Doing Good Feels SuperSustainable Sourcing
What is it about?
We’ll continue to challenge ourselves to choose ingredients and materials that are relevant to you as well as being kinder choices to the world around us.
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Paper & Pulp
You’ll find paper and pulp in a number of our Own Brand products including tissues, toilet rolls, hygiene pads, sanitary towels, nappies and wet wipes. So, with so many products on our shelves containing this raw material, we have lots of plans in place to ensure materials are sourced sustainably.
All of the paper used in our tissues, paper towel and toilet roll are either FSC or PEFC certified and all of the pulp used in our absorbent hygiene products such as towels and nappies are either FSC or PEFC certified. Plus, we have also committed that all of the paper used in our wet wipes will be either FSC or PEFC certified by 2020.
Mica
Used as an ingredient in eyeshadow (to make it glisten and sparkle), Mica is a mineral, gathered primarily in India and China and we’re committed to sourcing mica ethically.
Where we use Mica, we are committed to sourcing Mica ethically. We expect all suppliers of Own Brand products to use minerals sourced from the ‘Members of Responsible Mica Initiative’.
Palm oil
What is palm oil?
Palm oil is extracted from the pulp and fruit of the palm tree.
Palm kernel oil is more commonly used in the beauty industry and this is extracted from the seed or the fruit
The beauty industry worldwide uses less than 2% of the total production of palm oil, the majority of use is within the food industry. Palm oil is an incredibly effective crop, producing more oil per land area than any alterative vegetable crop, including soya and coconut. 35% of the worlds demand is produced on just 10% of land mass, whereas alternative crops require between 4 and 10 times more land to produce the same amount of oil. It is also important to recognise the economic benefit of the palm oil industry which benefits millions of smallholder farmers and economies, in Indonesia and Malaysia 4.5 million people rely on palm oil for their livelihood.
Sustainability is very important to us and we currently use sustainable palm oil in many of our own brand products. We continue to work with our own label suppliers to increase this, improve transparency and ensure we make the most sustainable choices in relation to palm oil and other materials for our customer.
What is a palm oil derivative?
Palm oil goes through further processing, and its these ingredients that are derived from Palm oil that are most commonly used in personal care and beauty products. Derivatives of palm oil are the main use in the beauty industry, the palm oil is used as a base oil or starter oil which is then synthesised into a many different ingredients including detergents, emulsifiers and emollients.
Why do we use it?
Palm oil is an incredibly efficient crop, producing more oil per hectare than any alternative vegetable crop, therefore using alternatives will have a greater impact on habitats and species.
What’s our current position?
Sustainability is very important to us as a business and where better choices can be made, we will continue to work on our own, with our suppliers and with other organisations to increase our use of sustainably sourced palm oil wherever possible.
We recognise that initiatives such as the Round Table on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) are working to make sustainable Palm Oil the norm , and although we are not members ourselves currently , more than 80% of the suppliers we use for our own brand products are.
Some examples of ranges where we use Sustainable Palm derivatives , are our Vitamin E range, one of our much-loved heritage ranges, 100% of the products use RSPO sourced palm oil. And for B., our biggest own brand, 91% of the products use RSPO sourced palm oil too.
Krill oil
We don’t permit the use of Krill in any of our Own Brand products.