Scrubbing Out Sea Life
Exfoliating plastic beads feel good—unless you live in the ocean.
Not all exfoliants contain plastic. Many products are available that use salt, pumice, or ground up seeds to do the same job without the environmental cost—like Burt's Bees Deep Pore Scrub (finely ground peach stones) or St. Ives Apricot Scrub (apricot kernels). So why doesn't Olay? "I'm a firm believer that just because it's natural doesn't mean it's benign," Gooch says. That's undeniably true. It's also true that just because it's advertised using tranquil ocean imagery doesn't mean it's good for marine life.
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Hillary Rosner is the co-author, with David Bach, of Go Green, Live Rich.
Photographs of: Olay Body Wash Plus Spa Exfoliating Ribbons © 2008 Olay; a sea otter on Slate's home page by Yoshikazu Tsuno/AFP/Getty Images.