Safety Issues Surrounding Neon Pigments

Hi, guys! Today I'm going to talk some more about a pretty serious issue: neon pigments in cosmetics.  Neon pigments (that is, colors that are UV-responsive) are NOT approved for use in the eye area. The dyes used to create UV-responsive colors can cause adverse reactions when used in the eye area, even sometimes negatively affecting the wearer's eyesight. There are many sellers out there, large- and small-scale that create and sell neon products and, appropriately, advising consumers that the colorants are not FDA-approved for eye use and not to apply them on or around the eye area. There are other sellers out there, however, that have no such warning.  It is all too easy to buy some jars, slap a handwritten "100% Natural" label on them, and dump soap dyes in them for resale.  I wrote about this a few years back, in regard to a specific company, when this seemed to be happening fairly frequently.  I noticed yesterday that I got a significant amount of hits from a Reddit thread last year questioning a newer company that appeared to be selling soap dyes as eyeshadow.  That company is still operating and selling neon pigments as eyeshadows, so I thought it was an important topic to bring up again.  Always do your research.  I wouldn't want anybody out there unwittingly causing themselves harm just to glow under a blacklight for a few hours.  You can view my list of brands I do not support to see a handful of companies doing this, and other sketchy stuff.  Always be wary of thing like this - especially when it comes to things you wear on or around the eye area - and research everything that seems too good to be true.  Stay safe out there!

Orglamix Update

Hello, everyone!  Awhile back, there was a stir in the makeup blogosphere when it turned up that Cheri Tracy, owner of Orglamix Cosmetics, was selling private label cosmetics as handmade.  Worse still, it was uncovered that she was selling products for uses that they were not approved for, and telling her customers that her products were vegan when they were not.  Photos were circulating of eyeshadow and primer pots with double labels - some with parabens on the ingredient labels, which Cheri claimed were never used in her "all-natural" formulations - and Cheri had no answers for any questions that arose, choosing instead to make extremely unprofessional comments in response before deleting comments and blocking the concerned posters who wanted to know what they (and others) might be putting on their skin.  People were even finding her "product photos" on stock photo sites, meaning that the photos she was using weren't even of the products she was selling.  Shortly after, Cheri ceased anything and everything pertaining to Orglamix, aside from a business venture that popped up later called Three Twelve Tudor (they were reported as selling the cosmetic line at the grand opening, and pictures were posted of the line in the store, but the ensuing uproar caused the incident to be buried quickly without mention.)  I'm sad to say it, but it looks like Cheri thinks the whole thing has blown over and decided to pull her head out of the sand.  I just want to make it clear that Orglamix is not vegan, not handmade, and not all-natural.  There is more on this subject (links to screenshots, photos of double labels, other blogs, etc.) in one of my previous posts.  Please, please, please, I urge all of you to research companies before you buy, because it seems cases like this are popping up all too frequently.  Thanks for reading!

Followup: Crush Cosmetics

Last week, I reviewed an Etsy shop called Crush Cosmetics.  In that review, I noted suspicions of certain colors not being original, i.e. repackaged.  So I placed an order with TKB, and I feel my suspicions have been verified.  While I did not find a match for every color, I still wanted to put my results out there.

Update: Fantastic Faces Cosmetics

Hi, readers! So it's been awhile since we all heard about the antics going on over at Fantastic Faces Cosmetics. Ms. Stephanie said she was discontinuing the neon pigments, and then said she was shutting down completely to take a short break. However, as anybody who has been following this company knows, Ms. Stephanie is about as trustworthy as you can expect somebody to be when they continue to sell harmful dyes as eyeshadow after repeated warnings that they are not intended for cosmetic use.  So she's still selling and she still has the soap dyes listed in her store as eyeshadows. No surprise there, but there have been a few new developments.

