exposure. And so I just told her, like, you have to go see a dermatologist to address this. Laser is the only thing that's going to remove the topical stuff. And then you need some kind of... prescription from them i mean it was very severe so she goes to the dermatologist and they said oh just use this um skincare product we sell it and it was a few hundred bucks per bottle just like this what
And she was just like, I work in the industry. Like, I don't think this product is going to fix my medical condition that I have. And it just goes to show that like, even though this product is at a doctor's office. that doesn't mean it works. Like they're interested in making money on this stuff. And I would say if, you know, you really have these hefty lines. You need fillers or you need Botox or you need some kind of like more stringent medical intervention. And.
This bottle is a third of the price of Botox and will last you about one month. Botox will last you three months. Fillers might last you a year. So I don't know. I would just kind of do the math. Yeah, save your money because go get Olay for $25, Regenerist. That's a great product. It is. It gives you nice moisturizing. And then save that other $300 that you were going to spend.
uh for you know botox yeah it's like it seems much more economical and it'll be much more effective because i cannot say even at 300 bucks i cannot say that this which is just humectants and this polyamine growth factor, I can't say that's going to work in a way that you'll notice. Certainly it's not going to work as well as both.
I really enjoyed seeing your face, though, when you saw the price tag. Okay, Heather snuck in another question. While I have you, you've talked about how to deal with excessive... Have you talked about how to deal with excessive sebum specifically on my cheeks, under my eyeglasses? Thanks for the pod, Heather. And what do you just, what, use a washcloth to like dab?
Do you have any excessive sebum tips? Well, sebum comes from the inside and it's usually genetic. And so I would recommend applying some routine salicylic acid, not just like... because you have pimples or whatever, but salicylic acid, even at a neutral pH, has a lot of beneficial data for regulating sebum production within the sweat glands and for reducing inflammation. So I would say that...
would help remediate the long-term problems with excessive sebum. And you have to keep using it, using it daily. But just topically, I mean, I think there's different makeup products that would help absorb it, but... Ultimately, that doesn't correct the issue. Yeah, like a cornstarch or a silicone, like a silica, products with silica in it would help. Powdered makeup.
absorb yeah that kind of thing but it's kind of a genetic thing so you just have to keep on it keep on it and yeah a low dose salicylic acid serum, and you could even just put it on your cheeks if that's your only problem area, but I would do it every single day. You know, I just got a product with salicylic acid in it, and it's 15%. You know what the product is?
uh a wart remover it is you have been obsessed with those i no i you know i get this i thought it was a bug bite but it's like it's like weird so i'm like this is probably a wart because every so often i'll get these like from out of nowhere i'll just get this wart on my hand i don't know where it comes from it's probably out there but i'm gonna like
salicylic acid the hell out of it. It'll be gone. I have a question. Do you think that gets rid of moles? I have a lot of, I wouldn't say they're moles, but they're like little skin tags and I get all these like really hard growths. My dermatologist said I won the list.
lotto with all the stuff that i have but do you think it would get rid of those because i usually just scrape everything off You know, I do not think it will get rid of those because the salicylic acid, what it does, I mean, it has the exfoliating, so maybe it'll help with that exfoliating piece, but I think the salicylic acid also kills the...
Because a wart is a fungi or a mold or something like that, and it will kill that. So I think silicelic acid is exfoliating, and so it could help take off a tag or something. I don't think it's going to help with mold. I mean, a girl can try, I guess. I know. You know, it does help with moles, though. It's shovels. You can dig up the hole. Oh, gosh. Don't we have another question? We do. Here's an audio question from Pia.
Let me play that now. Hey, Beauty Brains. This is Pia calling from Queens, New York. My question is about dry shampoo. I follow a local brand, a local skincare brand, and recently they posted... a video about dry shampoo. having dangerous ingredients. I think they mentioned benzene and also the fact that many hair care companies have done recalls or are in the middle of lawsuits because of dry shampoos, having dangerous ingredients. ingredients.
and ingredients that are carcinogens. So my question for you is, is that true? I don't use straight shampoo every day or anything like that, but I do use it like once, maybe once every couple of weeks. and I just want to make sure that it's a safe product for me to continue using. Thank you so much. Bye. Wow. I remember that the benzene thing was a big to-do last year. So the question is...
Do these products have benzene in them, and are these companies going through lawsuits? And so I think the quick answer is yes, there were some dry shampoos. Not all of them, but there were some dry shampoos that... tested positive for benzene. And two, yes, a couple of companies are going through lawsuits because of this. But the question is, does that make them unsafe?
