Much like how shopping fully sustainably can be difficult, shopping cruelty-free can also be hard; especially when you don’t suspect your favorite brands to test on animals.
After finding out Aquaphor isn’t cruelty-free, I went down a spiral of trying to find a dupe. I found one that could be really good, but I have yet to try it. (Burt’s Bees Baby Multipurpose Healing Ointment, $8.99 on their website. 100% natural and petroleum-free!)
While I was scouring websites for this dupe, I ran into a lot of brands that I currently use or have used in the past that test on animals. I was shocked that in this day and age there are still so many companies that are not cruelty-free. I would’ve imagined that after Elle Woods (Legally Blonde) went down to D.C. and banned animal testing that we’d be on her wave by now!
With that being said, there are a couple of websites I found on the way that can aid you in your cruelty-free cosmetics shopping:
Crueltyfreeinternational.org/leapingbunny
This website allows you to search by company or brand name to see which are cruelty-free! (Note: for this feature you do have to be specific with your spelling and special characters.)
You can also browse by product categories such as cosmetic and personal care products, household and cleaning products, and companion animal products. From there, many drop-down options are also available: body, face, makeup, hair, etc.
Crueltyfree.peta.org
Peta’s website allows you to search for any company that makes cosmetics, personal-care products, etc., and will tell you if they are cruelty-free or not.
They also have premade lists of companies that do and don’t test on animals, and “companies working for regulatory change.”
And ways you can filter cruelty-free products available by country/region and cruelty-free companies by product type.
They even have an app for it too! (Available on iPhone and Android)
Ulta
Ulta offers a no-worry shopping experience! They are a cruelty-free brand themselves. They don’t test on animals, they don’t sell products that are tested on animals, and they don’t sell their products where animal testing is required by law!
Here are some brands/products that I think are pretty popular and are tested on animals:
| Band-Aid (Johnson & Johnson) | Clorox | L’Oreal | Sephora Cosmetics |
| Cetaphil | Command (3M) (the hooks) | M.A.C. Cosmetics | Target Brand |
| CeraVe | Crest | Maybelline | Trojan |
| Chapstick (made by Pfizer) | Febreze | Post-It (3M) | Walgreens Brand |
So far, as of July 2021, seven states in the U.S. have banned animal testing: California, Nevada, Illinois, Maine, Hawaii, Virginia, Maryland. There are also four states that currently have pending bans on animal testing: New Jersey, New York, Oregon, and Rhode Island.
There are many other ways to test products without animal endangerment, so hopefully the number of states that have bans increases, and we can finally end the unnecessary cruelty!