Since our last encounter with FFC, Ms. Stephanie appears to have purchased a domain name, and has posted an ingredient list which you can find here.  She has, once again, listed mica as an ingredient and we all know that's not an ingredient according to INCI standards.  The only other additives she lists are titanium dioxide, iron oxide, ferric ferrocyanide, and tin oxide.  Titanium dioxide is a white colorant approved for eyes, lips, nails, and face.  Iron oxide can be red, orange, yellow or black in color (although the only color I saw when I searched for it on TKB was red,) and it is approved for eyes, lips, nails, and face.  Ferric Ferrocyanide is a blue pigment that is approved for eyes, nails, and face, but not lips.  Nothing came up when I searched for tin oxide on TKB, and from a quick Google search, I found out that it is an abrasive that can be absorbed through the skin.  Sounds totally safe to me.  So all in all, Ms. Stephanie's ingredient list includes a white colorant approved for all areas, a red/orange/yellow/black colorant that is safe for all areas, an eye-safe blue colorant that is not lip-safe, and an opacifying skin irritant.  No carmine, which is found in many brighter red-toned pigments, and no chromium oxide green, which is found in many green-toned pigments.  Nothing that would act as a base for a lip product, and certainly nothing that would be a UV-reactive, so we know she's still not disclosing all of her ingredients.  Wonderful.  Now I'm not saying a skilled formulator couldn't mix a yellow pigment with a blue pigment and make a green pigment; that's plausible.  It's already been established, though, that her supplier purchases from TKB, where the only iron oxide available is red.  As most children in preschool would be happy to point out to you, having only a red pigment and a blue pigment limits the colors she is able to produce to reds, blues, and purples.

On a slightly related note, remember up there how I said ferric ferrocyanide is approved for eye use but not for lip use?  Do you also remember the green pigment I mentioned up there, chromium oxide green?  That colorant is also considered safe for eye use but not for lips (it is not considered eye OR lip safe in the state of California.)  Ms. Stephanie has formulated several lip glosses that happen to be blue and green in hue.  If her disclosed ingredients are correct, the blue lip jellies contain an unsafe blue pigment, and the greens contain the same blue mixed with a safe yellow pigment.   So either way they aren't safe, but I speculate that the blues were formulated with ferric ferrocyanide and the greens were actually formulated with chromium oxide green.  If evidence is provided that these are not the colorants used in these lip glosses, I will happily retract that statement (although that would still mean her ingredients list is incomplete.)  There ARE lip-safe blue and green colorants out there, but you do have to look for them; TKB has conveniently placed lip-safe items in a lipstick section, and there are no green or blue micas in that section that match the jelly colors.  I'm certain that reputable companies producing green and blue lippies are doing their homework and using safe colorants, but since Ms. Stephanie has been caught selling soap dyes as eyeshadow and falsifying ingredient lists, I wouldn't put it past her.

Lastly, for those who haven't seen the "micas" being used in the neon set, which is now conveniently being referred to as the bright set, I want to provide links for the neons available from TKB, (all of which have a clear disclaimer stating that they are soap dyes and not approved for cosmetic use,) and cite which FFC colors they match.

http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=67 - color match to Elektrik
http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=68 - color match to Flashy

http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=69 - color match to the sold out FFC yellow, which I believe was called Sunnyshine
http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=70 - color match to Phizzle
http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=71 - color match to Baybee
http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=72 - color match to Outrageous

http://www.tkbtrading.com/item.php?item_id=73 - color match to Flame

I sent Ms. Stephanie an E-mail on 10/3/11 with the above links to the neon pigments and also informed her of the possibility that she may unwittingly be using unsafe pigments in her lip glosses.  I think it's safe to assume that she has nothing to say to me, given that her website states that all E-mails will be answered "with in 24 to 48 hours " [sic].  She has threatened and harassed both bloggers and potential customers just for asking about her ingredients, she posted a horrendously incomplete ingredients list, and is claiming her "bright" pigments are "100% safe" with the disclaimers "if you do not feel comfortable with these products please do not purchase them." and "if you feel you may have an allergies to any of the listed ingredients use at your own risk" [sic].  If you are claiming a product is safe, while at the same time telling your customers to use at their own risk, chances are that said product is not safe.  The moral of the story is: do your homework and go with your gut.  If a company seems suspicious, it's very likely there is a reason you feel uneasy with them.

Hi-Fi Cosmetics Swatches + Review

The Shop: Hi-Fi Cosmetics

My Order: I ordered a full-size Shimmer Dust in Famous, and Paparazzi Flash Powder in RIOT

Packaging:  I placed my order on August 5th, and received shipping information via PayPal on September 21st, but the package does not show as accepted at the Post Office until the following day.  More on that later.  My order arrived in a bubble mailer, with the two full-size products in a ziploc baggie and a business card and two bagged samples in another ziploc baggie.

Today's Swatches:

Look at the size of some of those particles... Eye-safe?

So the shadows are nice enough (although I did expect more sparkle from Famous.) but the size of the particles in RIOT is dubious...  Some of them are very fine, but the larger particles are about four times the size of the small ones.  It's not the huge chunky glitter you'd find in a grade school craft closet,  but it looks very comparable to the glitter I used to make locker signs for cheerleading in High School.  I don't really want to put that on my eyes...  Swatched on bare skin with a foiled stripe down the center (top row) and skin prepped with My Beauty Addiction's Shadow Poxy (bottom row.)

