WHY I AM NO LONGER CRUELTY FREE!

This will be a very awkward post and I am not looking forward to write it, but it has to be done! As many of you know: more than 3.5 years ago (exactly in May of 2014), I switched to buying only cruelty free cosmetics, but I have changed my opinion on that and I will tell you today, why!

OK, you have to understand, that it is not that easy to find out, which brands are cruelty free and which ones are not. I wish, we could just all rely on the list of the Leaping Bunny, but to be honest: if I would only buy from brands that are Leaping Bunny certified, I would feel really, really limited! 

And I really wonder:

WHY ARE SO MANY BRANDS THAT SAY THEY ARE CRUELTY FREE NOT ON THE LEAPING BUNNY LIST?!?

Usually people assume, that it costs too much to be Leaping Bunny certified. 

But here is the clue: 

It’s totally FREE!!! to apply and become certified by the Leaping Bunny Program!!!

DID YOU HEAR THAT? IT IS FREE!

Companies are also included in the shopping guide (online and print) for free! That is like free advertising! 

However, if a company chooses to use the Leaping Bunny logo on their products, there is a one-time fee. This is completely optional and not required in order to be certified by Leaping Bunny.

So, I am asking again: 

WHY ARE SO MANY BRANDS THAT SAY THEY ARE CRUELTY FREE NOT ON THE LEAPING BUNNY LIST?!?

OK, so you might wonder now yourself, why are these companies not on the list? Maybe it takes too long?

Wrong again. It usually takes about one week, if the company provides all the necessary information regarding their supplier/manufacturer chain. It does not take years, as some companies claim!!!

So there you go! I have absolutely no clue, why companies claim to be cruelty free, but choose not to be on the Leaping Bunny list. It makes just no sense from an ethical point of view. It could be so easy and simple if we all could just rely on one list! 

I can only imagine that they don´t do it because they are actually hoping to expand at some point into countries where animal testing is required by law- so they might think: "Why should I apply and waste my time, if I am soon probably not cruelty free anymore as my business is growing."

You see: The retail trade revenue of cosmetics in China grew from 19.5 billion yuan in March 2016 to 21.49 billion yuan in March 2017, so these businesses want a piece of that cake!

Also: A brand that is cruelty free today, might change tomorrow! 

If brands decide to sell in China, they are no longer considered cruelty free, because China requires animal testing on cosmetics by law. Since I switched to cruelty free cosmetics in May 2014, many companies changed their cruelty free status because of this! 

2 recent examples are Nars and Lipstick Queen, who both decided to sell in China to maximize their profit. So, they are no longer cruelty free!

So here I am: promoting their stuff and spending my money on these brands- only to find out a couple month later, that they are no longer cruelty free. 

So at the end I was supporting a brand, that actually did not really care to be cruelty free- it just happened to be a cruelty free brand- but not in a "planned and intended way", you know what I mean? They have a choice! They don´t have to go to China, but they want to! So they don´t care to be cruelty free at all!

Above: The 2 reasons to test on animals: toxic ingredients or to maximize profit

Brands don´t know what their supplier is doing

And then there are brands, that say that they are cruelty free, but they can´t testify if their suppliers are. These are considered "grey area brands"- nobody really knows, how to feel about this. I wrote my thoughts about this here.

Brands that are owned by companies that are not cruelty free!

My biggest problem are brands, that are owned by a company that is not cruelty free. Let´s take for example Loreal, who owns countless brands. Some of them are still considered cruelty free, such as: Urban Decay, The Body Shop or Nyx, but most are not considered cruelty free. This gets really complicated here, but at the end, if I buy something from Nyx, my money still lands in Loreal´s hands!

Now I could make of course the decision to not trust companies that are owned by a company that is not cruelty free- however: then I would feel REALLY limited in the choices I have!!!

Loreal bought recently also IT Cosmetics and Estee Lauder bought Too Faced and Becca. That means, if I still buy from these brands, my money anyway lands in the hands of Loreal and Estee Lauder! 

I decided for myself that I feel like a hypocrite, if I am preaching cruelty free living, if I anyway still buy from brands that are owned by a company that is not cruelty free. 

If I want to be true to myself and choose only "REAL CRUELTY FREE", that would mean for me that I would only trust the Leaping Bunny certified brands, but that list is really limited.

I have to say, when I switched to cruelty free cosmetic in 2014, I was very naive for 2 reasons: 

1. I thought people might follow my example (which nobody really did)

2. I thought this whole stupid animal testing has to end any time soon: it seems so medieval to me. But you know what? Here I am, more than 3 years later and NOTHING has changed. 

And to be quiet honest, I believe that: 

AS LONG AS CHINA EXISTS, THERE WILL BE ANIMAL TESTING!

And it does not look like China "goes away" in the future, right, lol.

Anyway, this is where I am right now: I will no longer be covering only cruelty free cosmetic on my blog.

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