Environmental Policy
Last updated: 15th May 2021
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Energy
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Cult of Cuda HQ is powered by 100% renewable energy, always has been, always will be. Aside from making cosmetics, our founder is also a mechanical engineer who works in the renewable energy sector, so if you ever want to chat about energy he's your guy!
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Water
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Tap water is the best, fact, and don't listen to anyone who tries to argue otherwise. In the UK, tap water is among the best in the world. It undergoes millions of tests making it the most regulated drink out there! Therefore it's perfect for use in our products.
Using tap water also means we reduce our plastic footprint by avoiding lots of pointless bottles.
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Ingredients
What goes into our products is our number one priority. Our aim is to source the best quality ingredients for you whilst also protecting the environment for future generations. This is why we refuse to use unsustainable palm oil, any of its derivatives, mica, and anything on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
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Palm Oil
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The shift to palm oil has been a major driver of deforestation of some of the world’s most biodiverse forests, destroying the habitat of already endangered species, and taking away land of indigenous people. Whilst some of it is grown sustainably, most of it unfortunately isn't, and is still causing huge problems.
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The RSPO (Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil) has developed a set of environmental and social requirements that must be followed in order to sell CSPO (Certified Sustainable Palm Oil). However, some have criticised them for having been slow to enforce the ban on deforestation, and failing to effectively monitor continued rule-breaking.
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Most commercial liquid soaps, and even some bar soaps, are not actually soap at all - instead they commonly use Sodium Lauryl Sulphate (SLS), which is nearly always derived from unsustainable palm oil.
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For this reason, we avoid all unsustainable palm oil, and all of our cleansing bars are made with a base of olive and coconut oils. Our shampoos also use surface active agents derived from coconut, rapeseed, and brassica napus seed oils. However, for some products where there is no alternative, such as cetyl alcohol, we use mass balance segregated palm oil, which is certified sustainable.
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Mica
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Mica is a shimmery mined mineral used extensively across the cosmetic industry (often labelled as CI 77019). Nearly all cosmetic products with a glittery sparkle or lustre will use mica.
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Whilst mica itself is safe, there are many problems with the mining process, which include the exploitation of child labour, unsafe working conditions, and unfair trade. Despite international efforts to stop this, it's still difficult to guarantee the source is ethically and environmentally sound. For this reason, we refuse to use naturally occurring mica, and instead only use synthetic mica, also known as fluorphlogopite.
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Threatened Species
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Certain varieties of natural oils, including Indian Sandalwood, most Rosewood and Frankincense (Boswellia Sacra, not the type we use), are listed on the IUCN Red List of threatened species. Unfortunately, some of the countries in which they are produced have not been able to protect the species while trying to meet demand, similar to palm oil. We won't even use this in our products.
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Packaging
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Cult of Cuda was founded on the principle of minimising packaging and where possible removing it all together. Recycling is great, but it's not a get out of jail free card, because things like plastic cannot be indefinitely recycled. Materials like paper and cardboard are great because they can biodegrade, glass can be reused, and aluminium almost indefinitely recycled! That's why we developed our solid products, which can just be wrapped in paper, without the need for plastic tubs or heavy glass jars.
As we continue to develop new products, packaging will continue to form a huge part of our decision making process, and we will keep you updated on our decisions.
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Recycling
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Companies rarely disclose the waste stream that comes from manufacturing, but we want to be honest with you. Like every cosmetic business, the raw ingredients we buy come packaged and often we don't have a choice over how this is done. Items include cardboard boxes, paper invoices, plastic bags, glass/metal/plastic bottles with plastic lids, and plastic tubs.
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We carefully choose suppliers that have the least plastic, particularly those horrible polystyrene packing chips, and always opt for the reduced packaging options. We try to buy in larger quantities to minimise the number of containers. We also buy essential oil and fragrance oils in glass or aluminium bottles where possible.
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Things are slowly improving, and we promise to keep pushing the suppliers for better packaging choices, but in the meantime we will reuse or recycle everything we can.