Overall: I understand (after making my order and doing some research as to what might be taking so long) that Hi-Fi did a Heartsy deal in early July, just two days shy of a month before I placed my order.  Normally, I wouldn't mind a long turnaround time.  I understand that things get crazy sometimes and it's really hard to stay on top of things.  I have no problem with having to wait if I know what's going on.  However, if Veronica was still in the wake of her Heartsy madness, there should have been some sort of announcement in her shop.  I do not recall seeing any such announcement for an extended TAT, because if it had been prominently posted somewhere I probably would have held off on ordering.  So I placed my order and sort of forgot about it until I was looking through my Etsy purchases and noticed that over a month later this one hadn't been marked as "shipped."  I tried to send her a convo through Etsy, but that didn't work and the link to her shop brought up a 404 error.  So then I tried to E-mail her, and received a form letter about her extended TAT, the first I had heard about the Heartsy deal.  In this E-mail, Veronica states that "My 12-15 business day TAT has been extended.  I'm doing everything in my power to get orders out the door and emails answered as quickly as possible" and also that "Hi-Fi Cosmetics will be temporarily closed for ordering starting on Monday, August 1."  These pieces of information would have come in handy when I was perusing her totally-not-closed Etsy shop filled with products on August 5th.  Having gotten no response through E-mail, I looked up Hi-Fi on Facebook and noticed many others were missing orders.  I made a post on the Facebook page on September 12th that went completely ignored.  Six days later, Veronica started posting on the Facebook page again, but had still not acknowledged either of my contact attempts.  She posted that the remaining orders would be going out that week, and listed the order numbers.  My order number was not on the list, so I responded asking why and included my order number.  No response, but I did receive shipping information from PayPal three days later and my package was accepted at the Post Office the next day.  Honestly, I don't know what her usual turnaround time is; I assume based on the information in the automatic reply message that it's 12-15 days, and that's fine.  However, given that I had no idea there was an extension, or how long the extension was (the E-mail did not give an estimate on a timeframe) I would expect some sort of response.  It's also noteworthy that the Facebook post I responded to first, dated August 31st, she said she was waiting on lip gloss tubes to get the remaining orders out.  Several people commented on that post, myself included, who were waiting on orders with only eyeshadows, and our questions elicited no public response from Veronica.  My reply was almost two weeks after the original post.  My second post was six days later, once she reappeared and was actively posting about re-opening, price changes, and selectively answering any questions that didn't have to do with missing or incorrect orders.  It took three more days to receive my shipping information, and another day to actually get my package in the mail.  The original, already-pretty-long TAT of 12-15 days was nearly tripled, and I had no idea there was an extension in the first place.  And not a word from Veronica, even after my package arrived.  No apology or personal note of any kind was included.  Aaaaand as icing on this disaster cake, one of my jars wasn't closed properly and leaked considerably.  I know others have had wonderful experiences with Hi-Fi, and I hope for her other customers that this is an isolated incident, but this is a business I will not support in the future.

Orglamix is at it Again!

The reason I started this blog was to make my readers aware of companies I think are awesome and comanies I think they should avoid.  If something isn't safe, I do my best to get the word out about it.  If something shady is going on with a company, I will do my best to warn you, my lovely readers.  One company in particular was enough to get me started.  Once I read about the terrible business practices and ethics of this company, I decided I had to do something.