I don't think so. So what happened is a few years ago, anyone who manufactured products with propellants got a letter from these aerosol manufacturers who actually buy the propellant for use in aerosol products. and they said hey oopsie we just wanted to let you know that our propellant's been coming back with high traces of benzene because it's not avoidable in this product type
And so then Valisher, this company, started doing a lot of benzene testing. Oh, yeah, Valisher. The FDA has since said your testing methods are bogus. You must cease testing immediately. because they actually didn't say this about the dry shampoos, but they actually said it about aerosol sunscreens. And so they basically said, you're creating a big scare when your test methods are leading to false positive results.
In my opinion, given the high publicity of this matter, given the fact that benzene contamination has been brought to the attention of aerosol manufacturers, I think there's a lot of diligence. And it's not like there's a ton of aerosol manufacturers. Very select few actually can produce aerosols. I think there's a lot of heightened attention to this. And so I think it's probably okay to use.
Yeah, it's certainly the way she's using it. She sprays it on her hair once or twice a week. And it's all about the dose. It's a lot easier to detect a level of benzene because it's way a tiny amount. the amount that will impact your health is much higher. And so the levels that we're talking about are way low. Now, the question was about what brands have lawsuits against them. This is what's going to happen.
lawyers will go after big companies. And so some of the brands that you're talking about, Dove, Nexus, Suave, Pantene, Herbal Essences, Aussie, all the big brands, right? Because those are big companies. They have money. And they have money. That's who you go after. Like a brand like Batiste, which you can find at Target, nobody's going after them, even though they're made kind of the same way.
Honestly, what happens here is this was a propellant issue. You're able to detect a really low level of an ingredient, which can be problematic if you're exposed to at high levels. This doesn't expose them at high levels. Now, as far as recalls go, you know, some of these big companies would just said, okay, let's just recall it.
to be completely safe right just because it has a bad reputation or something so they just recall it but there's never been any evidence that using these products causes any health
problems. I'd also like to throw another wrench into the mix. So dry shampoos... What is a wrench? Well, you know, I'd just like to... throw a wrench into it really just throw a monkey wrench into the into the works the spanner as it were yeah so basically dry shampoos historically have not been regulated for volatile organic compound content and the state of california has on and they said, wow, dry shampoos have around 95% VOC propellants in them.
whoa, we can regulate this and cut it down to 55 in a couple years, 50 years after that. So if the benzene comes from the propellant, which again, it is in very, very, very, very trace minute quantities and you're not exposing yourself. to a lot if we have to cut the propellant down from 95 to let's say 55 you're effectively cutting that benzene impurity quantity in half as well so
They're only going to get safer. Most states follow the state of California when it comes to BOC regulations. And in fact, many other states also follow it. So I think it's just going to get safer. Yeah. And. Honestly, it's not unsafe at the moment, at the levels that they find. All this shows is that they're getting better at detecting smaller and smaller levels. Benzene is a common ingredient.
in organic chemistry to make other ingredients and there is always some level that's unreacted but you know the dose makes the poison so i wouldn't worry about the dry shampoo that you're using Well, our next question comes to us from CK on Patreon. Hi, I have two questions. And since you're a patron, CK, you get two questions. Here it is. First one, I use prescription 15%.
azelaic acid from the pharmacy. I'm not a fan of the texture or tube and discovered Dermatica offers both 15 and 20% azelaic acid. And they do not require you to utilize their telehealth services to purchase these. Is there some sort of loophole that allows them to sell 15 and 20% without a prescription? Also, would you trust their... uh az acid is equally or close to as effective as the azelaic acid that you purchase from a pharmacy so let's go to that one first uh what what is this so
Actually, I was looking in some research of this, and you can get over-the-counter in the United States azelaic acid products at a 10% or lower. The Ordinary actually has a 10% version, and that's available without a prescription. But to get 15% and 20%, that does require a prescription. So how is it that this company is selling it without that?
I think it's probably a risk that they take. I don't really know because I actually go to a doctor to get mine and you need the script to do it. So I don't, like I said, maybe it's a risk thing. I would be surprised if they were allowed to do it, to be honest, because again...
It's not an over-the-counter drug product. It requires a prescription from a medical professional. And so unless they're just saying any person who inquires gets the prescription, I think it's pretty reckless and it's occurring at a risk to them. There is no data that shows azelaic acid is effective below 15%. 15% is the minimum requirement. And it is used to treat rosacea.
actually like the exfoliating properties are very low and slow um like they take it takes months it's not like instantaneous like glycolic so it's primarily prescribed for treating rosacea pustules that mechanism is not known and how it does it Treating rosacea is...
A drug claim. And so I think probably they're getting away with it because they don't actually talk about treating rosacea in the product claims. They say, oh, it fades, blemishes, stubborn dark spot, signs of aging. They don't actually talk about. the real things that it treats, but they have a little tiny note compatible with these pathways on their website, like rosacea, acne scars.
