Brand Visit: Nivea

Soooo, when I said to come back later for SMACK's first Brand Visit, I hadn't originally meant this much later. But here we are, spending a lovely Friday night together.

Without the benefit of any consistency through brands or product lines, how do we as consumers know who's doing a good job making and selling safe products? It turns out that hardly any of the brands have a full lineup of safe offerings. So with each Brand Visit we'll try to sort through the noise and marketing to see what's worth trying and what you should avoid.

First up is Nivea, who dropped some serious cash to put its name all over Times Square for the heavily televised New Year's Eve celebration. Something about winter dry lips and kissing.

Bonus history lesson: Nivea is owned by Beiersdorf, the German company which also owns Eucerin and LaPrairie. The company itself was founded in 1882 by pharmacist Paul Beiersdorf, and leans heavily still today on positioning its brands as dermatologically developed, implying the inherent trust that consumers will give nearly anything with a medical slant. That's what marketing does, create associations for the benefit of the manufacturer, not the consumer. 

Ok, Nivea, let's see how you look under the lens of scrutiny. EWG rates 198 of the company's products, while GoodGuide includes 181 products in its rankings. We're not looking at every single one. Let's instead check out the better- and worse-rated items and see where the rating guides agree -- and disagree -- with how different products and ingredients are ranked.

(All this helps us be more informed consumers, as we touched on in our New Year's resolutions. You're welcome.)

We'll start by pointing out that EWG gives none of the Nivea products it ranks -- NONE -- a rating lower than '3'. Over at GoodGuide, just one Nivea product -- Silhouette Redefining Gel Cream -- receives a health rating higher than a 6. (Remember that both the Skin Deep and GoodGuide databases rank products on a 1-10 scale, using opposite extremes. GoodGuide reserves 10 as the best score, while for EWG it's a 0.)

Let's dig a little deeper into the ratings. EWG and GoodGuide seem in agreement about Nivea's Original Moisture Daily Lotion, each giving it a 'not bad, but not great' rating. And when we look at the individual ingredients, we see why. Both ratings guides call out the use of METHYLISOTHIAZOLINONE (MI or MIT), a common preservative in cosmetics. GoodGuide notes that Canada has restricted the use of the chemical. Did you know that last month the EU decided to ban MI altogether? Here's the news article from the Daily Mail. 

Errrr, aaawwwkward. I mean, that's one of the better-rated Nivea products.

The worst ones? At the Skin Deep database, they are a few Nivea for Men products and a handful of shower gels. GoodGuide fills nearly all its bottom-of-the-barrel slots with Nivea for Men.

This is getting long. The take-aways here are that if you're shopping for shower gel or men's skin care, Nivea's not your brand. If you do use any Nivea products, watch the ingredients, especially for that pesky MI. And also know that petroleum is one of the brand's cornerstone ingredients.

So Happy New Year, Nivea. Thanks for keeping our lips kissably soft.

Yours,
Jazzy