Back in March, I saw a strange post in the Etsy forums that was quickly shut down by admin for "calling out."  At this point, I had never heard anything about Orglamix or Cheri Tracy, but I wanted to know more.  See the original forum post here.  I clicked on the links in the post, and one of them took me to a blog post over at The Eyes Have It with some pretty damning evidence against Orglamix.  I read that Cheri was claiming her products to be all-natural and handmade, but that they were not what she claimed them to be.  I looked further and found posts from many reputable bloggers that had questioned the contents and labeling of Orglamix and/or Urban Apothecary, Cheri's old company that is somehow defunct yet still has a website up and running.  Customers were getting curious after it came out that her Candy Glam line was private label, and sold as eyeshadows when they were not eye-safe.  Some customers decided to peel back the labels on their Orglamix jars and found strange labels underneath.  While Cheri's Orglamix labels were printed on a home ink jet printer with her logo and unscrupulous ingredients lists, the mystery labels were glossy, laser-printed, and had no trace of anything to do with Orglamix.  Some had strange numbers that were eventually traced back to a private label company (though these numbers did not always provide a color match), and the labels on her primer actually stated "Distributed by Quero Pro."  The more I read, the more Cheri seemed like not only a nut job, but also a total crook.  I found a blog that gave Orglamix an unfavorable review, and a follow-up to the post claiming that Cheri had sent the author a cease-and-desist letter.  A cease and desist letter for a bad review?  Are you serious?  I read everything I could find on the subject, and came to the conclusion that this woman is a complete con artist.  Many people, including myself, posted our concerns about the ingredients, double-labels, etc. on the Orglamix facebook fanpage and were promptly banned and their comments removed.  Thankfully, there are albums containing screenshots of the deleted comments on the fanpage, in addition to negative feedback left for Orglamix on Etsy, despite Cheri's claims to never have had a single complaint.  I got a lovely, professional response to my questions before they were deleted.  I was not able to screencap it, but I've copied it directly from the Facebook E-mail: "Jessica, I have a family-- and two kids to attend to for God's sake. I also have over 300 emails and 100+ Etsy convos that need to be addressed. I said I would make a statement and I will. I actually need to write it first-- and make sure I am addressing all legitimate concerns."  And if you were curious, her statement was written on a blog that is no longer available.  But she did gloss over important concerns, crafting her words carefully to make it seem as though she was actually answering questions.  When people continued asking questions, she kept claiming that her products are handmade and the double-labels were due to misprints or new names.  She had nothing to say about the laser-printed labels that had no Orglamix logo, or the ones that specifically said they were distributed by another company.  She even posted a video of her office and her "lab" to prove that she was making her products, but her "lab" lacked any sort of mixing equipment, sanitation equipment, or enough raw materials to make anywhere near the product she was supposedly making and shipping every day.  She also posted a video of her "mixing" a limited edition color, by putting some base, mica, and glitter in a tupperware container and shaking it.  Literally.  She claims she makes all of her products this way, and people still support her.  Her last post on the Orglamix Cosmetics facebook page is dated March 14th, at which point she had stated she would be going on vacation and that a friend of hers had a death in the family.  Her Etsy shop had actually been under investigation at this point according to admin, but she claimed that she had intentionally put it into vacation mode.  I believe that after the investigation was over and the shop was back up, she did in fact willingly put it into vacation mode, but she never once acknowledged that her shop was under investigation.  On April 17th, her shop was suspended due to non-delivery; any links to her shop, feedback, etc. now go to an error page.  Her twitter feed, which is run by a bot, is still up and running and posting broken links to her Etsy account.  Throughout everything, Cheri has been ignoring her customers, not sending orders, and being extremely curt and unprofessional toward any person who questions her.  Her PR representative, Kelly, has been contacting bloggers to do giveaways and reviews and acting as if everything is totally normal.  Some people had speculated Cheri had taken ill because of her having been quiet for so long, so it came as a shock to many when an article was posted about a new boutique opening up in Glencoe, Illinois as a joint venture by Amy Bishop and (surprise, surprise!) Cheri Tracy on July 6th.   Let me take a moment to make it clear that I do not wish any ill toward Cheri.  If she had said, 'No, I don't make my own products.  It's private label and I will now leave Etsy in respect of the fact that Etsy is for handmade items only.' and properly labeled her ingredients, this whole thing could have been avoided.  Saying your products may contain carmine essentially means that all of your products contain carmine if they are all made with the same equipment, just like the 'may contain peanuts' warnings on certain food items.  The peanut warning is there so that people with allergies know not to handle the product due to a potential reaction. In this case she was advertising her products as vegan, when in all likelyhood, they all contained carmine.  Saying your products are all-natural and paraben-free, but placing a label that says "pomegranate oil" over a label that says "liquapar oil" is straight deception.  Many people have serious reactions to ingredients that are in Orglamix products, and improper labeling knowing that it could cause a reaction  is absolutely deplorable. It's my belief that Cheri Tracy's business practices are horrendous, so I am sure that this post sounds quite biased, but I assure you this is not a jealous rant from a competitor.  This is fact.  This is research.  Take from it what you will, and form your own opinions.  As always, thanks for reading!

Regarding Neon Pigments

I'm sure by now that most of you have already read about this elsewhere from more prominent bloggers, but I wanted to put another post out there for anybody who is looking for answers and unable to find them elsewhere.  Fantastic Faces Cosmetics is a company that was started fairly recently, headed by a woman who calls herself Ms. Stephanie.  She recently released a collection of neon pigments that had heads turning and eyebrows raised in the beauty blogger community.

