Socially Conscious Spending

@violadavis

After I wrote my last post, I kept thinking about how this fight against systemic racism,  racial injustice and racial inequity is just beginning and it requires ongoing action for the paradigm shift to gain momentum and keep moving in the right direction. Hashtag activism only does so much. True allyship must be active and cannot be fulfilled by just signing petitions, making donations and bringing awareness. As I said before, change can only come about with a movement, not a moment and works needs to be done offline. One easy and impactful way to support the cause is by directing our consumer dollars towards black owned brands and pulling support from brands that aren't inclusive.

Something I've been doing for awhile is to be intentional, mindful and socially conscious with the brands that I support as well as those which I work with and share on this blog. Ever since Dove released this racist ad depicting a black model turning herself white I have boycotted the brand and passed on working with them. To be honest, I think their products are garbage anyway. Same with Tarte ever since their racist meme incident which was further justified by the limited shade range of their foundation. This eyeshadow palette went right into the trash and I haven't looked back. I've been told that this is a little harsh but you know what there are enough brands in the beauty space that I can avoid ones that don't have ethical/racist business practices. This is important to me and being able to this helps me sleep better at night.

I haven't really talked about how I work with brands here before but I can tell you that whenever a brand approaches me, I will always do a little research on them and their brand and business practices to make sure they align with my values before making a decision. Going forward I will do my best to support more black owned brands as well as those which are are diverse and inclusive. Socially conscious spending is a small and easy way to help bridge racial inequity and if enough people do this, it can facilitate change. I mean our wallets do wield power in a consumer market. I'm going to do this in addition to continue listening, learning and being an advocate. I realize that this is a lifestyle blog but it's also place where I've talked about what's going in the world and I plan to continue doing both.

@themommonalitymrkt

Here are some Black Owned Brands in the Beauty Space to support:
Uoma Beauty - Pronounced OMA, this contemporary, prestige and culturally irreverent ‘Afropolitan’ beauty brand looks to empower all of those who have felt left out by beauty by offering an inclusive range of shades
Briogeo - I'm a big fan of this hair care brand founded by Nancy Twine. Their Scalp Revival range and the Don't Despair, Repair! Deep Conditioning Mask are favorites.
Organic Bath Co - Upon discovering that women and particularly women of color are marketed toxic personal care products, this brand made a commitment to creating a straightforward, unisex bath and body line using nothing unnecessary, harmful or synthetic.
Golde – This independent Brooklyn born brand founded by a mother and daughter team offers a range  uperfood-boosted essentials for health and beauty including facial masks and wellness latte blends.
Serumize - The small batch skincare company centers around serums designed to deliver high concentrations of specific active ingredients to the skin.
UnSun Cosmetics - Katonya Breaux founded this brand in 2016 in response to the lack of options in the world of clean sunscreen products for women of color. Unsun Cosmetics product are clean, no-residue options that are safe for your skin as well as the environment.
Black Girl Sunscreen - This company offers a lightweight, moisturizing sunscreen that provides broad spectrum protection without any pesky streaky white residue.
Beneath Your Mask - Organic, handcrafted serums, scrubs and moisturizers made with potent, non-toxic ingredients to treat skin and hair.
JELN - This Toronto-based, self-care line is focused on natural beauty based on natural herbs/medicine and gentle healing.
Hanahana Beauty - An all-natural, skincare wellness brand with a mission to empower women of color with 100% handcrafted all natural products made with shea butter sourced from the Katariga (Suglo) Cooperative in Tamale, Ghana at 2x the fair trade rate.
The Healing Place Apothecary - This line of natural skincare is rooted in holistic rituals and healing botanicals from Asia, Africa, and the Americas.
Himistry - This range of quality men’s skincare offers solutions to men’s most common grooming issues with specialized systems that target specific conditions.
Piper Wai - Redefining the future of clean everyday essentials with their line natural, cruelty-free personal care products.
Range Beauty - High performance, clean beauty foundation for every shade made with high quality ingredients.
The Lip Bar - This vegan and cruelty-free beauty brand features an inclusive shade range.
Gold Label Cosmetics - This New York based company creates cruelty-free, paraben-free color cosmetics for the beauty enthusiast who seeks opulence and convenience.
Laws Of Nature Cosmetics - This safely formulated cosmetic line is shade inclusive and made with clean ingredients suitable for all skin types and conditions.
Coloured Raine - This makeup brand was built on a mission to spread awareness of diversity through beauty and to embrace all aspects of color through unity
Beauty Bakerie -  This cruelty-free, vegan cosmetics company offers a range of smudge-proof makeup centered around a bakery theme.
Mented Cosmetics - A range of vegan, paraben-free, non-toxic and cruelty free cosmetics made with an inclusive range of shades.
Iman Cosmetics - The legend of the modeling world was also pioneer in the beauty when she created her POC focused cosmetic line in 1994
Pat McGrath Labs - This luxe makeup is created by one of the most renowned makeup artists in the beauty industry.
Glamfro - This Houston based  nail polish range is 10-free (meaning it’s free of the 10 major potentially harmful ingredients in nail polish, such as formaldehyde, parabens, acetone, and animal byproducts), vegan line of nail polish, remover (which is soy-based and acetone-free), and top coats.

