{"id":7072,"date":"2026-11-15T01:24:42","date_gmt":"2026-11-15T01:24:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/?p=7072"},"modified":"2026-11-15T01:24:42","modified_gmt":"2026-11-15T01:24:42","slug":"the-clean-beauty-illusion-are-cosmetic-brands-misleading-consumers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/?p=7072","title":{"rendered":"The Clean Beauty Illusion: Are Cosmetic Brands Misleading Consumers?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Esther Egunyomi<\/em><\/p>\n

Associate Editor<\/em><\/p>\n

Loyola University Chicago School of Law, JD 2028<\/em><\/p>\n

Walk into Sephora or scroll through TikTok, and you\u2019ll probably come across a beauty product marketed as clean, natural, or non-toxic. The clean designation has become such a powerful marketing tool that it\u2019s now one of the key features people look f<\/a>or when buying beauty products. However, there is no standardized definition for the term\u2013clean, which creates opportunities for misleading advertisements. The Cosmetic Industry has much freedom when it comes to promoting its products. The use of descriptive terminology allows cosmetic<\/a> companies to appeal to consumer tastes; however, this freedom does not mean that cosmetic companies are free from responsibility for the expectations created by the claims made in advertising. While cosmetic companies should have flexibility in marketing their products, that flexibility should not eliminate accountability for the expectations their claims create. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC)<\/a> emphasizes that advertisers are responsible for both express and implied claims.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

The regulatory gap behind clean beauty products<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) regulates cosmetic labeling under the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act<\/a>, yet federal regulators have failed to establish a uniform cosmetic definition for the term\u2013clean. The FDA merely instructs<\/a>cosmetic companies that any marketing claims made must be truthful and not misleading. Additionally, the FDA has explicitly stated it does not have a definition for the cosmetic labeling term natural. As a result, companies are left to develop their own standards<\/a> for what qualifies as a clean or natural<\/a> beauty product, creating inconsistent expectations across the industry and giving certain market participants the appearance of a safer product without any objective evidence to support it.<\/p>\n

In conformance with the FDA\u2019s guidance, the Federal Trade Commission\u2019s (FTC) Health Products Compliance Guidelines<\/a> explain that advertisers must possess an adequate basis for their objective claims, whether they are explicit or implied. As explained in the FTC\u2019s Health Products Compliance Guidance, health-related safety claims<\/a> generally require competent and reliable scientific evidence. Accordingly, companies suggesting their products are healthier or safer must consider whether those impressions are scientifically supported.<\/p>\n

Finster v. Sephora<\/em><\/strong>: when clean becomes misleading<\/strong><\/p>\n

These concerns emerged in Finster v. Sephora USA, Inc.,<\/em><\/a> where a proposed class of consumers challenged Sephora\u2019s \u201cClean at Sephora\u201d program. The named plaintiff, Lindsay Finster, alleged that Sephora misled consumers by marketing products as clean despite containing<\/a> synthetic ingredients allegedly associated with irritation or harm.<\/p>\n

Sephora maintained that its \u201cClean at Sephora\u201d designation<\/a> reflected compliance with Sephora\u2019s own ingredient-exclusion criteria, rather than a guarantee that products were entirely natural or free from all potentially harmful ingredients. In March 2024, the Northern<\/a> District of New York dismissed the complaint with leave to amend, finding that the plaintiff had not plausibly alleged deception under the applicable consumer protection standards.<\/p>\n

Although the court\u2019s decision<\/a> favored Sephora, the case reveals a broader regulatory issue: companies\u2019 unrestricted discretion in defining \u201cclean\u201d has left some consumers interpreting the term as a promise of enhanced safety. Retailers should be permitted to establish ingredient standards, but those standards should be communicated clearly rather than obscured by broad marketing terminology.<\/p>\n

Moving beyond marketing buzzwords<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Finster <\/em>decision demonstrates why cosmetic companies should establish compliance procedures before advertising products as clean, natural, or non-toxic. But under the FTC\u2019s advertising substantiation principles<\/a>, companies must also evaluate what reasonable consumers understand from their advertisements rather than relying exclusively on their intended message. To reduce the risk of misleading consumers and promote greater transparency in clean beauty marketing, cosmetic companies should adopt five practices that clarify their advertising claims and strengthen consumer trust.<\/p>\n

First, companies should establish clear definitions for marketing terms such as \u201cclean.\u201d Brands should explain what the term means under their own standards by identifying the specific ingredients or product characteristics that qualify a product for the designation. Greater specificity could reduce consumer confusion while promoting transparency. Additionally, companies should only make safety claims if backed by reliable scientific evidence. Companies should safely store any documentation supporting their safety representations. Furthermore, compliance departments should review marketing materials, packaging, websites, advertisements, and influencer endorsements before they\u2019re published, evaluating each product for misleading implications. Moreover, companies must distinguish advertising compliance from product safety obligations. Satisfying federal oversight requirements should not be the basis on which to promote a products safety. If all market participants are mandated to meet certain consumer safety requirements, then a competitor should not suffer a marketing disadvantage simply because they failed to state the required testing all comparable products underwent. Finally, companies should regularly audit their representations, train marketing teams, and document internal reviews. Such practices can help companies identify potential deception before it results in litigation or regulatory enforcement.<\/p>\n

At a minimum, clean beauty marketing should convey to consumers verifiable product characteristics rather than an undefined marketing strategy. Furthermore, it should force companies to compete through product quality, innovation, and transparency rather than ambiguous safety implications. While cosmetic companies should retain flexibility in how they market their products, that flexibility must be balanced with accountability for the expectations their claims create among consumers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Walk into Sephora or scroll through TikTok, and you\u2019ll probably come across a beauty product marketed as clean, natural, or non-toxic. The clean designation has become such a powerful marketing tool that it\u2019s now one of the key features people look for when buying beauty products. However, there is no standardized definition for the term\u2013clean, which creates opportunities for misleading advertisements. The Cosmetic Industry has much freedom when it comes to promoting its products. The use of descriptive terminology allows cosmetic companies to appeal to consumer tastes; however, this freedom does not mean that cosmetic companies are free from responsibility for the expectations created by the claims made in advertising. While cosmetic companies should have flexibility in marketing their products, that flexibility should not eliminate accountability for the expectations their claims create. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) emphasizes that advertisers are responsible for both express and implied claims.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":191,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7072","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ftc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/191"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7072"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7072\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7073,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7072\/revisions\/7073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.luc.edu\/compliance\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}