Most significant challenges for natural formulators

One of the biggest trends in cosmetic formulating is the trend towards making “natural”, “green” and sustainable formulations. This represents a challenge for cosmetic chemists because you are essentially limiting the number of raw materials that you get to start with. It’s a bit like telling a painter to create a picture using only 3 colors rather than an entire pallet. It can be done, but the results may not be as impressive.

Here are the top challenges that natural formulators will face.

1. Determining what natural means.
Perhaps the biggest challenge is to figure out what your company considers “natural”. There is no single definition and the number of different standards that are out there are overwhelming. As a formulator, you’re going to want to get specific direction on exactly which ingredients you’ll be allowed to use and which ones you can’t. If your company doesn’t know, then you should just choose one of the leading natural cosmetic standards and stick with it.

2. End product performance.
Once you know which ingredients you are limited to, the real challenging part begins, formulating good performing products. There is one truism about consumers and “natural” products.

Consumers will not sacrifice performance quality for more natural formulations

This means you’ll have to find an acceptable benchmark filled with synthetic compounds, and try to match the performance. This is a difficult task especially when the best performing surfactants, moisturizing ingredients, cosmetic thickeners and most every other cosmetic raw material are synthetic compounds.

3. Adequate preservation.
Related to the previous one, preservation of your product will be a challenge when following almost any natural standard. When you can’t use parabens or formaldehyde donors as preservatives you have to make formulation compromises that can significantly impact performance or end user experience.

4. Formulation cost
Another problem for natural formulations is that they cost more than synthetic formulations. The difference doesn’t have to be crazy, but you should expect 50% or higher formulation costs.

5. Figuring out how natural you are.
Even if you do a diligent job of picking the right natural raw materials and matching performance benchmarks, you still may not be natural enough. While your raw material supplier may have given you a natural surfactant the first time, they may spike it with synthetic sources to “boost” the performance (say adding parabens to make the ingredients last longer). To ensure that you are meeting natural standards, you’ll need to work with the suppliers, getting all the appropriate paperwork. This can be a hassle.

Formulating natural products is an added challenge for cosmetic chemists but it also ensures that there will be more work in the future.

If formulating natural formulas is of interest to you, be sure to check out our Formulating Naturals Cosmetics course.

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How to Become a Cosmetic Chemist

The job of a cosmetic chemist, or as they call it in the UK a cosmetic scientist, requires you to do a wide variety of things both in and out of the lab. Your main responsibility will be that of a formulator. This means you mix raw materials together to create cosmetic products like lipstick, nail polish, skin lotions, shampoos, toothpaste and any other type of personal care product.

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