Spring! Awash in Greenwashing

How the beauty industry hides behind eco-friendly marketing while propping up fossil fuels

Greenwashing (n.): The act of misleading consumers into believing a company’s products are environmentally friendly, when they’re anything but.

Spring Is a Time for Renewal—But Also for Calling Out the BS

Spring invites us to take stock, reset, and make different choices. But in a world driven by convenience and consumption, it’s easy to overlook the true cost of those choices—especially in cosmetics.

The beauty industry, despite its focus on surface-level aesthetics, is deeply entangled in unsustainable practices. This blog dives into the ugly reality of fossil fuel capitalism and its quiet but dominant grip on the products we use every day.

Did you know the five biggest fossil fuel companies earned over $200 billion in profits last year alone?

Where Zero BS Stands

Let’s be clear—we’re not environmental saints. Zero BS has a carbon footprint. But we’re doing everything we can to keep the fossil fuel industry out of our:

• Products

• Production line

• Packaging

We:

• Wrap our soap in biodegradable cellophane

• Use cardboard merchandising stands

• Reuse recycled paper and bubble wrap where possible

• Use food-grade, biodegradable, petroleum-free ingredients

This might sound like greenwashing. Some might call us hypocrites—after all, our main ingredient is tallow, which comes from cattle. And cattle farming, when done irresponsibly, can be a major contributor to emissions, deforestation, and ecological damage.

But here’s where the nuance matters.

Factory Farming ≠ Regenerative Farming

We don’t source from feedlots or industrial farms. Our tallow is made from certified grass-fed, free-range cattle. Here's why that matters:

• Grass-fed cattle produce less methane than GMO corn- and soya-fed cattle

• Natural pastures mean no deforestation for feed crops

• Regenerative grazing practices rebuild soil health, which sequesters carbon and can offset emissions—making it a potential carbon-negative system

And most importantly, our tallow comes from suet—the hard fat surrounding the kidneys. It’s a by-product of the meat industry. It would otherwise be wasted.

The Dirty Swap: Tallow Out, Palm Oil In

Once prized in foods like Christmas puddings, pastries, and even Oreo cookies, suet has been quietly removed from ingredient lists—mostly due to pressure from the vegan movement.

What replaced it?
Palm oil.

And palm oil, while technically “plant-based,” is a leading driver of deforestation, species extinction, and climate destruction. It’s also used extensively in the cosmetics industry under names that don’t always say “palm.” It gets a free pass.

Enter Stage Left: Greenwashing. A Wolf in Eco-Friendly Clothing

Fossil fuel giants and cosmetics brands alike have mastered the art of deception.
They show you lush forests and buzzwords like green, eco, and natural. But they don’t show you the petroleum-derived ingredients hidden behind scientific names.

Did you know that an estimated 85% of cosmetic ingredients are sourced from the fossil fuel industry?

The Hidden Petrochemicals in Your “Natural” Products

Here’s what to watch out for:

• Mineral oil, paraffin, tissue oils, petrolatum, paraffinum liquidum – all petroleum by-products

• Nylon 66 – used by brands like L’Oréal, Kiehl’s, and The Body Shop for “silky texture”; it’s a plastic

• Synthetic vitamins (E, K, A, C) – often derived from petroleum

• Glycerin – supposedly “vegetable-based,” but often manufactured using plant matter, animal fats, and petroleum, then bleached and chemically refined

Even in products marketed as “eco,” these ingredients slip through under misleading labels.

I’ve Seen It Firsthand

When we first manufactured our products at a well-respected cosmetics facility (which produced for many so-called eco brands), I saw trucks arrive—not with clean ingredients, but with barrels of petroleum gel. Supplied by SASOL.

One day, a man from the Johnson & Johnson factory in the Eastern Cape told me they were making 90,000 units per day, 360 days a year. That’s 275 million litres of product annually—mostly petroleum gel.

All that? Eventually washed down our drains. Into our rivers. Into our oceans. Back into our bodies.

The Petroleum Industrial Complex: Who Cleans Up the Mess?

They made $200 billion in profits last year.
But who’s left to deal with the pollution, the microplastics, the hormone disruptors, the skin issues?

To put that number in perspective:
200 billion seconds = 6,400 years.
That takes us back to the Neolithic Age—which is exactly where the fossil fuel industry is dragging us, if we let them.

So What Can You Do?

You don’t have to be an activist. But you can:

• Read your labels

• Learn ingredient aliases (especially fossil-fuel derivatives)

• Ask questions

• Choose companies that take responsibility

• Call out greenwashing on social media

• Support transparency and regenerative supply chains

We may not be perfect, but we’re trying. And we’re committed to evolving. We can’t undo the past—but we can forge a more honest, regenerative future.

Let’s unmask the truth.
Let’s stop letting big beauty off the hook.
Let’s reject greenwashing—one product at a time.