Sustainable Brands to Make Your Daily Life More Eco-Friendly
(Sustainable products from farmers markets, small businesses, and companies like Lush)
What is Sustainability and How Do We Benefit From it?
Oxford Languages defines sustainability as an “avoidance of the depletion of natural resources in order to maintain an ecological balance”. In order to maintain this said ecological balance, we need to start cutting down global emissions. Currently, corporate companies contribute about 71% of global carbon emissions. While consuming single-use or non-sustainable items might be less time-consuming and cheaper by doing so we increase our carbon footprints and contribute to the increasing global emissions. By consuming sustainable products, we benefit ourselves, small ecological-friendly businesses, and the Earth. Sweatshops, which are unsanitary and unsafe factories and workshops, have become very popular in the clothing industry recently. The companies who use sweatshops profit off the suffering of child laborers, long hours, and unfair conditions. Sweatshops are also not sustainable and pollute thousands of gallons of local water per environment every day.
Ethical Consumption and Choice Privilege
Major corporate companies make products unethically. This allows lower prices-making the product more available for many people and thus feeding into this unending cycle of consuming environmentally-hazardous goods. An example of this is Palm Oil. Palm Oil is obtained through deforestation but is in almost every single ingredient list in reference to cheap skincare and food products. With that being said the ability to choose between the $26, 1 oz, Organic Face Oil with better ingredients compared to the $10, 3 oz, Face Oil is a choice privilege. It is difficult for millions of people to get the products they need since the higher-end products that are usually eco-friendly are nearly 2.5X more expensive than the cheaper non-eco-friendly products. Why pay $20.99 for a local company dinner when you can pay $6 for a full meal and a large soda drink at McDonald’s? It may seem difficult but it isn’t impossible to find ethical brands, with a little bit of research!
Brands to Use That are Eco-Friendly
There are hundreds of remarkable businesses that are eco-friendly and support the health of our Earth. Please remember that ethically made products will always be a little more costly, because of the quality that is put in. They actually pay their workers and manufacturers fair wages and do not take advantage of sweatshops.
For fashion, I recommend:
Madewell- A little pricey but a wide size range from XXS-3X.
GOEX- A great company background, a wide size range of YXS-4XL, and cute eco-graphic tees.
People Tree- Very pricey, great quality products, sizes range from 6-16.
For beauty, I recommend:
Lush- Amazing products with great prices, cruelty-free, and vegan! Lush also has a great info FAQ about palm oil here:https://www.lushusa.com/stories/article_FAQ-Lush-and-palm-oil.html
PHB Ethical Beauty- Vegan, cruelty-free, palm oil-free, ethically sourced!
Elate Beauty- Palm oil-free, cruelty-free, vegan, and ethically sourced!
Why these Brands?
These brands are all great because of their intentions, sourcing, product quality, and availability. By giving our money to great brands for amazing products in return, we are turning our business away from the sweatshops. We are the consumers, we have the power!
Work Cited:
https://www.dosomething.org/us/facts/11-facts-about-sweatshops#:~:text=A%20%22sweatshop%22%20is%20defined%20by,lack%20of%20benefits%20for%20workers
https://indigenouspeoples-sdg.org/index.php/english/all-global-news/874-just-100-companies-responsible-for-71-of-global-emissions-study-says
https://www.madewell.com/womens/sale/up-to-30-off?srcCode=Paid_Search|Search_Brand|Google|PMG^G^MW_BR_US_EN_X_Core_Exact_X^madewell&NoPopUp=True&gclid=CjwKCAjwrKr8BRB_EiwA7eFapqOruscUTEhpXM6cfInLR48AmmIFcrxhf-WtI_OfE5URcNDP07-kABoCBBUQAvD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds
https://goexapparel.com/about/?gclid=CjwKCAjwrKr8BRB_EiwA7eFapt__K2o6V7ei4HiFE60jozn0Cz58H9LTFEuBRFpIE4l_oJ3DCFrFORoC0bwQAvD_BwE
https://www.peopletree.co.uk/women/snorkmaiden-umbrella-tee
https://www.lushusa.com/stories/article_FAQ-Lush-and-palm-oil.html
https://earthhero.com/product-category/elate-cosmetics/?ref=sustainablejunglel
https://www.lovelula.com/t/brands/phb-ethical-beauty?affiliate_id=160403&clickId=3316023287