I have been thinking about cosmetics. A lot. I need a break from blogging about my art classes so I am going to talk about cosmetics.

I work in a salon part time. I use a ton of chemicals when I do. Many days after I work I have a heaviness in my chest or I develop cold symptoms. I am unusually sensitive to chemicals in cosmetics and beauty products. It's one of the reasons I can't stay a blonde for very long even though I love it.

Recently I was approached by a direct sales company to sell their cosmetics. I had been to one of their "spa nights" and must have been targeted as someone who is good at sales. I am usually pretty vocal at those kind of events. And it is true that if I like something I let the world know. The sales consultant gave me a bunch of products to sample for a few weeks to see what I thought. Even though I am very skeptical about direct sales products I agreed to try her samples.

I feel like she kind of opened Pandora's box for me. The whole scenario caused me to really think about how I feel about the beauty industry as a whole and my part in it.

I will say that I hate direct sales cosmetic companies. Most of them rant and rave about empowering and helping women.I don't dispute that they do give many women a chance to run their own business from the home and that this is valuable but I would like to make a few thought provoking comments concerning their business practices.

I wonder if it is helping women or hurting women to teach them how to ruthlessly sell cosmetics to their friends and family in the name of self esteem. Is it about really helping a woman with her self esteem? Is it helping or hurting women to spend so much money on needless cosmetics? Is selling them a twenty dollar hand scrub helping their self esteem? What about the harmful chemicals in the products? Is that helping or hurting women. I wonder if anyone else thinks these thoughts.

The company that approached me is called Beauti Control. The first thing I did was look at their website to find their parent company. I discovered that it was Tupperware Brands. Tupperware Brands also has six other skin care lines that they sell around the world. I am not thrilled about using a cosmetic line that is backed by a plastics manufacturer, especially one that is being shady about taking the BPA out of their plastics. The next thing I did was look them up on Cosmeticdatabase.com. The cosmetic database is a safety guide to cosmetics and personal care products brought to you by researchers at the Environmental Working Group. Basically the group signs contracts with different cosmetic companies to test and research their products and gives them a rating based on their toxicity. I was disappointed to see that Beauti Control won't even sign a contract with the company. I guess they have something to hide.

So I decided to pass on Beauti Control. I wonder what company I should look in to next on my quest for good cosmetics? While I ponder that I will also be thinking about what make-up line to buy for the salon.

Mary