Above: pigments sold by an E-bay seller as cosmetic-safe, Below: Ms. Stephanie's neon "shadows."  She has asked that her pictures not be used by others and some have respected that request.  However, I feel that she has completely disrespected a number of people by attacking them and/or banning them, so I have decided to show her exactly as much respect as she has shown me and my peers.  TKB lists all of their neons as not eye safe, and the FDA does not approve any neon pigments for eye use.  Before I started blogging, I had done an extensive amount of research on a couple of shady companies I had heard of lately; it actually is what inspired me to start a makeup blog.  I wanted to do what I could to sing the praises of cosmetic companies that run their businesses correctly and warn others of companies who don't.  The fact of the matter here is that no neon is FDA-approved for use on the eyes, but here Ms. Stephanie has somehow magically found a way around that and created neon pigments?  People wanted to know more, so they started asking questions.  Some already knew that there was no way the pigments could be safe, so they addressed the issue accordingly and were promptly removed and/or banned from the Fabulous Faces facebook fan page.  I would post a link, but I've been blocked.  For the record, I posted this in response to Ms. Stephanie saying that her customers could believe what they wanted, but she wasn't going to stop doing what she is good at: "Nobody is asking you to stop making cosmetics; they are only asking questions for their own safety and the safety of others. Not labeling full-size cosmetics with ingredients is against FDA regulations, and being an indie brand does not make you exempt from following them. It would not be acceptable just to put 'mica' on a label either, as every mica actually has many different ingredients in it; for example, a mica called "Cosmetic Fluorescent Strong Pink" on TKBtrading.com contains red 28 and polyester-3, and is not approved for eye use. A pigment being labeled as cosmetic grade does not mean that it is approved for all cosmetic uses. It may mean that it is acceptable for use on lips, but not eyes, or vice versa, or that it should not be used directly on the skin but you can use it in small amounts in soaps."  My subsequent banning took about ten minutes, and there was no response from Ms. Stephanie.

There's no way for me to tell for sure, but I'd wager money that it's not up anymore if you visit the fan page.  She has responded to inquiries about the content of her neon shadows and the lack of labeling and ingredients disclosure with statements that her pigments are 100% eye-safe, the only ingredient she uses is mica, and she is getting labels soon.  It is obvious she has previously had no idea what FDA regulations are for labeling and safe ingredients, or has blatantly disregarded them.  I myself, and several other bloggers, have tried to help her understand that she is in direct violation of these regulations and she obviously has no interest in becoming compliant.  I hope that she comes to her senses and pulls these products before somebody suffers a serious injury and she has a much bigger issue on her hands than a couple of curious customers and some blog posts.

You can read more about the debacle in these posts:

Cupcake's Quirky Corner made a post about the safety of neons, and then wrote a follow-up including her own experiences and some detective work, and another follow-up.

And the Snarky Princess made a post regarding her ingredient inquiries and the response she received.

*EDIT* 6/12/11 5:48 p.m.  Ms. Stephanie posted on the facebook page at approximately 2:30 p.m. that she is discontinuing the neon shadows, but made no statement about the safety issues.  She should definitely have made a statement about the shadows and the fact that they are not eye-safe, but at least she pulled them from her line.  One follower responded that she was glad she got two sets before she stopped distributing them.  I hope that this customer does not run into any issues with the  shadows, and I am glad that Ms. Stephanie (sort of) did the right thing.  I can say now that I will never place an order from this company, but I truly hope she turns things around.


*EDIT* 6/15/11 2:23 p.m.  I will say that I didn't trust her further than I can throw her, but lo and behold, Ms Stephanie has gone against her word and is still offering the neons in sample packs offered through a shop add-on on her facebook fanpage.  Her other store, where the neon "shadows" were still listed as a "last chance" item after she made her flimsy statement, appears to be closed at the moment.  The shadows in the sample packs are chosen at random, and oops there are totally neon shadows in the picture she used to illustrate what they might look like.  After pleas and attempts from bloggers and concerned members of the indie beauty company, she has chosen to continue selling these dangerous pigments.  If she will sell them straight, who's to say she wouldn't mix them with other colors?  I can only hope that she will pull the pigments and bow out gracefully, but I just don't see that happening.  I implore you not to purchase from this seller, and to spread the word about unsafe pigments.