Those would be drug claims. So I actually think they're not following the law. Now, in terms of is it the same stuff you get from the doctor? Probably. But, you know, when you look at the price of their cream versus like a copay if you have health insurance. I probably would just get it from my dermatologist and maintain under supervision with it. Yeah, I think maybe one of the things that they're doing, and we can only guess, if they're selling it online...
there's going to be some municipalities that don't require a prescription for 15% and 20%. And so if their idea is, oh, we're selling it to them, and then, oh, if you're in a place that does require it, well, you know. That's kind of a loophole. So that would be another guess of mine. Very interesting. Well, we'll never know, but I probably would just go see a doctor. Yeah, go see a doctor. Okay, she's got a second question.
It's regarding SH polypeptide 9. The ingredient is in a peptide cream that I really enjoy. This is the Stratia interface. However, I have rogesia and am going through BBL treatments to treat capillaries. Since this ingredient is supposed to stimulate the growth of new capillaries, do you think this is a product that those of us with vascular redness should avoid? this ingredient. Thanks, CK. SH polypeptide 9.
Yeah, I actually like the Stratia brand. I know the founder. She's really great, really diligent with her stuff. In terms of whether you should avoid SH oligopeptide. SH polypeptide 9. I know that the blend that Stratia is using is called Bioplacenta. It's a synthetic peptide blend out of Korea. There's a lot of really great data behind it.
That material on its own is probably going to be really innocuous. It's not going to impact your BBL treatments that are treating your capillaries. It's not going to impact your rosacea. I don't know necessarily that it stimulates the growth of new capillaries. That's actually a claim I'm not familiar with with bioplacenta and I'm very intimate with the material. Well, I will say they claim to be a cell signal of protein.
And it's supposed to be a vascular endothelial growth factor. So that's probably where they're getting it. It's supposed to play a role in supplying the fibroblast cells with nutrients in that. sort of mitigates and stimulates wound healing kinds of things. Again, it's a peptide thing. Often these peptides, they don't get down to the dermis where they would...
maybe be effective. And so if it's just topical, it's more like a marketing thing here. I don't know. What's your feelings of SH polypeptide nine? I mean, I think the supplier has a lot of really great data behind it, but again, I don't know what they do. Well, no, I mean, I, you know, they do that. It's really, really incredible, but I don't think it's going to really.
I don't want to say it's not going to do anything in the skin because I don't know if that's true, but I don't think that you have to be worried about it interfering with your treatments. So what are these BBL treatments anyway? I'm not familiar with that. BBL is basically broadband light treatments and it uses intense pulse light to improve different features of the skin. It can get really focused on like...
sunspots, rosacea, hair growth. I guess it's like some kind of laser. I actually prefer more like laser treatments um i think bbl is a little more less intense on the spectrum so even more i'm like this product's probably not gonna you know do any harm um Because, you know, CK is really focused on this like one ingredient, but there's actually a lot of synthetic human peptides in this product.
There's a lot of other materials present in the product. And you kind of have to look at the product as a whole, not just one ingredient. And I think this product's probably going to be fine. Like I said, the brand is really... um, stringent on how they put products together. And I would say you don't have to worry, but if you're concerned, you can skip it or patch test. Yeah. Okay. It shouldn't be a problem. All right. We got time for one more question.
Comes all the way to us from a patron. Ksenia? That's what I would say. All right, there you go. Hello, Valerie and Perry. Thank you for all the knowledge you are sharing with us. I was wondering if you could share your thoughts on natural fragrances and... aromatic extracts, and hazard statements in their safety data sheets. I'm confused when it comes to hazard statements in a safety data sheet because specifically in the areas of skin sensitivity and toxicity to aquatic life.
Natural fragrances, fragrances of plant origin and aromatic extracts, are being used by big sustainable brands such as birds, bees, and badgers. ethnique however reading the sds's on many of these natural fragrances i look at the hazard statement and it says the ingredient may be toxic to aquatic life. There are different categories, but still it's not very clear how toxic it really is. For example, in a rinse-off product,
What if a fragrance is used at recommended levels? Is it still toxic to aquatic life? The same goes for skin sensitivity, statements, and SDS. What are the chances a plant-derived fragrance would cause skin sensitivity, algae, if used at recommended levels in the rinse-off products? Hope that's not too confusing, and I look forward to hearing what you think. Thanks!
All right, Valerie. First of all, the SDS. What is this SDS she's talking about? Safety data, she is in the United States, an OSHA requirement, but there's also a global harmonization standard requirement where essentially the... ingredient, the finished product, the chemical mixture, has an assessment done on it to disclose hazardous materials to the consumer.
In the old days, we used to call them material safety data sheets, so the MSDS. Now they're just called safety data. Yeah, yeah. They made the switch like 10 years ago. Yeah, I don't know. The only things that need to be disclosed are ingredients that the consumer needs to be worried about. And it doesn't necessarily take into account the dose, unfortunately.