The PullUpOrShutUp Campaign launched by Uoma Beauty founder Sharon Chuter on June 3 called on “all brands that have released a statement of support” for Black Lives Matter to “publicly release within the next 72 hours the number of black employees they have at their organizations” at the corporate and executive level. “You can’t say Black lives matter publicly when you don’t show us Black lives matter within your homes and your organizations.” Beyond employing diverse staffs, companies are also being called to address their corporate culture and policies to ensure that minority employees have fair opportunities for success as well as influence at their companies. This campaign also called on consumers to refrain from buying products from those brands until they respond. Brands have been responding and you can find that information at @pullupforchange. See how your favorite brands stack up and how they plan to move forward.

@rankandstyle

In looking at the information shared by various beauty brands, it's obvious that there some that clearly need to do better. As consumers, we have the power to support those that promote diversity and inclusion and also to not support those companies that discriminate against minorities. We also need to discern those who are merely trying to profit off the cause like L’Oréal, the brand made a post last week saying that it stands in solidarity with the Black community and is “making a commitment” to the NAACP before it was quickly revealed that their actions don't back their words when an incident in 2017 resurfaced. L’Oréal Paris UK hired model and DJ Munroe Bergdorf to appear in a foundation campaign. When Bergdorf spoke out denouncing systemic racism and expressing frustration with the lack of understanding in response to the Unite the Right white supremacist rally in Virginia she was fired with L’Oréal reason being Bergdorf’s post was “at odds” with the brand’s values of “diversity and tolerance towards all people irrespective of their race, background, gender and religion.” These actions are in clear contradiction to their recent statement not to mention L’Oréal was sued by an employee for racial discrimination and a toxic work environment in 2018. Many are calling the company out for their hollow support for their unfair treatment of Bergdorf for which they still have not apologized for or acknowledged and what makes it worse is that they did not fire Amber Heard, a white woman, when her abusive behavior towards Johnny Depp came to light. And the brand also cancelled a concert featuring HK singer Denise Ho, an outspoken democracy activist who participated the Occupy protests, for fear of losing business in mainland China. L’Oréal's lack of principles already had me avoiding their products and in light of this incident where they are trying to profit off racism after vilifying a black woman. I will be boycotting L’Oréal and all of their brands entirely because I'm sickened by their actions and I'd prefer my money go towards brands that don't throw someone under the bus for speaking out against racism while employing a racist who engages in domestic abuse. Plus they're still testing on animals and lying about it. They are a major player in the beauty industry and they need to do better. Here is a list of all the brands under their umbrella, if you're inclined to do the same. I do currently use a few of these brands but will not be supporting them or working with them anymore going forward. If you go to Twitter and type in the hashtag #boycottloreal, you’ll see that this is a real movement and I’m not the only one doing it.

Just like supporting black owned and inclusive companies, not supporting brands that are not inclusive and/or have racist business practices is an easy and impactful way to support the anti-racism movement and drive racial equity within the beauty industry. Companies can pledge to do better and they must be held accountable to do so but some will only change when their bottom line is being affected. However you choose to support the movement is up to you and there are many ways to help but socially conscious spending are also forms of activism and allyship. I plan to personally support more black owned brands and will make an effort to feature them more on the blog in my gift guides and other round ups as well. Collectively our actions contribute to change for the better but that starts with an individual commitment to our own actions and intentions.

Another way to help along these lines is to sign the 15 Percent Pledge, that calls on major retailers to pledge 15% of their shelf space to Black-owned businesses.

Do you engage in socially conscious spending?

This post does not contain affiliate links. I wanted to show support for these brands by linking directly to them.