MY Aveda shampoos and conditioners are not kept in my bathroom but with my skin-care products in the bedroom. I cannot imagine them being used by my family on a daily basis just because they are so expensive. But they are so good on the hair and scalp and I trust them so much that when my dog got sick, Aveda Nutriplenish Shampoo was the only one I used to bathe her. If you know me and how I take care of my dogs, you’d know that what I just revealed is a seal of approval for this brand known for its vegan formulations.
Long before “Clean Beauty” became a buzz phrase in the industry, Aveda was already a green brand.
“Aveda holds a unique stake in the industry as a ‘no compromise brand,’ meaning you don’t have to sacrifice green for performance. We like to refer to Aveda as the brand of ANDs—today you can have products that are high performance AND vegan AND cruelty-free AND plant-powered AND created with a mission of care. You don’t have to choose,” Christine Hall, Aveda vice president of research and development, said in an e-mail interview.
Early this year, Aveda got certified cruelty-free under Cruelty Free International’s Leaping Bunny Program. This certification is more difficult to obtain than a PETA-certification because it requires companies to actually prove their claims and the certification process takes years.
Aveda is a pioneer in creating sustainability-minded products and its teams are dedicated to following the principles of green chemistry in every step of ingredient sourcing, product formulation and manufacturing. “Not only do we hold ourselves and our products to the highest standards—both in sustainability and performance—but we also hold our suppliers to these high standards. We prioritize working with suppliers who source from renewable and sustainable plant-based origins, avoid materials that negatively impact the ecosystems from which they are sourced and produced, and overall prioritize the practice of green chemistry,” said Hall.
Most of the time, Aveda painstakingly extracts its ingredients from plants instead of going for synthetic ingredients without fear mongering.
Aveda does this to reduce its reliance on non-renewable petroleum products in favor of renewable plants. Using plants responsibly helps Aveda protect the earth and provide economic benefits to people around the world who grow, wild harvest, and produce its plant ingredients. “This is important to us and to many consumers,” said Cindy Angerhofer, Aveda’s Executive Fellow of Botanical Research.
“Synthetic ingredients can undoubtedly provide good benefits to skin and hair. In many cases those ingredients are the same ones that are found in plants, e.g., betaine, salicylic acid, caffeine, aroma components, but they are just cheaper and easier to be made synthetically than to extract them from plants. We use some synthetic ingredients if we simply cannot get an ingredient another way, and if it is essential to the performance of our products. We like to use whole essential oils because their aroma has more depth and beauty than isolated compounds, and to use a whole extract of ginger or turmeric because nature has combined many different compounds that may give more or different activities,” she said.
The use of ferments and ferment-derived ingredients is a very big trend in beauty right now but at Aveda, it is also an important means of producing valuable ingredients.
“Fermenting yeast or bacteria can produce metabolites like sugars lipids, and amino acids or peptides and derivatives from these substances that are useful for skin or scalp. [An example is Lactobacillus that gives us a rich broth that is useful to support the skin barrier.] Fermentation can give us large quantities of ingredients using a controlled, natural process that we would otherwise have to make synthetically, or would have to harvest a huge amount of plants for. Growing microalgae in large vessels is a good example of that—we get high amounts of functional polysaccharides under sustainable, controlled conditions that soothe skin and scalp without disturbing the sea to harvest the algae over and over. Sometimes we are also able to ferment microbes that produce ingredients we would otherwise have to obtain from animals—hyaluronic acid and glucosamine are good examples of this,” said Angerhofer.
Aveda offers an assortment of ultra-hydrating, deep repairing and revitalizing products for all hair types and textures in three key Aveda collections: Nutriplenish, Botanical Repair, and Invati Advanced.
There are also products that address particular hair and scalp concerns.
“Our Invati Advanced and Pramasana collections contain powerful actives that support hair and scalp health. Additionally, Aveda has a longstanding partnership with the prestigious Center for Skin Sciences at the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom, which has a globally recognized team of scientists committed to building on the foundation of hair and skin biology. The findings of this team have helped drive Aveda’s research in developing powerful actives that can support hair and scalp health in Invati Advanced,” said Hall.
Another thing that Aveda is known for is the comforting aromas of its products. “Some of our most popular aromas are Shampure, Rosemary Mint, and Cherry Almond. While they have very different scent profiles, they share an element of complexity, thanks to the artistry with which they were formulated. This complexity, combined with the slight ‘roughness’ that our natural and naturally-derived raw materials contribute to our formulas, is what I think makes our aromas ‘smell like Aveda’ and draws people in,” said Sofia Blanco, Aveda’s Aroma Scientist.
In the Philippines, Aveda is available on Lazada, Zalora and Rustan’s. The Aveda Store can be found at Mall of Asia in Pasay City.