They basically just say, hey, this material's in here. It's in here at this range. And this material is known to do this to your eyes and this to your skin and this to aquatic life. Well, one of the important things that these safety data sheets are, and actually, as a cosmetic chemist, whenever you get an ingredient into your lab, they have to provide these safety data sheets.
A lot of times these safety data sheets are for like firefighters or first response emergencies because if there's like a chemical spill out there, they have to know how can we clean this up or is it safe for the environment and that kind of thing. So they're trying to communicate. not only information that...
to the people that are working with the chemicals and their exposure and that kind of important thing, but also to people who might have to interact with this chemical out in the environment or out in the marketplace. How to store it, how to handle it, exactly. Yeah, they're trying to communicate a lot of information, and it can actually sound pretty scary for things that aren't actually as scary as it seems.
safety data sheet. Exactly. So in terms of the skin hazards, I think you have to take it with a grain of salt because you're not using the product. or the fragrance at 100%, right? It's in a small percentage in the product. The other piece is in terms of the environmental fate, acute toxicity, chronic toxicity. Again, that's conducted on the raw material.
at 100% and they essentially expose invertebrates like Daphne or algae to the substance and they look at basically how long they're able to survive and they calculate the lethal concentration and the lethal dose. And they tell you if the test doesn't do well, it could be harmful to aquatic life. Now, if the fragrance is used in the raw material at a certain or in the product at a certain level, is it going to do the same thing?
I don't know. I guess the safety data sheets approach is like an abundance of precaution over exact usage case scenario. And so, again, it's really hard to tell. Honestly, I look at these safety data sheets as a thing that consumers should not be really worried about. Exactly. If you're working with a chemical, then yeah, that's your concern. But we're talking about...
information that is on the 100% of the ingredients. It's kind of like that benzene thing. If, yeah, if you were exposed to 100% benzene, that's going to be really bad. If you're exposed to .0001% benzene. it's not going to be that big a deal. So the dose really does matter. And I think a lot of the information that you see in these safety data sheets is related to 100%.
exposure which is just not realistic unless maybe you're working with the ingredients now as far as the the natural piece goes what you got to understand is Whether it's a natural fragrance or synthetic fragrance, they're all chemicals. Right. I mean, they're just chemicals and high exposure to a high level of chemicals can be dangerous.
isolate the ingredients in poison ivy and put that on you that's natural and that's not good for your skin so Did the fact that it's natural and fragrance it shouldn't surprise people because they are just organic chemicals Bottom line a safety data sheet is not a reliable method at least for a finished product to understand the real risk in terms of safety, additional safety testing would need to be conducted by the brand. And that's really what the consumer should be looking at.
Yeah, but it is really effective in fear mongers to look at the safety data sheet and try to scare consumers to get them away from somebody else's product. Oh, for sure. Well, that's all we have time for. Thanks for listening, everyone. Yeah, I do hear the music. Hey, if you get a chance, can you go over to Apple Podcasts or...
Spotify and leave us a review. That's going to help other people find the show and ensure that we have a full docket of beauty questions to answer. Speaking of questions, if you have one, we would love to get your voice on the show. It's easy to do. Just record a question on your smartphone using your voice app, email it to thebeautybrains at gmail.com, or there's even a form in the show notes of this episode to attach your question. Exactly. And you can be like Pia or...
I know Valerie doesn't like it but I could take your question and make it an AI. Which we don't want so we need you guys to send in your audio questions. That's right. Hey, you know, the beauty brains are also on Patreon. You know, you might not have noticed or you might have noticed that we don't have ads in our show, and we like it that way, but there are some expenses with the show, and so...
If you appreciate what we do and you want a higher priority to your questions to get it answered, follow us over there on Patreon. Go to patreon.com slash thebeautybrains and subscribe at any level. Not only do you get a higher percentage... Not only do you get a higher priority of your questions answered, you also get a transcript of the show. Also, don't forget to follow us on our various social media accounts on Instagram. I'm slaying it. We're at the Beauty Brains 2018.
You are killing it, by the way. Excellent job. Thank you. On X, we're at the Beauty Brains. On Blue Sky, we're at the Beauty Brains. I don't even know how to get to that. We have a Facebook page. And unfortunately, TikTok is still around, so we're still squatting on our TikTok handle.
Yeah, someday we might do that. We've been talking about it for like three years. We should just take it off. I know. Is it ever going to be banned? What do I have to say about Tic Tac? I don't know. Although we might just start clips from the show when you do it on Tic Tac. We'll see. Maybe. Well, thanks again for listening everyone. And remember, be brainy about your beauty. Thanks everyone.
There's a shampoo that colors your hair No peroxide needed, just leave it there But science says it's a slower game Not magic, just oxygen making the change Change.